hal.dll error on unbootable partition

  • Thread starter Thread starter k.korsch
  • Start date Start date
K

k.korsch

I can no longer boot to my FAT32 WinXP partition, although my folders
seem intact and accessible from recovery console. I recently upgraded
hard drives and cloned my partition, which seemed to work fine, until I
started getting the "missing or corrupt" hal.dll message whenever I try
to boot.

If I boot to the WinXP CD I am not offered the repair option to do a
repair installation. Out of desperation I tried 'fixboot /rebuild' and
later 'fixmbr' commands from the repair console which did not help.
Still the hal.dll message.

In case it's helpful, here are the results of partinfo.exe on the
problem hard drive:


================================================
PARTINFO 1.09
Copyright (C) 1996-2003, TeraByte Unlimited. All rights reserved.


Run date: 02/20/2005 14:07


============================================================­========
MBR Partition Information (HD0):
+====+====+=============+====+=============+===========+====­=======+
| 0: | 80 | 0 1 1 | c | 1023 254 63 | 63 | 312576642 |
| 1: | 0 | 0 0 0 | 0 | 0 0 0 | 0 | 0 |
| 2: | 0 | 0 0 0 | 0 | 0 0 0 | 0 | 0 |
| 3: | 0 | 0 0 0 | 0 | 0 0 0 | 0 | 0 |
+====+====+=============+====+=============+===========+====­=======+


============================================================­===================

EMBR Found (HD0)
------------------------------------------------------------­-------------------

Revsion: 2 Min SPT: 9 Sectors: 1 SSize: 512
Last Cyl: 1023 Last Hd: 254 SPT: 63
------------------------------------------------------------­-------------------

MPT Found: Revision: 5, Number of Entries: 1 Flag: 1
------------------------------------------------------------­-------------------

0: LOCAL DISK-0 Flag: 4000 Start: 63 End: 312576704 FS: C

ID: 1
------------------------------------------------------------­-------------------

MBFT Found: Revision: 2, Number of Entries: 0
------------------------------------------------------------­-------------------

------------------------------------------------------------­-------------------

MDT Found: Revision: 2, Number of Entries: 1
------------------------------------------------------------­-------------------

0: Bootit EMBRL Flag: 20 Start: 0 NumSecs: 7 Alloc: 50
ID: 0
============================================================­===================

BOOT SECTOR INFORMATION
------------------------------------------------------------­-------------------

File System ID: 0xC LBA: 63 Total Sectors: 312576642 ID: 0x1
Jump: EB 58 90 (EB 58 90)
OEM Name: MSWIN4.1 (MSWIN4.1)
Bytes Per Sec: 512 (512)
Sec Per Clust: 64 (64)
Res Sectors: 32 (32)
Num FATs: 2 (2)
Root Dir Ents: 0 (0)
Sectors: 0 (0)
Media: 0xF8 (0xF8)
Secs Per FAT: 0 (0)
Sec Per Track: 63 (63)
Heads: 255 (255)
Hidden Secs: 63 (63)
Huge Sectors: 312576642 (312576642)
Huge Secs Per FAT: 38149 (38149)
Flags: 0x0 (0x0)
Version: 0 (0)
Root Dir Clust: 14043 (14043)
FS Info Sec: 1 (1)
FS Bkup Sec: 6 (6)
Reserved: 0 0 0 0 0 0
Drive Num: 0x80 (0x80)
Res: 0x0 (0x0)
Boot Sig: 0x29 (0x29)
Vol ID: 0x1A330EDF (0x1A330EDF)
Volume Label: LOCAL DISK (LOCAL DISK)
FS Type: FAT32 (FAT32 )
Boot Flag: 0xAA55 (0xAA55)
------------------------------------------------------------­-------------------
 
As a follow up, my boot.ini reads as follows:

[boot loader]
timeout=20
default=multi(0)disk(0)rdisk(0)partition(1)\WINDOWS
[operating systems]
multi(0)disk(0)rdisk(0)partition(1)\WINDOWS=""
 
The hardware abstraction layer (HAL) is missing from your system or is
corrupt; or the boot drive contains one or more driver versions that are not
the correct version for your run-time image. This could be as a consequence
of the change of hard drive make , model.

Without the ability to perform a Repair Installation you can try:

Insert and boot from your WindowsXP CD.
At the first R=Repair option, press the R key
Press the number that corresponds to the correct location for the
installation of Windows you want to repair.
Typically this will be #1
Type bootcfg /list to show the current entries in the BOOT.INI file
Type bootcfg /rebuild to repair it
Take out the CD ROM and type exit

No guarantees.
 
I can no longer boot to my FAT32 WinXP partition, although my folders
seem intact and accessible from recovery console. I recently upgraded
hard drives and cloned my partition, which seemed to work fine, until I
started getting the "missing or corrupt" hal.dll message whenever I try
to boot.

If I boot to the WinXP CD I am not offered the repair option to do a
repair installation. Out of desperation I tried 'fixboot /rebuild' and
later 'fixmbr' commands from the repair console which did not help.
Still the hal.dll message.

-------------------------------------------------------------------------------
(If you change your news reader's MIME text encoding setting to
None from Quoted-Printable, people will be able to answer you
with the ">" automatically inserted.)

After you cloned the original OS onto your new HD, did you
disconnect or remove the old HD before booting up the new
OS for the first time? That seems to be a necessary procedure
to avoid problems with the new OS. After the first independent
boot of the new OS, it can be allowed to "see" the old HD on
subsequent boots.

*TimDaniels*
 
Hi,

See if this site can help you....
http://www.kellys-korner-xp.com/xp_haldll_missing.htm

All the best,
--
George Aker aka SG
Google is your friend www.google.com
Anything else is just a search engine
I can no longer boot to my FAT32 WinXP partition, although my folders
seem intact and accessible from recovery console. I recently upgraded
hard drives and cloned my partition, which seemed to work fine, until I
started getting the "missing or corrupt" hal.dll message whenever I try
to boot.

If I boot to the WinXP CD I am not offered the repair option to do a
repair installation. Out of desperation I tried 'fixboot /rebuild' and
later 'fixmbr' commands from the repair console which did not help.
Still the hal.dll message.

In case it's helpful, here are the results of partinfo.exe on the
problem hard drive:


================================================
PARTINFO 1.09
Copyright (C) 1996-2003, TeraByte Unlimited. All rights reserved.


Run date: 02/20/2005 14:07


============================================================­========
MBR Partition Information (HD0):
+====+====+=============+====+=============+===========+====­=======+
| 0: | 80 | 0 1 1 | c | 1023 254 63 | 63 | 312576642 |
| 1: | 0 | 0 0 0 | 0 | 0 0 0 | 0 | 0 |
| 2: | 0 | 0 0 0 | 0 | 0 0 0 | 0 | 0 |
| 3: | 0 | 0 0 0 | 0 | 0 0 0 | 0 | 0 |
+====+====+=============+====+=============+===========+====­=======+


============================================================­===============
====

EMBR Found (HD0)
------------------------------------------------------------­---------------
----

Revsion: 2 Min SPT: 9 Sectors: 1 SSize: 512
Last Cyl: 1023 Last Hd: 254 SPT: 63
------------------------------------------------------------­---------------
----

MPT Found: Revision: 5, Number of Entries: 1 Flag: 1
------------------------------------------------------------­---------------
----

0: LOCAL DISK-0 Flag: 4000 Start: 63 End: 312576704 FS: C

ID: 1
------------------------------------------------------------­---------------
----

MBFT Found: Revision: 2, Number of Entries: 0
------------------------------------------------------------­---------------
----

------------------------------------------------------------­---------------
----

MDT Found: Revision: 2, Number of Entries: 1
------------------------------------------------------------­---------------
----

0: Bootit EMBRL Flag: 20 Start: 0 NumSecs: 7 Alloc: 50
ID: 0
============================================================­===============
====

BOOT SECTOR INFORMATION
------------------------------------------------------------­---------------
----

File System ID: 0xC LBA: 63 Total Sectors: 312576642 ID: 0x1
Jump: EB 58 90 (EB 58 90)
OEM Name: MSWIN4.1 (MSWIN4.1)
Bytes Per Sec: 512 (512)
Sec Per Clust: 64 (64)
Res Sectors: 32 (32)
Num FATs: 2 (2)
Root Dir Ents: 0 (0)
Sectors: 0 (0)
Media: 0xF8 (0xF8)
Secs Per FAT: 0 (0)
Sec Per Track: 63 (63)
Heads: 255 (255)
Hidden Secs: 63 (63)
Huge Sectors: 312576642 (312576642)
Huge Secs Per FAT: 38149 (38149)
Flags: 0x0 (0x0)
Version: 0 (0)
Root Dir Clust: 14043 (14043)
FS Info Sec: 1 (1)
FS Bkup Sec: 6 (6)
Reserved: 0 0 0 0 0 0
Drive Num: 0x80 (0x80)
Res: 0x0 (0x0)
Boot Sig: 0x29 (0x29)
Vol ID: 0x1A330EDF (0x1A330EDF)
Volume Label: LOCAL DISK (LOCAL DISK)
FS Type: FAT32 (FAT32 )
Boot Flag: 0xAA55 (0xAA55)
------------------------------------------------------------­---------------
----
 
If I boot to the WinXP CD I am not offered the repair option to do a
repair installation. Out of desperation I tried 'fixboot /rebuild' and
later 'fixmbr' commands from the repair console which did not help.
Still the hal.dll message.
Click to expand...


That message is rather misleading. It happens because the boot.ini file
that tells the boot where to look for 'Windows' is damaged, so it is
looking for files in the wrong place - hal.dll just happens to be the
first one it looks for.

Set the BIOS to boot CD before Hard Disk. Boot the XP CD and, instead
of Setup, take the immediate R for Repair. Assume any password
requested is blank, and TAB over.

Use
Attrib -H -R -S C:\boot,ini
DEL C:\boot.ini
to delete the bad one
BootCfg /Rebuild

to search for Windows installations and make a new one
 
Alex Nichol said:
That message is rather misleading. It happens because the boot.ini
file that tells the boot where to look for 'Windows' is damaged, so it is
looking for files in the wrong place - hal.dll just happens to be the
first one it looks for.
Click to expand...


The boot.ini file that the O.P. supplied was:

[boot loader]
timeout=20
default=multi(0)disk(0)rdisk(0)partition(1)\WINDOWS
[operating systems]
multi(0)disk(0)rdisk(0)partition(1)\WINDOWS=""

This has a null descriptive name for the single optional
OS (i.e. nothing between the quotes).
But the descriptive name is entirely arbitrary and it
can be set to be anything (even "Linux is Great").
Are you saying that the descriptive name cannot be null?

*TimDaniels*
 
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