External HDD Enclosure can't see hard drive

cak1124 · 9th June 2009

Problem: Thosiba Satellite M45 laptop. Hitachi Travelstar 100GB ATA/IDE 5400RPM HD. OS XP. Get this message: "<Winnt_root>\System32\Hal.dll missing or corrupt:
Please re-install a copy of the above file."

All research points to boot.ini, corrupt or missing hal.dll file, or bad hardrive.

The recovery CD does not provide a recovery console only reinstall of OS. I can't install recovery console because I can't see HD. Safe mode no help. C prompt shows no directory to display.

I purchased a NexStar SX 2.5, 2.0 USB PnP external HDD enclosure for IDE. Manufacturer indicates no driver install needed because both Vista and XP support. I tried to view HD by connecting to Gateway Vista tower. The tower crashed two tries. I connected it to XP laptop CompaQ Presario. When the LED is green on NexStar, drive will not display. When it is red...it might briefly, then disappear. When I see it...the files are there. The boot.ini looked okay. Mostly Freezes XP laptop each time USB connected and drive is not visible. Took Nexstar back exchanged it for same. Talked to techs at store. One mentions jumper for slave other said not on a laptop, switch out Nextstar to see if the original was bad. No change. I tried to view drive through explorer and through the manage feature using "My Computer". Any ideas on why HD is not visible and freezes computer.

I know I may have to reinstall the OS, but I can't be gauranteed that it's not a bad HD, but I do not know how to test a HD I cannot see. That would be another question. Can I test it, if I can't see it, and if so how? Thank you.

**mattman** · 10th June 2009

Get Drive Fitness Test at the Hitachi website. You will be able to make a boot CD from it to test the drive. My guess, the partitioning information is corrupted.

If the another computer can "see" it, run Error Checking (CHKDSK) on it and be sure to test the disk surface (leave it to run overnight). Also scan it with an antivirus.

I've seen a lot of boot.ini, hal.dll, etc., questions in the Windows XP forum and one of our members is particularly clever with those. Try searching for those terms in the Win XP forum [my limit has been running FIXBOOT and FIXMBR]. Also try searching around at Toshiba.

Matt

cak1124 · 10th June 2009

Thank you for your help. I will try these things.