HP NX7400 laptop formating problem

[de51gn]

Hi My brother recently bought a HP NX7400 laptop from ebay, he wants to reformat it, & insatll a new XP copy. However every time he puts the XP cd in it goes through the first part of loading the drivers to memory, ther either freezes or comes up with the error message "NTLDR file is missing".
I have tried creating an automated recovery disk from my pc for this, but this has not done it either.
I have even tried changing the harddrive (to check if it is faulty) but the hardrive has a special connection on the end which cannot be taken off.
I am lost now, can someone tell me what i am missing.
Thank you.

 

[davelichfield]

I believe that the hard drive is a standard SATA drive, the attached adaptor should be removable.

 

[karym6]

or comes up with the error message "NTLDR file is missing".

broken install disk - do you have another one you can try?

also, is this one you burned yourself? if so, try burning another on a good quality disk or (even better) try burning it with a different burner.

 

[Curious123]

NTLDR missing means the CD is not bootable. You normally get this when you leave floppy disc in the drive. Try doing a search for Windows XP floppy install disc usually 3 disc and than it will prompt you to load the cd.