Disk Boot Failure

First off, you need to check the BIOS, first to check the boot order (A,C,CD. C,A,CD) There are many options. I usually use A, C, CD. If you have a A (floppy) drive you need a boot disk matching the type of floppy drive. Most common is C, CD, A. Meaning it will try to boot from the C drive first, then the CD, then the floppy. If it can't find a boot track on any device it should move on to the next selection as chosen. You should select automatic drive selection so that the C drive will be selected by the BIOS.

DO CHANGE THE PREFERENCE OF BOOTING FROM THE BIOS.
IF THIS DOES'NT SOLVE THEN CHECK UP THAT WHEN U BOOT THERES NO FLOPPY INSERTED IN THE FLOOPY DISK.
AND IF THE PROBLEM PERSISTS THEN WHILE U INSTALL THE XP NO PROBLEM OCCURS.COZ IF NY PROBLEM OCCURS WHILE INSTALLATION THEN THERE R CHANCES THAT THESE TYPE OF PROBLES EXIST.

I just discovered that my c drive is not showing as being actitve, it just says "system". My d drive is showing as being active. How do I make my c drive active using winXP pro? might that be my prolem?

If you are using XP this should not be a problem but if you have an older MB this may help. Go in to your BIOS and set it to boot to floppy. You will need a Win98 boot disk for this, it is every where on the web. Boot to the floppy and after it loads type fdisk. This will let you create partitions, delete partitions, set active partitions. That is where you can set an active partition.
But if you are using XP the active partition should be set, unless you have a virus, trojan or your computer is faulty.
Start your computer with the XP CD and do a repair to see if that fixes your problem.

I would first suggest that you download a HDD testing utility and test the HDD/s to make sure that they are actually working. From your description it sounds as if there is something seriously wrong with your Hardware. Even with XP installed it should boot off any HDD or Partition it doesn't need to be loaded onto the C Drive. The only possible problem here is if you've had XP loaded onto a different Partition or Drive and then either removed the C Drive or partition as there are files written there to point the XP installer to where to look for XP and then set about installing it. Generally speaking you are unable to delete a C Partition or Drive within Windows as there are System Critical Files located there so Windows prevents you deleting this Drive/Partition but if you do this in anything else it will cause Windows to fail to boot and an error message like the one you are describing to appear.

Col

Is this a NTFS or Fat32 Formatted Drive.. Some versions of XP Pro still allowed a Fat32 drive.

What i would try. I would get a windwos 95/98 Boot disk and use FDISK to mark your first partition as active. after exiting out of Fdisk.

Try to reboot once again. In windows XP Command Prompt (if you do a recover when you boot with your windows XP Cd) it will through you into a command prompt only (DOS Screen) In there there is something called bootcfg (Its a boot config Tool) also chkntfs could possibly show you some info needed as well if there is a problem with your C Drive.

Best thing and quickest by far. If you can backup when you can. (If possible that is) try reinstall XP on First partitoin, this should make it active. Even if you have to format the partion. (This may be your only choice in a situation like this) could be a drive problem where the first block has been damaged by power spike or brownout. Or it could easly be a mis matched drive table (the main NTFS Table doesn't match the seconedary Image)

Try to reinstall/reformat and install first.

Any info needed let me know.

Craig

It will only be your problem if XP is on the C Drive/Partition.

If that is the case go into the Device manager Disk Management and set the C Drive to Active. Then reboot and it should be working.