new empty HD NTFS formatted when booting computeractive CD ntldr is missing

Im not sure what you are doing / asking.
Windows asks for the ntldr file when booting, are you booting to Windows?
Or else you are booting from a non bootable disk

I am booting using the CD from the Computeractive magazine Ultimate Guide to linux 8.10 the HD is empty I have removed the HD which contained XP. As far as I now there is now no operating on the computer. Yet I still get the message NTLDR is missing press ctl alt del to reboot

OK, do this. reinstall the hard drive with XP on it. (boot to the cd to see what happens) sont worry, it will not over write the XP OS. You should see a menu to either boot from dvd, install, do a mem test

let me know what you find

Let me ask, did you format the the new drive to NTFS?
If so, did you use the Windows disk to do so?
If so, reformat it to a FAT drive. see if get the same error. Yo should not

With the XP HD Installed the same thing happens ntldr is missing thats why I removed XP HD. I am baffled and appreciate you taking an interest

Is there a floppy in a drive or an external drv attached a USB in?
You should not get this message unless you are booting to windows!
This file is the boot loader file for windows with the NTFS file system on it.
Linux/ Ubuntu use the ext file system although you can format the drive as a fat for data share and ntfs for windows share.
Perhaps the disk you are using is bad.
down load Ubuntu from here.

http://www.ubuntu.com/getubuntu/download

Have reformatted toFAT Ubuntu appears to be now booting I will have to leave off for now and will try later. Your help has been a god send to a silversurfer. I will let you know how I get on tomorrow once again many thanks.

Ubuntu will now load but when I try to install it appears to want to load on HD with windows. I want to load Ubuntu on my second HD by itself. Any suggestions please

Ubuntu will now load but when I try to install it appears to want to load on HD with windows. I want to load Ubuntu on my second HD by itself. Any suggestions please

Hmmm, is this a dual-boot setup? A good help page is ...

https://help.ubuntu.com/community/WindowsDualBoot

Personally whenever doing an install i like to try to get a bootable Cd ("Live Cd") of a tiny distro like Wolvix
http://distrowatch.com/table.php?distribution=wolvix
then i boot into that and use the GPartEd from the System menu to have a look at my drives. A linux distro prefers to use a large ext3 partition (for Ubuntu 5Gb or more) preferably with a small Linux-swap of double the Ram size but 512Mb is a good size if uncertain.

Be careful with Gparted as its very good at deleting partitions aswell as creating or resizing them. Note the ext3 will need a mount point of / at some point although that might be arranged during install.

Good luck
Regards from
Tom

Ahhh, i think i'm beginning to understand what you're aiming for but i'm not sure it'll be easy. Even though installing Linux on your 2nd drive it'll want to save it grub-boot-loader on your first drive (hda rather than hdb) ideally it'll want to install into the mbr of the Windows there or into a linux there. It wont be happy about being left in the vacuum of space.

Good luck ;)

If you are still having trouble with this then please post it as a new question. Only the most recent questions tend to get looked at so posting/reposting a question just before america arrives online gives the best chance of getting a good few answers.

If the problem has been resolved then please follow the link to the forum thread and mark it as Solved.

Good luck and many regards from
Tom :)