When loading XP the computer gives an error. Quick solution to “Windows can’t start because the \WINDOWS\SYSTEM32\config\system file is corrupted or missing” error in Windows XP

OS boot problems are a widespread phenomenon among Windows users. This happens due to damage to the means responsible for starting the system - the MBR master boot record or a special sector that contains files necessary for a normal start.

As mentioned above, there are two reasons for boot problems. Next, we’ll talk about them in more detail and try to solve these problems. We will do this using the recovery console, which is contained on the Windows XP installation disk. For further work we need to boot from this media.

If you only have a distribution image, you will first need to burn it to a flash drive.

MBR recovery

The MBR is usually written in the very first cell (sector) on the hard drive and contains a small piece of program code that is executed first when booting and determines the coordinates of the boot sector. If the record is damaged, Windows will not be able to start.

After booting from the flash drive, we will see a screen with options available for selection. Click R.
Next, the console will prompt you to log in to one of the copies of the OS. If you did not install the second system, it will be the only one on the list. Enter the number here 1 from the keyboard and press ENTER, then the administrator password, if there is one, if it is not set, then just click "Enter".

If you have forgotten your administrator password, please read the following articles on our website:
The command that “repairs” the master boot record is written like this:
The new MBR has been successfully written, you can now exit the console using the command
and try to start Windows.

If the launch attempt was unsuccessful, then we move on.

Boot sector

The boot sector in Windows XP contains the boot loader NTLDR, which “fires” after the MBR and transfers control directly to the operating system files. If this sector contains errors, then further start of the system is impossible.

Recovering the boot.ini file

In file boot.ini the order of loading the operating system and the address of the folder with its documents are specified. If this file is damaged or the syntax of the code is broken, then Windows will not know that it needs to start.

Transferring boot files

Except boot.ini files are responsible for loading the operating system NTLDR And NTDETECT.COM. Their absence makes booting Windows impossible. True, these documents are on the installation disk, from where you can simply copy them to the root of the system disk.

Launch the console, select the OS, enter the admin password.
Next you need to enter the command
This is necessary to view a list of media connected to the computer.
Then we need to select the drive letter from which we are currently booting. If this is a flash drive, then its identifier will be (in our case) "\Device\Harddisk1\Partition1". You can distinguish a drive from a regular hard drive by its capacity. If we use a CD, then select "\Device\CdRom0". Please note that the numbers and names may differ slightly, the main thing is to understand the principle of choice.
So, we have decided on the choice of disk, enter its letter with a colon and click "Enter".
Now we need to go to the folder "i386" Why are we writing?
After the transition you need to copy the file NTLDR from this folder to the root of the system disk. Enter the following command:
and then agree to a replacement if offered ( "Y").
After successful copying, a corresponding message will appear.
Next we do the same with the file NTDETECT.COM.
The final step is to add our Windows to a new file boot.ini. To do this we run the command

Enter the number 1 , enter the identifier and boot parameters, exit the console, boot the system.

All actions we take to restore the download should lead to the required result. If you still fail to start Windows XP, then most likely you will have to reinstall. You can “rearrange” Windows while preserving user files and OS settings.

Conclusion

A download “breakdown” does not happen on its own; there is always a reason for it. These can be either viruses or your actions. Never install programs obtained from sites other than official ones, do not delete or edit files that were not created by you, they may turn out to be system files. Following these simple rules will help you avoid having to resort to a complex recovery procedure once again.

Booting Windows consists of many steps performed sequentially. If one of the startup operations is performed incorrectly, the system will not boot. One of the most common problems of this kind is a corrupted Windows XP boot record.

What is a boot record?

The master boot record, better known as the MBR, stores a piece of code, a special signature, and partition tables necessary for the system to start correctly. When you turn on the computer, the BIOS, after completing the initial test, loads a fragment of MBR code into RAM, transferring control of the further launch of Windows to it (the code).

If you see a message on the screen like “ntldr is missing”, “no boot device” or just a black background with no further progress, then to fix the error you need to perform a Windows XP boot loader recovery.

Reasons for failure:

Incorrect installation of several operating systems, which causes the boot code to be overwritten.
Uninstalling Linux OS or boot manager.
Virus infection (usually ransomware that blocks Windows from starting).
Hardware damage to the disk.
Power outages (emergency shutdown).

Sometimes it is possible to return the system to functionality by simply rewriting the MBR, sometimes you have to restore the boot sector. The most difficult case is manually copying bootloader files to the boot sector of the hard drive.

MBR recovery

The first thing to do if the system does not start is to restore the MBR using the recovery console:

The boot record has been restored - try rebooting and turning on Windows XP again.

Boot sector recovery

If a message like “NTLDR is missing” appears on the screen, then the problem is caused by a damaged boot record. The symptoms of this failure are similar to an MBR error, so it is better to run two recovery commands:

If rewriting the boot sector and MBR did not help, then try fixing the errors in the Boot.INI file:

When the command is executed, the program will scan all disk partitions, trying to find a copy of Windows. The user will be prompted to record information about loading this system into the configuration file, as a result of which Windows will start correctly.

Copying download files

If creating a new MBR and boot sector does not help resolve the startup error, you will have to manually move the NTLDR, NTDETECT.COM and boot.ini files to the root of the disk.

Boot from the disk, open the recovery console.
Write the MBR and boot sector as shown above.
Run the "map" command to list all mapped drives. Find the drive letter of your Windows distribution.
Enter the drive letter of the distribution and press Enter to start working with it.
Enter “cd i386” to open the folder of the same name on the Windows XP distribution.
Type "copy NTLDR C:\" to copy the NTLDR file.
Enter "copy NTDETECT.COM C:\" to copy the NTDETECT.COM file.

Next in line will be the BOOT.INI file.

Hello! Today I didn’t plan to do anything on the Internet, I thought I’d go skiing and relax. But this morning I decided to come in for a few minutes to check my email and respond to your comments on the blog. I turn on my younger brother’s computer (he’s running Windows XP) and here’s an error I’m already familiar with “Windows cannot start because the \WINDOWS\SYSTEM32\config\system file is corrupted or missing”

It’s a weekend morning, the main thing is that yesterday everything was turned off normally, but today there’s this “beautiful” error. I wrote about one way to fix this error in the article ““. Be sure to look at this article if the method I describe below does not help you.

This means that I needed to quickly solve this error with a missing or damaged \WINDOWS\SYSTEM32\config\system file; I had no desire to play for a long time.

Therefore, before booting from the boot disk and replacing the “system” file with a backup one (this is exactly the method I described in the article linked above), I decided to try loading the latest configuration, that is, with the settings when the computer was still starting.

Everything worked out, after selecting the boot with the last known good configuration, the computer turned on and works fine. Now I’ll tell you how to do all this. Just a couple of minutes.

Removing the error “Windows cannot start due to a corrupted or missing file \WINDOWS\SYSTEM32\config\system”

I did all this on a computer with Windows XP installed, but I think that this method should also work on Windows 7, but I haven’t tried it yet.

This means the computer showed us an error that there is no file \WINDOWS\SYSTEM32\config\system, or it is damaged.

We restart the computer and immediately begin to actively press the F8 key, a window will appear in which you can boot into safe mode, etc. But we are interested in “Loading the last known known good configuration (with working parameters)”. So we select it by pressing “Enter”.

After selecting this item, Windows XP started loading and the computer turned on normally. After another reboot, the error did not appear.

It's that simple, you can remove the error:

Windows cannot start because the \WINDOWS\SYSTEM32\config\system file is corrupted or missing

If you didn’t succeed in this quick way, then try the method I described in another article. By the way, judging by the number of views of that article, this mistake is very common.

That's all, today is a day off :), so as little work as possible and as much rest as possible. Good luck!

Also on the site:

A quick solution to the error “Windows cannot start because the \WINDOWS\SYSTEM32\config\system file is corrupted or missing” in Windows XP. updated: January 12, 2015 by: admin

Surely most of us have encountered a problem that at first glance is quite difficult to solve. It occurs when installing the operating systems Windows 10, Windows 7, Windows XP. In fact, solving the problem that has arisen is not so difficult. In this article, you can find a suitable way to fix the Error loading operating system error.

What does this error mean?

First, you need to understand a little about the essence of the error itself and what it is. Typically, this problem occurs during the process of turning on and loading the operating system of a personal computer. In this case, the following is observed: a black screen and only one inscription in English “Error loading operating system”, which, in fact, means “error loading operating system”.

There may be several reasons for this:

Old version of BIOS on PC. In this case, the BIOS does not support hard drives with a large amount of memory;
Incorrect BIOS settings for a given drive;
The boot partition of the hard drive is not functioning properly. Most often this happens due to surges in voltage supply in the networks.

How to fix error loading operating system code

If you still encounter such a problem when turning on your personal computer, then there is a way to try to fix the problem yourself.

1). First of all, check the BIOS boot order, make sure that the hard drive you currently need is the boot priority. If this is not the case, then change the order yourself.

2). The second thing you can do is edit the BIOS settings. Log into the BIOS itself and go to the settings of the hard drive that did not boot. Adjust the “Access mode” parameter to the “Large” state.

3). If you are the owner of Windows XP (by the way, it is with this version of Windows that such an unpleasant but completely solvable problem most often occurs), then you will need to use the installation disk of your operating system (Windows XP OS) to log into the system. To do this, you must first go into the BIOS, insert the disk into the drive and try to boot from this installation disk. In the menu you need to press “R” in order to call the command to restore the Windows XP operating system. Next, select the desired OS and enter the command to check the disk chkdsk /P/R, then you need to press the “Enter” key. A little patience and time to complete the process, after which you can exit the program.

The Windows XP Recovery Console should appear like this:

4). Also, if you encounter such a problem, you can generally update the BIOS version. This method is effective.

5). Edit the boot option of the operating system. Everything must be done in the same way as in the third case. After you have entered the menu and using the “R” key to restore the functioning of the OS, you need to enter the number of the desired operating system (this is usually one), and then start entering through following:

Fixmbr
Fixboot

After this, you need to exit again and your PC will boot again. Starting with Windows 7 and other recent operating systems, you can enter the value Bootrec. And for Windows XP the order of commands will be as follows.

A number of users of the Windows operating system (especially for users of the rather archaic Windows XP) may encounter a situation where, when trying to load the operating system, an error message “Error loading operating system” appears. Restarting the computer in such a situation usually does not give anything, and the person does not know or imagine what to do next in this situation. In this material, I will tell you what to do with the Error loading operating system error, introduce the reader to a list of reasons that cause this problem, and also explain how to fix it.

Error loading operating system - symptoms and causes

Typically, the Error loading operating system error occurs when you turn on the computer, when it tries to load the operating system (most often Windows XP). The user is presented with a black screen with one line “Error loading operating system” (translated as “error loading operating system”), and then simply nothing happens. Restarting the computer usually only leads to a repetition of this situation.

The causes of the Error loading operating system error may be as follows:

When you turn on the PC, other texts with errors may also appear, I have already described several of them on MakeComp.ru:

How to fix operating system boot error

and press enter. Wait for the process to finish, type exit to exit, and restart your computer. This often helps with the question of how to fix the Error loading operating system error;

Run the command chkdsk /P/R

We fix the OS boot option. As in the previous case, we enter the recovery console using the “R” key, enter the number of the OS we need (usually it is 1). Then enter the following lines one by one, remembering to press Enter after each command:

After that, type exit again to exit and restart our computer.

In operating systems more modern than Windows XP (for example, Windows 7), another similar command operates - Bootrec. Type the following commands into the command line, remembering to press “Enter”:

bootrec /FixBoot

bootrec /rebuildBcd

then restart your PC.

You can also try updating your BIOS, this may be quite effective in solving the problem in question.

How to use a special system recovery disk

Special disks for emergency recovery of your operating system can also help us solve the problem of Error loading operating system. For example, I would recommend Easy Recovery Essentials - a universal, powerful and automated product for restoring the operation of Windows OS from XP to Windows 10. The program itself is distributed in the image of a boot disk, which must be burned to a blank and used when boot problems appear on your computer.

When booting from such a disk, just select the “Automated Repair” option, then select the disk you need to restore, and click on “Automated Repair” again at the bottom. The program will do everything else itself, and the user usually gets a stable working system as a result. And although this product has a paid basis, it is worth it.

Select Automated Repair

Conclusion

If you are thinking about what to do with Error loading operating system, then I recommend following the tips I described above to correct the situation. I recommend starting by changing the BIOS settings, then using the capabilities of the CHKDSK command, and if all else fails, then you should consider using special disks for emergency system recovery; they usually give a very effective result.

Fix error loading operating systems in windows

Error loading operating system windows 7 occurs when the operating system is turned on directly, so the user simply does not have a seemingly huge set of tools to correct this error - the error does not make it possible to turn on the OS even in safe mode in order to gain access to various built-in debugging elements .

Considering the situation described above, some users, when asked what to do - error loading operating system, confidently answer that only reinstalling the OS will help. But for many people this is not always the optimal solution to the problem, so they begin to search for alternative methods.

They really do exist and can help even if the message “error loading operating system” appears when installing Windows 7 from a flash drive.

How to fix loading operating system error? The fact is that there are two main root causes, the consequence of which is this situation:

Conflicts with the hard drive being used.
The OS itself has crashed.

Based on these data, the further stages of human actions are built.

The first stage is an attempt to solve the situation with error loading operating system windows 10 or 7 by bringing the hard drive to the desired functional state:

Initiate turning off/on the computer.
Enter the BIOS settings menu.
Travel to the section where the installed hard drive and other devices are displayed.
Click on the name of the hard drive to bring up an additional menu.
Go to “Access Mode” and set the value to “Large”.

Save all changes just made and try to turn on the system again. If the problem remains the same, then move on to the second step:

It is necessary to have a bootable drive on hand. You should start the startup from there - to do this, you almost always need to first go into the BIOS again and set the desired boot priority.
After several automatic processes, the launched program will provide the user with access to a menu where it is possible to select an operating system recovery tool.
Go to the command line. Select the OS version that should be restored. Most often, the answer to this question will be the number “1” - if the equipment uses one operating system.
The next step is to use the command "chkdsk /P/R". After the automatic process is completed, you need to wait until the PC restarts and make sure that the problem is completely resolved.

The final stage - if the first two methods did not help achieve a positive result:

Repeat the launch from a bootable CD or flash drive using the method described above.
Another transition to the command line and selection of the damaged OS.
Alternately entering two commands: “fixmbr” and “Fixboot”. Each time you will need to confirm the planned actions.

In the end, all that remains is to initiate a restart of the equipment again, go into the BIOS again and return the priority to using the operating system from the stationary screw.

Error loading operating system, what should I do?

Hello everyone, “Error loading operating system” is another error due to which the computer sometimes stops working. A little background. Before the weekend, they brought me a computer and asked me to see what was wrong with it, as the user said: “Windows won’t load and an error appears.”

Well, of course, to start diagnosing the problem, I connected it to myself. The computer turned on, seemingly normally, even the BIOS made one short sound, which indicated that the system was ready for operation. But, as soon as it was time to load the operating system, the same error that the user mentioned was immediately displayed in front of me: “Error loading operating system.”

You can immediately draw certain conclusions that the problem is a malfunction of the hard drive or operating system. What could have caused this error? There is no exact answer, since there could be many reasons for the error, starting from an incorrect shutdown of the computer, ending with the installation of some program that could damage system files.

As it turned out, a very large number of different tips and recommendations (such as flashing the BIOS, reinstalling the system or formatting the disk) for eliminating the text message with the error “Error loading operating system” are described on the Internet. But, as it turned out, most of them were simply ineffective and did not bring any benefit. So I had to look for ways to restore the system to a working state on my own. Looking ahead, I’ll say that I succeeded, so read on and you will find out a hundred percent option that will help you cope with the operating system loading error

I want to immediately note that this message appears mainly only on Windows XP. Therefore, all further actions that I will describe below will be shown using this particular operating system as an example. But, if you have this error on Windows 7, then write to me in the comments and I will definitely try to help you.

Getting rid of the “Error loading operating system” error

As I mentioned earlier, I found a lot of advice on the Internet, but for me they were useless. But, I still want to share the topics with you in ways that, in my opinion, are the most appropriate and can really help.

The first of the simplest solutions is to change some settings in the BIOS settings. My examples will be on Pheonix - AwardBIOS, but if you have a different version it's okay, just look for similar names and items. As always, if you have any questions, please leave comments.

Having entered the BIOS, go down one line and select “Standard CMOS Features”.

Additional hard drive settings will open. This is where we click on the “Access Mode” item and select the “Large” value. After that, save the changes and exit the BIOS by pressing the F10 key. We check the result, if it does not help, move on to the next method.

Fixing the error using Check Disk

In this option, to get rid of the “Error loading operating system” error, we need an installation disk with Windows XP (Example of writing windows to disk). Which we insert into the drive and use the BIOS to boot from the disk. The selection and installation of the necessary drivers will begin, so you will have to wait a few seconds. Then, a menu should appear where you need to press the “R” key for the recovery line.

A black screen will appear in the form of a command line; a message should appear on the screen stating that first you need to select the operating system with which we will work. In my screenshot there is only one, so I put the number 1 accordingly, most likely you will have the same.

It will take several minutes to check for errors and correct them, if any were found on the hard drive. At the end of the check, we finish the work in the recovery line with the “Exit” command, after which the computer will begin to reboot, and you just have to check the result of the work done. Again, in case of failure and when the “Error loading operating system” error appears again, we try to get rid of it using the following method.

Getting rid of the “Error loading operating system” error using the Fixmbr command

For this option, as for the previous one, you will need to boot from the installation disk and go to the system restore line. Just like in the previous method using the number 1, select the windows that we will restore and press the “Enter” key.

Now enter the command: fixmbr. A text message will appear on the screen warning you that the existing partition table may be damaged. But, since our windows does not load at all, you can safely press the “Y” (YES) key, which will confirm the start of the process.

Below, we will write the Fixboot command. Once again, a message will appear asking: “Do you want to write a new boot sector to the C: partition?” As in the previous option, click on “Y” and confirm the choice.

Now, having entered “Exit”, go back to the BIOS and change the boot priority from the drive to the hard drive. After the next startup of the computer, its performance should be restored to its previous state.

What to do if an error occurs: Error loading operating system

What does this error mean?

There may be several reasons for this:

Old version of BIOS on PC. In this case, the BIOS does not support hard drives with a large amount of memory;
Incorrect BIOS settings for a given drive;
The boot partition of the hard drive is not functioning properly. Most often this happens due to surges in voltage supply in the networks.

How to fix error loading operating system code

If you still encounter such a problem when turning on your personal computer, then there is a way to try to fix the problem yourself.

1). First of all, check the BIOS boot order, make sure that the hard drive you currently need is the boot priority. If this is not the case, then change the order yourself.

3). If you are the owner of Windows XP (by the way, it is with this version of Windows that such an unpleasant but completely solvable problem most often occurs), then you will need to use the installation disk of your operating system (Windows XP OS) to log into the system. To do this, you must first go into the BIOS, insert the disk into the drive and try to boot from this installation disk. In the menu you need to press “R” in order to call the command to restore the Windows XP operating system. Next, select the desired OS and enter the command to check the disk chkdsk /P/R, then press the “Enter” key. A little patience and time to complete the process, after which you can exit the program.

The Windows XP recovery console should appear like this:

4). Also, if you encounter such a problem, you can generally update the BIOS version. This method is effective.

After this, you need to exit again and your PC will boot again. Starting with Windows 7 and other recent operating systems, you can enter the Bootrec value. And for Windows XP the order of commands will be as follows:

bootrec /FixMbr bootrec /FixBoot bootrec /ScanOs

bootrec /rebuildBcd

How to cure - Error Loading Operating System (replacing HDD with SSD) - 140200.pro

When installing windows or when copying from an old HDD to a new one. After rebooting, the system displays the error “Error Loading Operating System”.

The problem here is in the boot area of the disk. There are two options for solving the problem. More precisely, if the first option does not help, then we also do the second.

1) Boot from the Windows XP or Windows 7 installation disk and launch the command line (aka the recovery console). If you already have Windows XP on your disk, then the recovery console will ask for the administrator password, which is not very convenient. So a Win 7 console is better.

windows xp recovery console

windows 7 recovery console

Type commands in the Win XP console

FIXBOOT then Enter and

FIXMBR then Enter

In seven it is a little more difficult - the teams look like this:

BOOTREC.EXE /FixBoot

BOOTREC.EXE /FixMbr

2) If after a reboot the message “Error Loading Operating System” appears again, then most likely this is a problem with connecting the new large hard drive to the old motherboard.

Go to Bios and go to the hard drive management section:

In the Access mode line set Large

Save (F10), exit and reboot.

If, after all of the above, the system does not try to start, then the problem may be in the HDD; you can try checking it for bad sectors using Victoria.