windows only loads with cd in drive

thefishdude · 1 Sep 2008 at 22:05

ok pc was running fine. installed new gfx card weekend and monitor drivers are only changes i made. tonight was playing a game and pc crashed i restarted the pc but no image soo had to power down and then back on again to get display. but it came up with error

error loading os

tried some reboots same message.

i dint have much on pc soo just reinstalled windows. reinstall has gone fine everything working but if i take the windows cd out of the drive i get that message again..

please help never seen this happen before ? im on *** pc now and all works fine just wont boot with out the cd in drive

rpstewart · 1 Sep 2008 at 22:24

What has the BIOS boot priority reset itself to?

thefishdude · 1 Sep 2008 at 22:54

i have made it hdd first and then cd rom but also tried it cdrom then hdd does exactly same thing.

oldbag · 1 Sep 2008 at 22:56

I reckon your boot.ini file needs editing to set the right boot drive.

thefishdude · 1 Sep 2008 at 23:09

how do i do that ?

thefishdude · 1 Sep 2008 at 23:16

ok looked it up om microsoft site and it gave an example of a boot in for winxp install wich is what i have

[boot loader]
timeout=30
default=multi(0)disk(0)rdisk(0)partition(1)\WINDOWS
[operating systems]
multi(0)disk(0)rdisk(0)partition(1)\WINDOWS="Microsoft Windows XP Professional" /fastdetect

now this is my one

[boot loader]
timeout=30
default=multi(0)disk(0)rdisk(0)partition(1)\WINDOWS
[operating systems]
multi(0)disk(0)rdisk(0)partition(1)\WINDOWS="Microsoft Windows XP Professional" /noexecute=optin /fastdetect

mine has an extra bit, noexecute=optin
does that mean anything can anyway else check there xp pro install to compare

edit* looked it up its line that was added with sp2 lol so its not that

oldbag · 1 Sep 2008 at 23:21

What's with the spaces between WINDOW and S? Or is that a cut and past glitch?

sid · 1 Sep 2008 at 23:22

This is classic case of having more than 1 hdd installed and windows has chosen to install the bootloader on the wrong hdd i'm afriad so you need to select that one possibly or reinstall windows with the only 1 hdd

thefishdude · 2 Sep 2008 at 00:08

yeah cut ans paste glitch.

is there anyway to check bootloader is on wrong drive ? how do i select it ?

and yes i have 3 drives windows is installed on the one i wanted b ut dont know how to check this bootloader thing

thefishdude · 2 Sep 2008 at 00:22

ok solved it cheers

i new i had the boot order set hdd-cd-flopy but something you said about multiple drives got me thinking. so owent into bios was submenu bit in there were you selected order of hdd and my os drive was set as last changed it to first and it worked