Laptop Booting Problem

[Airflite40]

My laptop worked fine until recently, when my little brother screwed it up. He was going to porn sites and probably got a virus on it. Now when I try to run windows it says:

Starting Windows...
-----------------------------------
Windows 2000 could not start because the following file is missing or corrupt:
\WINNT\SYSTEM32\CONFIG\SYSTEM

You can attempt to repair this file by starting Windows 2000 Setup using the original Setup floppy disk or CD-ROM. Select 'r' at the first screen to start repair.
I dont have the recovery cd that came with it originally, but I have a Windows NT installation CD and the boot disks for it. I also have a Windows XP Pro installation CD. I tried bootin from both of those CD's and it says operating system not found. The boot disks dont work either. I am not partial with any files, so I am thinking about wiping the whole thing and starting over. Can you guys help me?

[Murf]

Reboot then start tapping the F8 key, when the menu comes up select "Last known configuration". Follow the prompts. May fix it, let us know before going further or formatting the drive.

[Airflite40]

Thanks Murf, I have already tried that though. I still get the same message. Is there anyway to reboot in dos and copy the missing files from the NT cd to the hardrive?

[Murf]

The problem lies with a corrupted registry. You can try Windows 2000 Registry Repair Utility (http://www.microsoft.com/downloads/details.aspx?displaylang=en&familyid=56d3c201-2c68-4de8-9229-ca494362419c)

You will need 6 floppies.

HERE (http://support.microsoft.com/default.aspx?scid=kb;en-us;822705) is the MS article on it.

[Airflite40]

Thanks Murf, I'll try that and report back the results.

[Airflite40]

I tried to make those disks and it says that I need Windows XP SP1 boot disks. My laptop does not have XP, it has NT. I have the NT boot disks, and there are three of them. It said that this program takes the 6th disk of the XP boot disks and modifies it to repair a Windows 2000 registry. That doesnt make sense. The NT boot disks I have would not boot the laptop either, I think that it has a virus. Can you help me format the hard disk and reinstall NT? How do I boot to DOS?

[Murf]

Doesn't sound like the boot sequence is set right. First screen hit the DELETE KEy (Or what ever key the screen tells you to use to get into SETUP).

Under one of those menu items you set your boot sequence. Set it for CDROM as the first device. SAVE & EXIT. Have the XP CD in. It should boot from that. Depending on what verion of Windows 2000 you have, you may be able to upgrade it to XP Pro.