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13025
February 9th, 2006 05:00
Dell MBR (Master Boot Record) fatal errors
I certainly hope someone can help me to solve this mystery how I can restore Dell MBR. Here's what happened and I even emailed to Dell Tech Support. First and foremost I am on disability pension and cannot afford to call tech support from Dell otherwise they'll charge me since I have Dell Inspiron 1100 about 2 years now, thus warranty is expired. I never had a problem with it until now.
When I received laptop computer from Dell, it was all set and was running on Windows XP Home, and about I believe 6 months ago I installed Windowx XP Pro on my laptop, and about 3 weeks ago I started having problems. At first Windows went blank to blue screen with Message:
STOP 0X000000F4 (0X00000003, oX82916DA0, 0X82916F14, 0X805F9F88)
Begining dump of physical memory
I rebooted the computer, and the next message come up:
Primary Hard Disk Drive not Found
Rebooted the computer again, and then another message come up:
NO BOOTABLE DEVICES.. strike F1 to retry boot, F2 for setup utility
I hit F2 for setup utility to check if it recognizes HDD, and it is there.
(Keep in mind that when it didn't boot up, I went out to the store and bought a new HDD for my laptop, installed it, formatted it by way of WindowsXP Pro, installed programs, and it did the same thing when booting the system).
After reboot again, I hit F12, and selected "inernal Hard Diskl" and it works,
I also updated system bios and old version was A27 and new one is A31 now in my system.
I tried everything I could possible think of why is this happening, and I even emailed Dell, but I am not holding much help if they would offer any help, so I am posting it here.
I also did followed the instructions from others who suggested to try the web site:
http://wwwgoodells.net to try to fix MBR. When I typed in DOS: dsrfix (dsrfix.exe), it showed this string:
DSRFIX - Dell DSR Analyzer Ver. 1.2
good : int13 extensions supported
alert : boot code does not match dell mbr
alert : pbr descriptor 1 is not type DE
alert : pbr descriptor 2 is not type 07
alert : pbr descriptor 3 is not type DB
!!fatal : pbr1 is not fat 16
!!fatal : pbr3 is not fat 32
alert : backup partition table no tin sync
!! fatal errors, no changes will be made
Does anyone please know or have knowledge how to fix this problem and get it back to working condition.
Thank you so much,
dg1261
623 Posts
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February 9th, 2006 09:00
I can't help you with the blue screen, but I can tell you that dsrfix won't help you at all. Dsrfix is for repairing a broken DSR (Dell System Restore) partition, aka "Symantec PC-Restore". But it's of use only if you have a DSR partition in the first place.
"I went out to the store and bought a new HDD for my laptop..."
If your original HDD had a DSR partition, you don't have it anymore because you changed HDDs.
"I have Dell Inspiron 1100 about 2 years now..."
Dell did not begin shipping systems with DSR until July 2004, so you didn't even have a DSR partition to begin with.
You never had a restore partition, you don't now, and you cannot magically pull one out of thin air. This isn't a problem about the Dell MBR, so you might want to restart a new thread with a subject title more descriptive of the real problem. That will give you a better chance of attracting the attention of someone who can help you sort it out.
CANTravis
4 Posts
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February 9th, 2006 11:00
Thank you for your reply. You are right, I got this laptop about December 2003, as family member was heading to Europe for 4 months and I needed laptop beside my desktop computer. Do you think, or does anyone believe that Dell might send me a disk to restore the DSR that is lost? It's a pain in the a** to keep any dell CD in the drive, in order to get in the Hard Disk, or pressing F12 and then select start from Hard Disk Drive.
I'll also wait and see if I get couple of more responses and what Dell Tech will suggest. I'm not putting much hope of their compassion and help one out if they have heart, and that remains to be seen.
I will let you know what suggestion I received from Dell.
Thanks,
GreyMack
2.2K Posts
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February 9th, 2006 17:00
The error "Primary Hard Disk Drive Not Found" indicates the BIOS was unable to detect the hard drive, regardless of the presence, absence, or corruption of an MBR. Did this error go away completely with the old drive?
If the "Primary Hard Disk Drive not Found" problem was eliminated by the installation of the new hard drive, and the "No Bootable Devices" error is stable and repeatable, with no intermittentcy that would be indicative of other problems, and this is immediately following the clean installation of XP, be sure to verify the HDD is enabled on the list of bootable devices in the BIOS setup screen, in cased you overlooked it. It isn't clear to me that F12 could be used to boot from a partition that is not designated as active in the MBR, which is the same designation the BIOS looks for when going through it's list of bootable devices.
pattyandme
62 Posts
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February 23rd, 2006 13:00
CANTravis
4 Posts
0
February 24th, 2006 01:00
Well, after much of a discussion and help (not much) from Dell Tech Support. Their support was obviously simple.. insert their Disk (operating disk), and reboot it from CD, Install the Windows. although they did step by step helping in re-installing WindowsXP Hope, but in reality I DO NOT want Windows XP Home, I want PRO. So anyways, I followed their instruction, and when it comes to partition of hard disk, they told me to delete that partition, after that hit enter to Install WIndows XP Home, it then will partition hard disk and should show C:\ as the hard drive where to install the WIndows. When that was done, same problem, and telling me same thing as before and insiting to press F1 to retry or F2 to enter bios. When it loaded into WIndows XP Pro (updated over WIndows XP Home), my external mouse didn't work at all, even after I tried number of times to re-insert the program or work with 'control panel". Nothing.
What next I did: Rebooted the laptop and I pressed F2 to enter the bios, hold down ALT+U (it could be P), for next page, and highlighted drive by drive, and hit spacebar, to block certain component, but never block the last two (leave those last two alone), so I left only CD/DVD drive as the available drive to check. To my surprise when rebooted the computer, it loaded WIndowsXP Home. That brought a smile on my face.
What I have done next, I've inserted WIndowsXP Pro Upgrade disk, and rebooted the computer, as I said, I wanted XP Pro due to the highest security features, and I followed exact same procedure as with WIndows XP Home, it loaded the program, but it never asked me to insert the previous operating system, (it should have been looking for it, but it didn't) which I have (win98se), and it works fine, and external mouse works. That surprised me as well.
I loaded up all other programs, and my laptop is working fine. What went wrong in the first place, is a mystery, if I block all except hard disk, it won't read it, and will give usual error message, if I block hard disk and leave CD/DVD open as the only item for laptop to go through, it loads windowsXP pro without any troubles? Why's that?
Keep in mind that my BIOS is up to date.
Message Edited by CANTravis on 02-23-2006 10:13 PM
Message Edited by CANTravis on 02-23-2006 10:16 PM