NTLDR is missing

Was tryin to reformat an old computer and then sell it:

HP Pavillion 4453
AMD-K6-2/380
64MB SDRAM
6.4 GB HD

It originally had Win 98, hubby upgraded to Win XP, I was trying to get it back to Win 98 so I could give the buyer the disks that came with it. I put in the system recovery disk, and got an error message saying hard drive couldn't be read, needed to be re-initialized using Fdisk. I went into Fdisk (unfortunately, I should have stopped right there and come and asked for help) and went through virtually every available option, backing out and trying again to reformat. Each time, it would start the reformat, and it would stop after a few minutes with the error message "Warning- Recover ran out of disk space while recovering files".

When I would try to start the computer w/o the recovery disk, it gave me the error message "Invalid system disk- replace and then press any key".

The Partition Info displayed was:
Partition Status Type Vol. Lable Mbytes System Usage
1 NTFS 6150 100%
C:2 A Pri Dos HP_Pavillion 7 FAT12

After trying everything, I read somewhere that I needed to make the first partition the primary dos, and set it as active, so I tried to do that by deleting the 1st partition, the NTFS one, and that left:
Partition Status Type Vol. Lable Mbytes System Usage
C:2 A Pri Dos HP_Pavillion 7 FAT12

So...that's where I stopped, I figured I'd done enough damage messing around, and now when I try to start the comp I get the error message "NTLDR is missing, ctr-alt-del to Restart". And I have no clue what else to try, or how to undo what I did.

Any help, suggestions would be greatly appreciated. I'm in way over my head. *s

Val

 

i can maybe help u with the NTDLR part. i spent a whiole day trying to install xp last week and kept getting that message. turned out that its something to do with the cd drives. well in my case, the pc card i have (raid controller) expansion for other drives. when i plugged my cd drives into the motherboard controller it worked. are u using an expansion card? if so try a different controller.

 

"Invalid system disk" errors during formatting can be very tricky.

You need to delete all partitions, that includes primary and any extended ones.

Then just create a primary one, format and install.

 

laserbrain- thanks, but no expansion cards. The cd drive seems to be working since it's reading the recovery disk still, so hopefully I didn't mess that up. *s

insomniac- I'll try that. I got no data to lose so no big deal there. Hopefully, that will do it. Just to be on the safe side, any chance you or someone could give me some more specific steps? Like, go to fdisk, then create new partition, and make it the primary dos and active?

Thanks for the help,

Val

 

No one is going to be able to help you any more than your computer screen.

You just need to make the right selection or it can get very frustrating going around in circles.

As I said, delete any Primary Partition/s and then delete any Extended Partitions till there is nothing left, then create just one Primary Partition which you can use to install Windows.

If you have the Windows 98 CD you can also try it with that if it makes you more comfortable.

Set the Bios to boot from CD as the first device, and reboot with the 98 CD in the drive. (same procedure as XP)

Then just follow the prompts to format and install. If not, then you will have to use fdisk above.

If neither works, you can try using a utility from the hard drive manufacturers site, or a third party tool like Partition Magic, but one of the above methods should work if done correctly.

Good luck.