Missing HAL.DLL file

[jen4950]

Hey-

I think I am up shit creek and need some help; OS forum doesn't get enough traffic. Luckily I have my laptop to work from..

I got the "HAL.DLL file is missing or corrupt" on startup the other day. After panicking a little bit, I unplugged all of the drives in the machine and picked out one of the new 750GB drives for my new machine (a mere weeks away from completion) and attempted to install Windows XP on that drive. Looked all fine and dandy, until the last restart- and I get the same error.

To me, it seems like a faulty Mobo- is this a good assumption?

Next, If that's the case, and I go buy an exact replica of my current mobo- can I take the RAID 10 array off of the current mobo and plug it into the new one and have it recognize it? Do I need to do a more involved surgery? Or an I totally screwballed?

HELP!!

[EDIT] I also have a really big RAID 10 array on a 3Ware card- but I'm not worried about that one so much- it's all in the card ROM's. I'll just plug the card in the new machine.. but the on Mobo array is making me pucker a bit..[/EDIT]

 

[engiNURD]

Some things you could try:
- another xp disc
- new data/power cables
- another optical drive

I'd definately run memtest86+ to make sure the RAM isn't faulty -- at least a few passes per stick.

It could be the mobo if none of the above works. I'm not sure about your RAID array controlled by the onboard controller, sorry.

edit... googled it...

RAID is not readily moved to a new system. When using a single disk, it is relatively straightforward to move the disk to a new system. Simply connect it to the new system, provided it has the same interface available. However, this is not so easy with a RAID array. A RAID BIOS must be able to read metadata from the array members in order to successfully construct the array and make it accessible to an operating system. Since RAID controller makers use different formats for their metadata (even controllers of different families from the same manufacturer may use incompatible metadata formats) it is virtually impossible to move a RAID array to a different controller. When moving a RAID array to a new system, plans should be made to move the controller as well. With the popularity of motherboard integrated RAID controllers, this is extremely difficult to accomplish. Generally, it is possible to move the RAID array members and controllers as a unit, and software RAID in Linux and Windows Server Products can also work around this limitation, but software RAID has other limitations (mostly performance related).

So, if you get the same board, it should work.