New BB Computer Boot Error

[mikki]

Hi, I just purchased a new barebones computer . I added my drives, hooked everything up checking everything twice. When I booted up I got this message:

00
Searching for Boot Record from IDE-0..OK

NTLDR is missing

Press Ctrl+Alt+Del to restart

None of the keyboard keys worked F2, Ctrl+Alt+Del, etc. I tryed two different working keyboards just to be sure that was not the problem. The results were the same on both. If anyone knows what the next step here is or what I am missing here please post. Thanks

[TRICKPLAYER]

check boot settings and make sure drive boot sequence correct one, you would probably do better with a fresh install as apposed to swapping, windows xp don't like major hardware changes

[Ferrit]

I think the point here is that
Does the bios see the harddrive you put in it?

[Ahcoraj]

If you're using 2k or XP and still have the computer from which the hard drive came out of, try re-installing the drive, boot into windows, go into the device manager and change the IDE/ATAPI Controller to Standard Dual Channel PCI IDE controller from whatever flavor of bus mastering one you may have. This can get XP/2k working on a new mobo 90% of the time with the only hassle being activiation in XP......

Since the bios reports a boot record on IDE 0, the drive is seen, and the NTLDR mesage is coming from the windows startup process...another caveat, make sure there are no floppies in the drive as it will give you the same message.....

[JeffO93]

Ahcoraj is right-on, but I'd add more...

You say "barebones" but I'm unclear as to what the state of the hard drives were. You don't mention anything about whether Windows was ever installed and running. Barebones usually means "no OS" installed yet. So you'd only have to boot off the Windows CD, follow the install wizard to partition/format, and install to your new C: drive.
You can partition/format the D: drive after Windows is installed using the Disk Management Console.

If you had Windows installed to a drive and booting previously, and then added a second one, then it could be a drive jumper/cable select position problem. Most defaults on hard drives are "CS" for cable select and normally the drive on the end of the data ribon is Master (boot) drive [but I've seen some motherboards that defy these industry standards and go the other way!]
So having a drive set to CS and connected in the middle and no drive on the end might boot fine... until you add the second drive on the end connector. Different motherboard/BIOS code will handle these situations differently. I've seen many bomb, and others somehow boot fine (and something in Windows edits boot.ini to the new locations!).
Bizarre failsafe stuff these days, in some computers.