BleepingComputer.com: Can't start computer hal.dll missing or corrupt?

okay, downloading the program to backup before continuing.

Thanks so much for being so patient with me, though I have a slightly off question now.

I was wondering if this whatever it is renamed the boot.ini file boot.old, and that's why the computer can't find it. Just a thought.

Once again, thank you for all your help!

dragonfall1221

I'm not sure but my understanding is that if Windows cannot find the boot.ini file it will create a new one. So I do not think that a missing boot.ini file will prevent Windows from starting.

okay. just wondering

fixmbr didn't work. I used the command and it said that the new master boot was created successfully, but when I restarted it went back to the black screen of death. I think I'm just gonna go ahead and use the PC recovery option and get a fresh start on everything. At least with the program you directed me to I don't have to lose all my documents (I'm a writer, and losing that stuff would have killed me). Thank you for trying so hard to help me.

dragonfall1221

I had a feeling it would come to this. But hopefully you will be able to backup your documents before doing the recovery.

yeah. The only problem now is that I can't access PC Recovery. f10 does nothing (while for some strange reason f8 still works). I tried to reinstall from the disk I made, but it says it can't find the EULA agreement and shuts down. Am I going to have to spend $$$ now to go get a windows XP disk to install?


EDIT

Nevermind, I was able to use UBUNTU to make the Recovery Drive the bootable drive and make the C drive nonbootable. I love that program!

This post has been edited by dragonfall1221: 04 January 2010 - 10:50 PM