So heres how it all started. I would usually be using my zune software for music and the computer would just turn off at random times. It got real bad and the more i restarted to computer the quicker it would shut off. So i saved all my stuff on an external and tried to reformatt from the drive. Then when it was almost done the computer would shut down. So then i tried a full reformatt from the cd and the same thing happens. At the very end it shuts off and now when i try to start it i get this message....

NTLDR is Missing
Press CTRL ALT Del to restart.


Is my hd shot? What can i do?

Read through this article:

http://www.computerhope.com/issues/ch000465.htm

This may or may not resolve the original issue that your computer shuts down randomly. I would assume that this may be an overheating problem which would cause this symptom.

There's several things that could be causing this - the most common being that the Boot Sector on your drive cannot locate NTLDR.

I'd suggest first running a free, bootable diagnostic from the hard drive manufacturer's website.

If the drive tests good, then I'd suggest booting from your XP installation CD an entering the Recovery Console: http://www.bleepingcomputer.com/tutorials/tutorial117.html

Once in there, type each of the following commands exactly as they appear, and press Enter after each one. Answer Y and press Enter for the prompts that appear.

chkdsk /r

fixmbr

fixboot

I had a similar problem sometime back after I unknowingly deleted a system file (maybe NTDETECT) from C drive. douglas martin's link of computerhope's tutorial rescued me. I suggest you try the same, and turn on hide system files from folder options if you've got it turned on to make sure system files dont get deleted.