hello and help

[steveruss1973]

Let me start off by introducing myself. My name is Steve and i am fairly new to all this IT stuff. Have just built a second computer out of spare parts i had and have networked it to my original pc along with a router for the internet connection. Having been very proud of this etc etc, one of my friends decided to let me have a look at thier laptop. However it comes up with a message at boot up
Error: following files are missing or corrupt : \ windows\system32\config\system.

I know this is serious and have tried several options.
1. recovery with my winXP disc.
2. connecting it to my second pc to try and pull the my documents off (as there are pics on there of her kids going back 4 years)
When i do this it comes up with invalid file partition.
The laptop has two partitions on it
1. 13G
2. 17G

Can anyone help me or are these files gone and will i have to do a clean install of windows.

yours kindly and hopefully.

Newbie Steve:-|

[gerbil]

..you mention recovery with win xp disc. what do you mean? since you have that disc, did you go into recovery console and try fixmbr command? that should sort the partition error problem. It may even make the HD bootable again.

[steveruss1973]

Hellol and thanks for the assisstance. No I hadn't tried that but did do today and it has seemed to fix the problem. I have now formatted the hard drive and re-installed windows, thanks again for info.

Steve

[gerbil]

well, gee!... i hope you got those precious photos off the drive before you reinstalled windows..... or at least they were on a volume that you did not format....