Hello, I am running (or aleast trying to) a Soyo mobo with an Athlon 1600+ processor and 128 mb of ram, before 2 weeks ago I have always left my system running, then I was going on vacation and decided I will shut down the computer while I am gone, system shut down normally. I come back from vacation and try to start up the computer to find the file NTOSKRNL.exe is missing or corrupt, so O.K. I have seen this before. I try to get into safe mode- no luck. try from boot floppies- after the F6 to load drivers goes away i get "LINE 216 OF THE INF FILE IS INVALID SETUP CANNOT CONTINUE, PRESS ANY KEY" pressing any key just repeats the process with same resluts. So I thought floppies were bad and created a new set, but same resluts. I then tried from the CD and have the same message come up, And this is a recent (ok maybe 7-8 mo. ago)installation and did not get the chance to install the recovery console. Nothing was recently installed or changed and system was as normal as can be before I shut it down. Any suggestions on how to get my system booted to make repairs, I have searched to my wits end for the error message I am getting but to no avail, and I am reluctant to just format the drive just yet as there are some things I need from the drive if it still intact.(Yes, I think my hard drive crashed bad but am hoping some will tell me other wise.) Thanks, Shawn

If you have a spare hard drive with an OS loaded, you can get on there and get your data off the old hard drive. The hard drive itself probably did not go bad, but it looks like your windows install did. You may want to try and repair it from the w2k CD if you have it.

You should use a software like NortonGhost. On my system i have 3 OS (2000, 2003, Linux), and i have done an image for my 3 OS. It's very useful?

I was thinking of the old hard drive route, and it may have to be done. I do have the w2k cd, when I try and boot it, it will start up at the blue screen and as soon as the "press F6 to install 3rd party drivers" goes away the message " LINE 216 OF THE INF FILE IS INVALID, SETUP CANNOT CONTINUE, PERSS ANY KEY TO EXIT" after pressing a key it goes back to the black screen with "setup is checking..."then to the blue screen again. A constant loop. I have tried booting from CD, floppies, floppies created on another machine, everything. A win 98 startup disk and fdisk show the volume is NTFS and is showing correct capacity so I do belive the hard drive is in working order, I just cannot find any means to get the system booted to recover it.

The "inf" error message 'could' be due to a failing RAM stick or two/three. If possible, try a fresh/known reliable stick and see how things go. If you still cannot boot normally etc. then try the Setup\repair routine; even perhaps the Upgrade of current installation approach - via CD boot or the floppies. This may then allow you back in OK - providing installed RAM is OK. Incidentally that ntoskrnl error is 'usually' associated with a corrupt or incorrect boot.ini entry for the OS itself. (i.e. the ARC path) The line for the ntoskrnl.exe is not pointing to the correct location. Since you were away and changed nothing (knowingly) yet the error/problem appeared when you booted up on your return, it does tend to point to something else - and this could be RAM...? A virus problem might also be present - but I put that low on the list on this occasion... Also verify that RAM is securely installed (pressed home) in its slot(s). What file format is the drive at present? If fat32 then you should be able access the boot.ini (via a'98 boot-disk) and post details here? Also how is the drive configured (partitions etc.)?

RAM.. Hmmm... About 2-3 months ago I got some BOSD's related to RAM. Reseated the DIMM's and all was good, I will try that again. The current drive format is NTFS on a single partition on a 8GB drive so booting a '98 startup disk doesn't get me far. Virus files updated about 2weeks before all of this and never really gave it a second thought that a virus may be causing havok, if is it's a darn good one. I cannot get to the repair/setup routine on this system, the CD will boot but stops before I can choose to repair or reinstall. Floppies are the same way. (floppies created from the cd and tried ones from bootdisk.com all the same result) I will try reseating the RAM and also I'll get out that old hard drive and see if I can get w2k loaded on that. Thanks for all the input please keep it coming,It gives my brain a little break.I will post my results and findings.

Look at this site to see if this will help: http://www.ntfaq.com/Articles/Index.cfm?ArticleID=14722