How to stop booting Win XP from my previous hard drive? Solved/Closed

Question

Hi there,

I used to run Windows XP on my Hitachi SATA 160 gb hard drive quite well. As my hard disk got full of files I wanted a new hard drive to be added with it. I added a new 1 tb Hitachi SATA with it. I want XP to be run from a partition of my new hard drive rather than the previous one. Besides, I want to repartition my previous hard drive and make it a single logical drive to work with the new one. I formated & partitioned the new hard drive well and set up XP to my desired drive. After taking a back up of the previous hdd I erased the files in its C drive (all the system files, although a few could not be deleted and the drive could not be formated as this is a bootable drive).

After the system files being deleted in C: of previous hdd when I restarted the computer a message appears "NTLDR is missing Press Ctrl Alt Del to Restart." The system works fine If I detach the previous hdd, however, whenever I attach it the error message appears every time. But, I want the the old hdd to work along with the new one. I have changed the BIOS boot sequence and made the new hdd the first device. However, no result. :( 
Can anyone help me get out of it please?

Zohaib R · Answer

Hi shahjalal2005,

You receive this error message ("NTLDR is missing Press Ctrl Alt Del to restart") when your PC is trying to boot from a non-bootable source. This is the most obvious cause however, there are other causes also. To fix this please ensure that the "Primary Hard Drive" (1 TB Hard Drive which has Operating System) is set as "First Boot Device" in BIOS. If this doesn't fix the issue try connecting the other Hard Drive to another computer and try performing a complete format after backing up the data in it and then check.

Do reply with results.

shahjalal2005 · Answer

Hi Zohaib R,

Thanks for your reply. I updated the BIOS & further change the boot sequence. Boot problem is solved :). Now I can access the old hard drive beside the new one. However, I cannot format the primary drive of the old hdd (few system files are there which I could not delete). How can I delete these files to format it? Which tool should I use to repartition & format the disk and make it a single logical drive?


Thanks,
Shah Jalal

Zohaib R · Answer

Hi Shah Jalal, 

I am glad to know that the boot issue has been fixed. It will be a good idea to delete all the logical partitions and then re-create new partitions in the unallocated space. For this you can use "Disk Management" in Windows XP. Please check the below mentioned link for steps on how to re-partition the drives using "Disk Management": 

https://www.lifewire.com/how-to-partition-a-hard-drive-2626081 

If you receive any error during format/partition using "Disk Management", please reply with the exact text of the error message. Also, I would like to know the specifics of the files you are not able to delete. 

Please do write back to us. 
  
  
Thanks & Regards 
Zohaib R 
#iworkfordell

shahjalal2005 · Answer

Hi Zohaib,

The issue is now totally solved :)

Thanks for your support.


Shah Jalal

Zohaib R · Answer

Hi Shah Jalal,

I am glad to know that the issue has been totally fixed. Please feel free to contact us if you have any further queries.

How to stop booting Win XP from my previous hard drive?

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