Oh no...

M

Morox

New Member
I am in a crappy situation here. I split up with my girlfriend recently and prior to that, I took the hard drive from her computer and planned on putting it into mine (we only wanted one desktop in our household). I never did get around to putting it into my computer and now that we have parted ways, she wants her computer back. So, I took her hard drive and placed it back into her computer and when I try to start it up, I get this message:

Windows could not start because the following file is missing or corrupt:
<Windows root> \sytsem32\hall.dll.

Please re-install a copy of the above.

So yeah, I have no idea what's going on here. Her hard drive worked perfectly fine before and I never played around with cables or knocked any loose or anything. When I get into the BIOS, it still recognizes the hard drive. Also, I tried putting the hard drive into my computer (I tested this once and it worked fine) and I get the same message. Any idea on what to do? Here's her specs:

Dell Desktop 2400 (Pentium 4 2.66GHz, 512MB RAM, 80GB HDD, XP Home)
 
Mitch?

Mitch?

banned
If it's a Dell, i'm sure you had a back up CD. Or possibly a back up partition (like 4gb of HDD devoted to restoring the original Windows XP Home). This route, you could just repair windows, and it should allow her to keep at least her files, in a backup somewhere on the hdd, and you'll have to manual set up her account and all that though.
 
M

Morox

New Member
Mitch? said:
If it's a Dell, i'm sure you had a back up CD. Or possibly a back up partition (like 4gb of HDD devoted to restoring the original Windows XP Home). This route, you could just repair windows, and it should allow her to keep at least her files, in a backup somewhere on the hdd, and you'll have to manual set up her account and all that though.
Click to expand...

Well, if she did have the cd, it's nowhere to be found. I can't access anything on the pc. The error pops up before I am able to do anything. What are my other options?
 
Mitch?

Mitch?

banned
You don't have a whole lot of options. I haven't used XP Home forever, someone else may be able to help you better, like if there's a native 'repair' option at startup for XP. You're missing a boot file, so you won't be able to boot past POST into Windows. The disc would be able to repair that though, all you'd need (hopefully) is to replace the one file.
If you want to replace it, go here http://www.dll-files.com/dllindex/dll-files.shtml?hal. You just have to copy the downloaded .dll into your windows directory (as you mentioned above where it was, winidowsroot/system32/)
You'll have to put the hdd into YOUR computer, as a slave, so you boot from yours, but it'll recognize hers as just storage. The website i linked to also has instructions if you need help.
 
Motoxrdude

Motoxrdude

Active Member
Mitch? said:
You don't have a whole lot of options. I haven't used XP Home forever, someone else may be able to help you better, like if there's a native 'repair' option at startup for XP. You're missing a boot file, so you won't be able to boot past POST into Windows. The disc would be able to repair that though, all you'd need (hopefully) is to replace the one file.
If you want to replace it, go here http://www.dll-files.com/dllindex/dll-files.shtml?hal. You just have to copy the downloaded .dll into your windows directory (as you mentioned above where it was, winidowsroot/system32/)
You'll have to put the hdd into YOUR computer, as a slave, so you boot from yours, but it'll recognize hers as just storage. The website i linked to also has instructions if you need help.
Click to expand...
Nah, definitely don't go that route.

You are going to need a repair CD. Put it in and boot from the CD and repair windows. An installer disk will work as well.
 
M

Morox

New Member
Motoxrdude said:
Nah, definitely don't go that route.

You are going to need a repair CD. Put it in and boot from the CD and repair windows. An installer disk will work as well.
Click to expand...

Do you think that the problem is not hardware? When I first took out the hard drive, I put it on MY PC and it booted up fine. About 6 months later of the hard drive sitting around, I popped it back in and that's when the error occurred.

Is it pretty unethical to download either one of them but use a valid cd-key that was paid for? I don't really have any options. Is there any legal ways to obtain either?
 
Mitch?

Mitch?

banned
antdemo45 said:
test post new member
Click to expand...

There are over 50,000 on the forum. It works.

And I don't think downloading the .dll is illegal, and I've done it before, you literally just copy and paste it into the system32 folder. It's really your only route if you don't have an XP disc.
 
M

Morox

New Member
Mitch? said:
There are over 50,000 on the forum. It works.

And I don't think downloading the .dll is illegal, and I've done it before, you literally just copy and paste it into the system32 folder. It's really your only route if you don't have an XP disc.
Click to expand...

Have you had the same problem as me before? Hopefully that works. I will give it a try!
 
Motoxrdude

Motoxrdude

Active Member
I would give it a shot, but who knows. I'm pretty sure your problem is with the master boot record, but I guess right now that is your only option.
 
adarsh

adarsh

New Member
This came up in a google search :

  • Boot from your XP Setup CD and enter the Recovery Console
  • Run "Attrib -H -R -S" on the C:\Boot.ini file
  • Delete the C:\Boot.ini file
  • Run "Bootcfg /Rebuild"
  • Run Fixboot

Ofcourse, for this, you need access to a XP Home disc because need to get into the Recovery Console...
 
M

Morox

New Member
Mitch? said:
You don't have a whole lot of options. I haven't used XP Home forever, someone else may be able to help you better, like if there's a native 'repair' option at startup for XP. You're missing a boot file, so you won't be able to boot past POST into Windows. The disc would be able to repair that though, all you'd need (hopefully) is to replace the one file.
If you want to replace it, go here http://www.dll-files.com/dllindex/dll-files.shtml?hal. You just have to copy the downloaded .dll into your windows directory (as you mentioned above where it was, winidowsroot/system32/)
You'll have to put the hdd into YOUR computer, as a slave, so you boot from yours, but it'll recognize hers as just storage. The website i linked to also has instructions if you need help.
Click to expand...

I replaced the file like you said and it worked! :)

Thanks!

I have one other question. I took this hard drive out some time ago and I have no idea how to put it back in. I know I didn't remove it from any specific slots or anything, all I had to do was unplug it. I took a picture of the inside of the tower:



Any idea on where it goes?
 
M

Morox

New Member
Mitch? said:
looks like it goes on the bottom, where that other drive is in the middle.
Click to expand...

On the very bottom? Like on the floor of the case? That's the hard drive I am trying to put back in. I can't seem to find where it goes.

If you're referring to the top right corner, I am sure it didn't go there before. I don't recall having to remove anything to get the hard drive out and there is definitely no way to put it in any open slot without removing anything.
 
Cromewell

Cromewell

Administrator
Staff member
On the very bottom? Like on the floor of the case? That's the hard drive I am trying to put back in. I can't seem to find where it goes.
Click to expand...
It looks like it is in a 5 1/4" caddy. Does it fit near the top under your CD drive?
 
M

Morox

New Member
Cromewell said:
It looks like it is in a 5 1/4" caddy. Does it fit near the top under your CD drive?
Click to expand...

It MIGHT fit, but I am nearly positive that I didn't have to remove anything to take it out. I remember just having to unscrew it from somewhere and unplugging it. This is weird...

I notice that on the right hand wall, there are two open spaces (you can't see it in the picture), and there are tabs on the hard drive itself and they fit perfect inside of them. This way, the hard drive is actually standing and not laying flat. I don't know if this is the way it's supposed to be? If so, once fitted in, I can't seem to find a way to secure it.
 
Z

Zatharus

VIP Member
Morox said:
It MIGHT fit, but I am nearly positive that I didn't have to remove anything to take it out. I remember just having to unscrew it from somewhere and unplugging it. This is weird...

I notice that on the right hand wall, there are two open spaces (you can't see it in the picture), and there are tabs on the hard drive itself and they fit perfect inside of them. This way, the hard drive is actually standing and not laying flat. I don't know if this is the way it's supposed to be? If so, once fitted in, I can't seem to find a way to secure it.
Click to expand...


That sounds familiar. Is there a third tab with a screw hole on the drive caddy? Usually with a slide-in tab setup there will either be another tab with a single screw to secure it, or there will be a locking clamp that you can slide over the caddy somewhere.

Can you post some closer pictures of the actual drive caddy and the inside of the front panel?
 
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