NTLDR not found - me and my bright ideas!

Factual Questions
1

I’ve done a(nother) bonehead thing with my computer. I have a dual boot system (w98 and win2k). I’m planning on upgrading to XP soon, and have been backing up stuff in preparation. Last night I decided I didn’t need anything in the W98 partition, so I deleted everything there. Dumb. Today when I power on, I get “NTLDR not found”. So obviously, I hosed some files crucial to Win2k.

I’ve done some Googling and tried something from the MS knowledge base (sys c:, that got me a w98 command prompt instead of “NTLDR missing”). I can get to the Recovery Console, and from there I have tried “fixboot c:” and “fixmbr c:” neither of which did squat. Do I want to try “fixmbr d:”?

C: was where w98 was, D: is where win2k still is.

Here’s a screenshot of PartitionMagic:

(Thanks Imageshack)

What I’d really like to do is to can everything except for D: (OS and program files) and the NTFS Data partition. I’d eventually like to dualboot with Mandrake Linux (there’s an install there I can’t get to but I’d prolly reinstall). Are the Linux partitions in the right place or should they be after the Win2k partition?

Thanks for any help. I’ve been Googling and banging my head all evening.

capn

2

Bumping this, as so far no kind soul has offered a possible solution.

Apparently, three files are needed in the bootable drive - ntldr, ntdetect.com, and boot.ini. Boot.ini I can handwrite, but the others can only be gotten by copying them from another win2k system, which I don’t have handy. I can probably see them from the recovery console, but the RC doesn’t allow you to write to floppy, even if you know the admin PW. ARGH. I do have a w2k CD and a “spare” system, but I’d rather not install 2k over a good XP setup only to reinstall XP an hour later.

To any who’ve read this far, a golf joke:

The resident golf pro was heading out to the links when he came across Mrs. Thurburson heading back to the clubhouse and looking distraught.

“What’s wrong?” he asks.

“I got stung by a bee” she replies.

“Where?” he queries.

“Between the first and second holes” she says.

“Ah, there’s your problem” says the Pro. “Your stance is too wide!”

capn

3

You don’t need to copy those files from another Win2K system; since you have the Win2K CD, you can get them from there.

This kb article describes how:

http://support.microsoft.com/kb/318728