I know you need the Windows XP Home CD, which I haven't got (it never came with any) but can any copy of the Windows XP Home CD work?
 
Is there any way I can sort this myself by obtaining a copy of the CD via download or whatever?
 
Anything else I need to know or have to do before I get someone to fix it.

A copy should work as long as it is the same media type i.e. full or upgrade version, edition i.e. Home, Pro etc. and revision i.e SP as the original install.

Should I mention drive imaging here or not?

There are lots of things you COULD do but it would depend on the current state of corruption on your existing install which is difficult to ascertain from a remote location.

Cheers

There's not a lot on here that's important. I copy most it to an external harddrive. It's a laptop for surfing mainly. It would take me a while to get product registration codes again but not a lot else matters.

Also, I assume you can shove the harddrive of the laptop into a USB reader to be read on another PC? I've done it with desktop harddrives.

My DAW PC is excessively imaged of course.

They are going to send the disk that was applicable at the time - it is an old PC - and then walkthrough the repair - although I do know how to do that part.

strikinglyhandsome1


They are going to send the disk that was applicable at the time - it is an old PC - and then walkthrough the repair - although I do know how to do that part.

Good stuff, you'll also get to be able to spend a few hours connected to Windows update after the re-install.

Not knowing what messed up the filesystem I'd suggest a complete re-prep and reformat first off.

Good luck.

Although the error message seems uncommonly specific for Microsoft, consider the possibility that it is not pointing directly to the cause of the problem. One possibility is that the driver is intact but is not loading for some reason. While waiting for the install CD to show up, try running a system memory check using memtest86 http://www.memtest.org/ . Memtest boots from linux, so will work even if you can't get into Windows XP. A bad segment of memory might be addressed at exactly the same point in loading windows at bootup, and cause the failure of the specific driver to load--interpreted by the OS as a missing or corrupt driver.
 
You might also try to find the hard drive manufacturer's test utility. Most drive makers have a downloadable test program version that will boot under its own linux or dos operating system like memtest.  A bad hard drive sector (and consequently corrupted ntfs.sys) is a more likely cause than memory failure. If you can't get a boot after trying to restore the driver, then a check of the memory, and running chkdsk from a command line in the recovery console after booting from the install CD may help. If not, then a repair installation of Windows XP would be the next step.
 
http://support.microsoft.com/kb/822800
http://support.microsoft.com/kb/555531
 
http://support.microsoft.com/kb/307654
 
http://pcsupport.about.com/od/operatingsystems/ss/instxprepair1.htm
 
http://support.microsoft.com/kb/917964
 
 
 
 

Cheers for the info and links. I think it is memory but my expertise is limited to the on/off button. It was severely dragging and has had problems for a while now (Hence my other thread). No virus as far as I can tell. It's slowly dying.

I'm using paid help and I've used them before and they go the whole way so hopefully they'll have an idea.

And the follow up.........I got the disk and they tried to fix it but the OS has gone to a better place. Re-install the only option.

I recently had this trouble on a gigabyte P45 motherboard.
Same error msg ntfs.sys. It could be a lot of things RAM HDD Motherboard PSU.

After 3 days of testing RAM CPU & PSU, I tried to reinstall from scratch,
  and the motherboard was the cause.  

Try ultimate boot cd to test your hardware.

Cheers OM. I'm just testing one more thing and then bringing in some help. I've a had run of PC issues recently with HDs. The only common denominator is me.! I reckon I can break anything but always without touching it. Keyboards, speakers, monitors.... the list is endless recently. One minute they're ok and the next..... whoosh...... it's toast. I'll be out busking to pay for all this. I'm not selling another kidney. It's a pain to meet, drug and operate on people without their consent.