HELP! windows 2000 prof

[LHoyer]

Ok, I screwed up.! I changed a setting to boot to windows, now all I get is a C prompt. Where do I go from here?

[jdhurst]

Sounds like something wrong with your BOOT.INI file. That file sits in the root directory and can be edited (with great care). Post it here if you are unsure and someone may be able to help.
... JDH

[LHoyer]

I had changed something in control panel-I don't remember what. I know 2000 still resides on HD but what exe file do I need to run from c prompt to get it to run and where, in what dir does this file reside?

[GomJabbar]

Did you try booting into Safe Mode?

[The Spirit of X21]

Did you try typing "win" at the c: prompt?

[Stargate199]

You need to edit the boot.ini file, to do so, from that C:\ prompt type "edit boot.ini" (note you must do this from the C:\ root and not from any other directory. Now make sure the following is correct in that boot.ini file and change what is correct. It should look like this.

Code: Select all

[boot loader]
timeout=30
default=multi(0)disk(0)rdisk(0)partition(1)\WINDOWS
[operating systems]
multi(0)disk(0)rdisk(0)partition(1)\WINDOWS="Microsoft Windows 2000 Professional" /noexecute=optin /fastdetect

"multi(0)disk(0)rdisk(0)partition(1)\WINDOWS="Microsoft Windows 2000 Professional" /noexecute=optin /fastdetect" should be all on the same line.

If anyone believes this is wrong, please correct it, it has been a while since I have dealt with 2000's boot.ini

[LHoyer]

When I do a dir of c:\ i get 3 files and 7 dir(s) none of which is boot.ini.

[RealBlackStuff]

boot.ini is a System/Hidden/Readonly file.
You can try this:
c:\Windows\system32\attrib.exe -s -h -r c:\boot.ini
Now when you DIR it, it should show. If not, it's gone missing!

The above is for Windows XP.
For W2000, change c:\Windows into c:\WinNT

[LHoyer]

OK, did what you said, first i got a msg that said"This program cannot be run in dos mode", but i found the boot.ini and i edited it to read what was suggested above, rebooted but it comes back to a c:\ prompt. Any more suggestions?

[RealBlackStuff]

For W2000, the boot.ini should also read WINNT instead of WINDOWS, unless you gave the windows directory another name yourself.
Use the name that should show up when you DIR the drive.

[LHoyer]

Thanks everyone for the help! Don't know what I did (correctly or incorrectly) but I'm back to where i should be with 2000 prof booting ok. Thanks again everyone!

[Stargate199]

Thanks RealBlackSuff for correcting my mistakes. It has been so long since I have had a system I regularly use that ran Windows 2000. Forgot that the Windows directory was named WINNT (though for my uses, I think I renamed it WINDOWS).