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Get the fix to the Windows XP boot error "<strong>Fatal error reading boot.ini</strong>" and other NTLDR/boot.ini problems affecting <strong>Windows XP</strong>.

<h2>About "Fatal error reading boot.ini"</h2>

[kbintro]

<h3>Description and Symptoms</h3>

The error messages, alerts, warnings, and symptoms below are tied to this error.

<h4>Symptom 1: Fatal error reading boot.ini</h4>

When attempting to boot a Windows PC, the following fatal error is thrown by NTLDR, preventing the computer from starting up successfully:

The full text:

<pre>NTLDR: Fatal Error 1 reading BOOT.INI</pre>

<a title="Windows XP Boot Components" href="http://neosmart.net/wiki/windows-xp-boot-process/">Both NTLDR and BOOT.INI are critical components of the Windows XP boot process</a>. BOOT.INI stores the list of installed operating systems, and NTLDR uses it to generate the boot-time menu offering the selection of an OS.

The number in the error message is not restricted to being "Error 1" but rather may be any of the following, amongst others:

<ul>
<li><code>NTLDR: Fatal Error 256 reading BOOT.INI</code></li>
<li><code>NTLDR: Fatal Error 512 reading BOOT.INI</code></li>
<li><code>NTLDR: Fatal Error 4096 reading BOOT.INI</code></li>
<li><code>NTLDR: Fatal Error 2952 reading BOOT.INI</code></li>
<li><em>etc.</em></li>
</ul>

<h3>Causes of this Error</h3>

This error has been known to occur as a result of one or more of the following:

<h4>Cause 1: Corrupted boot partition</h4>

If the Windows boot partition (the partition marked as 'active' on startup disk 0, typically also the same as the Windows partition for most computers not running in a dual-boot environment) has become corrupted, the "NTLDR: Fatal error reading boot.ini" error may present as NTLDR is unable to read the configuration settings within boot.ini in its attempt to boot your Windows XP installation.

Corruption to the boot partition may be caused by unsafe writes to the boot partition, sudden power loss, or interrupted writes, and will prevent some or all of its contents (in this case, especially boot.ini) from being read correctly.

<h4>Cause 2: Compressed BOOT.INI file</h4>

Users attempting disk compression of the boot drive in an attempt to reclaim disk space or free up used disk space can accidentally compress boot.ini in the process.

This can happen with software such as DoubleSpace, DriveSpace, or 3rd party file compression software that enables NTFS file compression on <em>all</em> files on the system partition.

Many 3rd party disk compression products are very much to blame for instances of a compressed boot.ini, as few have done the required research into which files may or may not be safely compressed.

Partition compression is the primary cause of this error when the number in the "NTLDR: fatal error reading boot.ini" error is 1.

<h4>Cause 3: Fragmented BOOT.INI file</h4>

An obscure cause of "NTLDR: Fatal error reading boot.ini" on Windows XP is excessive disk fragmentation. NTLDR expects the files <a title="Windows XP Boot Components" href="http://neosmart.net/wiki/windows-xp-boot-process/">it loads or reads as part of the XP boot procedure</a> to be stored contiguously on the disk (i.e. the files are stored in consecutive blocks in the filesystem and not spread around).

Fragmented dependency files for NTLDR, in this case the fragmentation of boot.ini, can cause this error to occur.

The most common way of verifying this is the case is by checking the number in the "NTLDR: fatal error reading boot.ini" text. If it is a power of 2 (2, 4, 8, 16, 32, ...) such as 512, 1024, or 2048 which is also the blocksize on the active partition (FAT, FAT12, FAT16, FAT32, or NTFS), this NTLDR boot.ini error can occur.

<h2>Fix Fatal error reading boot.ini in Windows</h2>

<h3>Fix #1: Rebuild BOOT.ini with Easy Recovery Essentials</h3>

In cases where BOOT.INI is compressed, fragmented, or corrupted, EasyRE can re-create a valid and correct boot.ini automatically, resolving the "fatal error reading boot.ini" error.

The automated system repair function of EasyRE which is responsible for this action will also search for and correct any other incidental boot issues.

[easyre error="NTLDR: Fatal error reading BOOT.INI" bootscreen="xp" guaranteed="true"]

<h3>Fix #2: Re-create boot.ini</h3>

[setupcd]

If boot.ini is unreadable by NTLDR (though it may be difficult to tell, as in many cases files that cannot be read by NTLDR can be read just fine by other software), the following steps will help in the re-creation of the boot.ini boot configuration file:

[partial name="partial_bootini"]

<h3>Fix #3: Using chkdsk to repair filesystem errors</h3>

[partial name="partial_chkdsk_xp"]

<h2>More Information</h2>

<h3>Linked Entries</h3>

The errors below have been verified as being associated with or related to this problem:

<ul>
<li><a href="https://neosmart.net/wiki/invalid-boot-ini-file/">Invalid BOOT.INI file</a></li>
<li><a href="http://neosmart.net/wiki/ntldr-is-compressed/">NTLDR is compressed</a></li>
<li><a href="https://neosmart.net/wiki/bootcfg/">bootcfg</a></li>
<li><a href="https://neosmart.net/wiki/chkdsk/">chkdsk</a></li>
</ul>

[partial name="partial_moreinfo" versions="xp,server2003"]