just installed windows

[sam510]

hello i had windows vista and i hated it. i dont recommend it to anybody. i have 2 computers 1 emachines 1 hp. i installed windows vista on my emachines and i didnt like it. so i wanted windows xp back but i couldnt install it because it was and older version of windows. so i put the emachines hard drive into the hp 1 so i could format it and install it. i did the new installation option on the windows cd and choose the second hard drive to install it on. it finished installing so i took the hard drive out and put it back into the emachines computer. but now i get this error message when i try to boot with the emachines. the error says "NTLDR is missing Press Ctrl+Alt+Del to restart"how can i fix this problem?? it only boots to windows when i put the hard drive in the hp computer.

[Neil]

When you put it in your hp computer, it was assigned a different driver letter (let's say E) the when you put it back in your new computer, it wen't back to C. You'll need to format and reinstall again in the new computer.

[sam510]

the problem is i cant do that. my hp computer has a messed up cd drive. it wont read / write cds. so thats why i switched it to my emachines computer because that had a working cd drive. is there any other way?

[panboy]

If you do swap HDD's from one computer to another one , there is a MS utility for helping with this  
 
If you put the Drive in the computer that works and run
 
sysprep /dif
or
sysprep /pnp
 
This will turn off all the Drivers for your system , and set windows to do a mini install in the new computer
 
http://support.microsoft.com/kb/838080/
Read this, it tell's you where to find Sysprep and how to use it

[panboy]

Oh, i just Cop'ed some thing..

When you Installed windows , Did you Still have 2 HDD's in the HP computer?
I Suggest , Install it on the HP with only the 1 HDD hooked up, This is Because if the Installer See's a copy of Windows on the Other HDD , it Will configure a Multi Boot, and Not A Standalone Boot, and that will case a problem, after you install it on the HP , Run The Sysprep Program as i said above , and this will Greatly improve the Chance of it working

[Nitro]

Or you could take the cd drive out of the HP and stick it in the emachines, Then everything will be configured correct and then take the cd drive and and stick it back in the HP and do the same?

[sam510]

*censored* it. my friend alreadu came by to pick up the cd. but i copied the files onto my computer. so i can still install it but i only got the files on my hard drive. i dont know what i can do. i need the hp hard drive in the hp computer so i can install windows xp from it. and i cant boot with just the emachines hard drive. its formatted. so i dont know what to do. and i need to fix this asap.

[GX1_Man]

Well each machine needs it's own licensed copy of Windows to be legal, so I think you have more problems than just the CDROM drive. You will also run into problems with activation, etc. shortly. If that copy is already installed on another machine it might affect his as well as yours. Whose CD was this?

[sam510]

this was my friends copy and dont worry i have my cd keys for both systems. its in the back of the computer and it works.

[GX1_Man]

You can try downloading boot CD's from www.bootdisk.com and then running the install from the i386 directory, assuming you have a floppy drive.

[sam510]

ehh no i have no floppy drives on either computers =/

[panboy]

You could make a Boot CD in nero if you have it, Nero can use most Boot floppy images to make a boot CD , and it also comes with its own Nero Dos Version of dos

You can download the Demo of Nero from

http://ahead.nero.com

[GX1_Man]

Just one more example of how a simple floppy drive can simplify your life.

[sam510]

haha another problem. my cd burners dont work =/

[GX1_Man]

You're screwed then!  

You need to make some friends that have a working computer soon.