missing or corrupt hal.dll again!

[Guest]

ok I boot xp recovery console run bootcfg it finds the xpe drive and
directory adds it to the boot.ini, I then reboot and select what it added to
the os boot menu and I still get hal.dll corrupt or missing. what did I
screw up!
thanks
tr

 

[KM]

tonyr,

Forget about bootcfg or any other "high" level tools to set up ARC paths. Just edit the boot.ini manually.
You must understand how ARC paths work in order to get your XPe image up and running. Otherwise you may get stuck of some/many
problems there. Please read this KB to get a feeling on what ARC Path Naming Convention is
http://support.microsoft.com/default.aspx?scid=kb;en-us;q102873.

Also, please make sure the Windows directory name you use in the ARC path matches the target device windows folder name you set in
TD. When you copy the image to the target storage, please make sure the Windows directory is under the root of the boot drive.

If you still have problem, please post the content of your boot.ini file here and describe your target device hard disk and
partition setup.

KM

 

[Guest]

I know arc paths and how to edit them but no matter what I still get the
hal.dll is missing so I ran the bootcfg just to check my work and it gave me
the same answer that I already had

multi(0)disk(0)rdisk(1)partition(1)\WINDOWS="Microsoft Windows XP Embedded"
/fastdetect

this is a secondary drive on ide controller 0, 1st partition windows
directory with a system32\hal.dll

so I'm really stumped on this any ideas?
thanks again!

 

[Slobodan Brcin \(eMVP\)]

Tony,

I hope that you boot from first HDD that contain boot.ini with this record:
multi(0)disk(0)rdisk(1)partition(1)\WINDOWS="Microsoft Windows XP Embedded" /fastdetect

In case that you tell BIOS to boot from second HDD (the one with XPe) then you must use:
multi(0)disk(0)rdisk(0)partition(1)\WINDOWS="Microsoft Windows XP Embedded" /fastdetect

Regards,
Slobodan

 

[KM]

Tony,

And also check if your second drive's primary partition is marked as active.
(if your first drive is the system one, i.e. contains ntldr, ntdetect and boot.ini)

KM

 

[Guest]

I boot off 0,1 my xpe is on 1,1 and is marked active! man this is driving me
nuts! any more ideas.
tr
ps does xp home have a different ntldr then xp pro?

 

[Slobodan Brcin \(eMVP\)]

tony,

ps does xp home have a different ntldr then xp pro?

XP Home/Pro and XPe use same ntldr. file.

I boot off 0,1 my xpe is on 1,1 and is marked active! man this is driving me

If you edit the boot.ini of your first disk then everything is ok with ntldr, and boot.ini.

BTW: Are you sure that you have first primary partition on your second disk?
I mean there is MBR partitions and dynamic disk partitions.
Delete all partitions from second disk, and make sure to create MBR style partition there.

Regards,
Slobodan

 

[Guest]

I'm not on site right now so I'll have to wait until I get there, I'm not
sure about the type of partition!
thanks
tr

 

[Guest]

since I know I have the arc path right and its a mbr partition and set to
active and I'm not playing bios tricks to reorder the drives what the heck
else could be the problem? thanks and I do appreciate your response! The
only thing that I did different then I normally would is I left this drive as
a cable select drive, in other words I did not force it to slave..

tr

 

[KM]

tonyr,

I don't know what is going on with your system.

You may want to try some other things to get more info:
- play with different rdisk and partition numbers
- disconnect your primary drive, make the second drive bootable (active
primary partition, bootprep if FAT, NTFS), add ntldr, boot.ini (default ARC
path with rdisk(0)partition(1)), ntdetect.And see if you can boot off that
drive. At least you would know whether it is ARC path problem or not.

KM

 

[Guest]

could different versions of the ntldr cause the problem the one on my c:
drive has a mod date of 8/2004 the on on my d drive where the xpe is located
has a mod date of 1/2003 and the sizes are different. when I do a help about
in the target designer it does not mention sp2 so does that mean I'm not
running the sp2 version of xpe and my xph is sp2, just a thought.

the rest of what you mentioned involves me bending over with a screw driver
in my hand my wife gets real nervous when I do that no telling what goodies I
could be adding to the system!

thanks

and yes that was my next step!

 

[KM]

tonyr,

could different versions of the ntldr cause the problem the one on my c:
drive has a mod date of 8/2004

It could only make a difference if you used ntldr from Win2K which is not
the case, right?

the on on my d drive where the xpe is located
has a mod date of 1/2003 and the sizes are different.

This one is not used at all since your XPe partition is not the system one.

when I do a help about
in the target designer it does not mention sp2 so does that mean I'm not
running the sp2 version of xpe and my xph is sp2, just a thought.

You won't notice any difference in tools between SP1 and SP2.
The difference is in Repository content. Open up CDM and check out if you
have SP2 repository package there.

Also, keep in mind that the error you see does not depend on what version of
ntldr you get (at least it does not depend on SP version of ntldr from XP).

KM

 

[Slobodan Brcin \(eMVP\)]

Tony,

It is enough to select disk boot order in BIOS and ARC path will rearranged. No need to open your computer if it makes you (your
wife) nervous.
I use two-three disks per test computer and select boot order in BIOS and it work fine.

Regards,
Slobodan

 

[Guest]

yea I guess if I'm just testing it will be ok! I'll let you know the
results! I'm offsite again!
tr

 

[Guest]

I know that I'm not using the ntldr off d: drive I just think its weird that
this condition exist since they are both supposed to be xp sp2 ntldr's. Once
again thanks very much for your response! I'll let you know what I find out.
tr

 

[Guest]

all I get now is a blinking cursor, its a mbr ntfs partition with ntldr etc
any more ideas?
thanks
tr

 

[KM]

tonyr,

Can you describe what did you now? So that we all were on the same page.

Also, how did you exactly partition and format the drive?
Can you do that from DOS on the target machine? (boot DOS from floppy or CD-ROM)