I am using WIN XP professional on Compaq nc 8230 laptop,as soon as i boot my laptop there is this error " ntldr file is missing, press ctrl+atl+del to restart but after every restart the same error message appears,when i try to repair WIN XP from Win XP setup CD,it asks for 'administrator password' which i dont have, so is there anyway that i can access my DOS mode & copy the files needed into WIN XP directory ? Please i need help ASAP in the matter. !!! P.S : My laptop doesnt support USB flash drive boot up .
If you are talking about Safe mode then u need to reboot laptop and keep pressing f8 when the laptop boots up and also look here for a possible fix to the issue.
Also, when you are asked for the Admin password, if you didn't have a password set, you simply leave it blank and just hit enter. If you're still not able to access it/back up your info this way, you can always get an external enclosure, remove the laptop HD and hook it up to another computer using the enclosure to first backup everything before you reinstall XP
And to get into your admin account you need to press alt ctrl del on your user name account screen where u type a password to get into the admin side of it.
Little late post but anyways.... Insert the Windows XP bootable CD into the computer. When prompted to press any key to boot from the CD, press any key. Once in the Windows XP setup menu press the "R" key to repair Windows. Log into your Windows installation by pressing the "1" key and pressing enter. You will then be prompted for your administrator password, enter that password. Copy the below two files to the root directory of the primary hard disk. In the below example we are copying these files from the CD-ROM drive letter, which in this case is "e." This letter may be different on your computer. copy e:\i386\ntldr c:\ copy e:\i386\ntdetect.com c:\ Once both of these files have been successfully copied, remove the CD from the computer and reboot.
He still needs to go into bios to change the boot order i'am not gonna tell him how to do this because if he presses the wrong thing in bios then his laptop may never boot up again.
