How did I corrupt Windows?

I have been running Ubuntu 6.06 on my laptop, but I ran into a problem connecting to wireless networks. They network manager stopped allowing me to connect to wireless networks, there was no option for wireless anymore. So after I tried everything on the web I decided this was just time to format and install 6.10.

So I load up the 6.10 (32 bit) cd and I delete my Ubuntu partitions also I deleted a 10 gig space that was devoted to Dell recovery, even though I paid the $10 to get actual XP cd. The dell recovery partition was not accessible in windows, it wasn't until I first installed Ubuntu that I found out it was eating up 10 gigs sitting there.

So after I delete the partitions, all I had left was Windows, so I created a 10 gig partition for Root and a 2gig for the swap. It installed fine. Ran fine, so I decided I would also install Ubuntu 64 bit, because I want to try out the folding SMP beta client. The 64bit cd keep freezing on me when I went to create partition for it.

I gave up after about 4 tries. I went to load windows and found out that "hal" was missing! So it looks like I'll have to just format and reinstall everything, but I want your opinion on where I went wrong and corrupted windows.

I assume the windows installation was done by Dell?

Its possible the 10gb dell partition has files that windows needed.

CGR said:

I assume the windows installation was done by Dell?

Its possible the 10gb dell partition has files that windows needed.

Click to expand...

So I shouldn't have deleted that dell partition..ok I thought that might have been it, but I wasn't sure if I did something installing Ubuntu.

I think it may have been removing the recovery partition as well.

humm, i nuked the recovery partition on my dell B130 and never had an issue. strange things happen with windows for unknown reasons.

Please give the actual and complete error message.

Did it say something like "NTLDR missing"?

uOpt said:

Please give the actual and complete error message.

Did it say something like "NTLDR missing"?

Click to expand...

It said something like "C:\Windows\System32\hal.dll is missing" Basically hal.dll was missing.

I've already reinstalled XP, I was just wondering where I went wrong.

CGR said:

I assume the windows installation was done by Dell?

Its possible the 10gb dell partition has files that windows needed.

Click to expand...

This was the case for me on an old Toshiba desktop running Me. There was what seemed to be a 'recovery partition, but there was something on there that windows needed...I found out the hard way. (So after winodws got spanked, I repartitioned and threw XP on it. )

to add to the windows stories, i installed vista a couple weeks ago, then decided to play around with my linux partition. i installed freebsd, then netbsd, then gentoo 32bit all within a few days. I got grub going, then decided to reboot in to vista for the hell of it, but it wouldn't load...said something about some file missing or being corrupt...so, instead of fixing it, i just decided to reboot to gentoo and haven't tried to load vista since.

Shelnutt2 said:

It said something like "C:\Windows\System32\hal.dll is missing" Basically hal.dll was missing.

I've already reinstalled XP, I was just wondering where I went wrong.

Click to expand...

The way windows boots is peculiar.
Some files have to be located at the "start" of the hard drive. Below a certain physical boundary.

Changing the restore partition may have effected how windows sees the drives geometry. Since it's looking for "hal" at a specific location, it can no longer find it.

This is pure speculation on my part. But I have heard of similar things happening.

splat said:

to add to the windows stories, i installed vista a couple weeks ago, then decided to play around with my linux partition. i installed freebsd, then netbsd, then gentoo 32bit all within a few days. I got grub going, then decided to reboot in to vista for the hell of it, but it wouldn't load...said something about some file missing or being corrupt...so, instead of fixing it, i just decided to reboot to gentoo and haven't tried to load vista since.

Click to expand...

I've had similar Windows dual boot woes. Where did you install grub?
I guess what I did was just find a scheme that works well and stick with it. In my case, I use 2 physical hard drives and install grub to sda, Linux to sda1 and windows to sdb1. I set sda as first boot device in BIOS. Then through grub I map (hd0) (hd1) to 'fool' windows into thinking it's the boot drive. I have tried all different schemes with varying degrees of success, as I am sure you have too...but I've been very successful with this one in particular.
Whenever grub or lilo is written to the mbr of a HD with windows on it, there always seems to be a chance that Windows may be borked irreparably. (At least in my experience)
Sometimes the recovery console works for me, other times not.

i think it was freebsd that actually borked windows. At any rate, I install windows to /dev/sda1, linux to /dev/sda2. grub gets installed to hd0 (/dev/sda). Sometime in the near future i'll probably wipe out the windows install and start over anyway. the new vista install is pretty to watch.

splat said:

i think it was freebsd that actually borked windows. At any rate, I install windows to /dev/sda1, linux to /dev/sda2. grub gets installed to hd0 (/dev/sda).

Click to expand...

Oh, I see.
In my experience, Whenever grub is installed to the mbr of a windows drive, it's a tossup. I've messed up my windows installs quite a few times, unfortunately.

I've never messed my windows install installing linux, and I've always installed grub to the MBR.