OK, so I've been having this issue for a while and have posted a number of times on it.
To recap: every so often with no warning my PC will fail to boot and display the message "NTLDR is Missing." After thoroughly exploring and trying a number of fixes and boot discs for this problem nothing is able to get around it. So after a while I just put my HDD into an enclosure and pull off any data I didn't already have backed up (data always appears to be perfectly intact just something wrong with MBR). Then I delete the old partition, reformat the drive, reinstall all my stuff, and presto everything works...for a while.
Last time I went through all this I noted that the backup folder I had made on my laptop from the time BEFORE that was made on the exact date two months before. Thinking this was peculiar, I kept a close eye on it and sure enough EXACTLY two months later it happened again!
It's like there's a time bomb in my computer or something. Now this has happened with multiple HDDs and every time I start from scratch the HDD is wiped clean so it seems unlikely that the problem lies in the drive itself or some weird virus I may have picked up. I don't THINK its Windows doing it because I make sure to do the online authentication and that's got a 30 day limit anyway. So the question is what in the rest of the hardware could be sending out a signal every 60 days that is either corrupting something in the boot sector or messing up the partition?
I suppose its still a possibility, but my RAM has tested good with MemTest 86+.
sammorris:
Its definitely kindof an oldie: Mach Speed Matrix P4M800 Socket 478 Motherboard. Bought it in late 05. Is there any diagnostic program or manual test I can do for the HDD controller. What about the controller could make it go haywire exactly every 60 days rather than just being generally faulty? Guess that same question would apply to the RAM too. The time aspect of this is what really puzzles me. I've never heard of something malfunctioning in such an orderly manner.
If MoBo is out that means a whole new PC since I'm not likely to find a replacement 478 socket board =/
Others may disagree, but unless you have tested your memory OUTSIDE of the computer with an external memory tester, or eliminated it by removal/swapping, you can't be 100% sure. In this instance, I would agree that RAM is probably NOT the problem.
As far as socket 478 motherboards go, if you are in the US, they're quite easy to find. Even Newegg has one currently in stock.
Copy these files to a floppy or cd boot.ini
ntldr or NTLDR
ntdetect or NTDETECT
All 3 located in C:,unhide folders by clicking tools,folder options,click view tab,tick "show hidden folders",untick "hide protected operating system files" now hit apply,once files are copied reset to default,leave disk in drive to boot computer,of course if it's hardware failure somewhere you'll need to locate it.
The issue your experiencing & although it could be any part of the hardware is the same as i had except on some occasions i got a no disk error,the time frame you mention although longer than mine is uncannily similar as i also reinstalled numerous times & even on spare hdd's,the problem turned out to be a faulty IDE cable,for now i suggest don't bother activating windows if you've done a format & reinstall otherwise you'll end up reaching your activation limit & then will be forced to phone activate,instead use a spare hdd & put a free linux distro on it until issue resolved
