Missing Operating System

[Hybrid_11]

I have a labtop that recently crashed on me. When the computer starts to boot up it goes to a black screen with the words missing operating system. I can't get my recovery cd to work for some reason so im curious to know if anyone has any ideas of what i might be able to do.

When you see the startup script, does it recognize the hard drive? Assuming the hard drive is OK and is not the cause of the problems with your laptop, try changing the CMOS settings to boot from CD before booting from the hard drive.

When you start the computer, it should tell you what button or buttons to press to enter the system BIOS. Once you open that, find the settings or advanced settings that list the boot order of the drives. Change the boot order to make the CD-ROM drive the first to boot, and then put in the windows disk (or the system recovery/startup disk, as they may fix or re-install windows as well). Save these changes and restart. The computer will boot from the disk in the CD-ROM drive first, enabling you to reinstall or repair your operating system.

Good Luck

MisterW

[Nepa]

Stupid question but did you drop it? It sould like you Hard drive is gone. Contact the O.E.M. and try to get them to send you a new hard drive.

[Hybrid_11]

The thing is i brought it into best by so they can do a diagnostic checkup on the computer and they couldnt find anything wrong with it but the recovery cd would not work so they said all i need to do is replace the recovery cd so i took it back. Ive recently turned it on since back from best buy and instead of the missing operating system it shows NTLDR is missing, Press ctrl,alt,del to restart . I did what the first responder said but when it loads the cd it says the hard drive has been processed take cd out and press restart (the only button showing) I press restart and it loads then displays the same restart screen

You should try to install the OS from another disc (any OS really, just to see if it will properly install). If that doesn't work you probably have a bad hard drive.

[Hybrid_11]

Where can I get a cheap OS disk that will still be combatible with the labtop though. I can't think of having one in my household but maybe i do not understand quite what exactly the operating system is.