Windows systems are using the NTFS (New Technology File System) file system for quite some time now as it is fast, secure, and reliable from its predecessors. That is the reason some of the users use FAT (File Allocation Table) file system apparently convert from FAT to NTFS. However, at times the conversion can go haywire as some critical files go missing during the conversion.

In such cases, you should replace the files to recover hard drive using the setup CD of the operating system. If the method does not work, then you should use a third-party Windows hard drive recovery to do the needful.

Let us assume a practical situation in which you have used the 'convert drive: /fs:ntfs' command to convert the file system of your Windows XP system from FAT32 to NTFS. However, when you try to start the system you fail to do so. An error message is displayed in this case, which is:

“Windows could not start because the following file is missing or corrupt: System32\Drivers\Ntfs.sys”

Cause:

The possible cause of this problem is that the NTFS.sys file may have become corrupt or is missing when you converted the hard disk to NTFS file system.

Resolution:

To resolve this situation, you should replace the missing files using the following steps:

Insert the Windows XP CD-ROM in the CD-ROM CD drive and restart the system. Press R to select the 'To repair a Windows XP installation using Recovery Console, press R' option, when the 'Welcome to Setup' screen appears. In the command prompt, enter the following commands and press Enter after each command to rename the corrupt ntfs.sys file. If the file is missing, then nothing will happen: cd \windows\system32\drivers ren ntfs.sys ntfs.old Type the following command and press Enter: copy cd:\i386\ntfs.sys drive:\windows\system32\drivers Remove the Windows XP CD-ROM and type 'quit' and press Enter to exit Recovery Console. Restart the system.

If the problem is still appearing even after performing these steps, then you should recover hard drive before reinstalling the operating system. For this purpose, you should use a third-party Windows hard drive recovery software to do the needful. These data recovery tools use fast and advanced scanning algorithms that do not damage the existing hard drive while recovering the data.

The most effective hard drive recovery software that works for NTFS, FAT, and exFAT file systems is Stellar Phoenix Windows Data Recovery. With the ability to recover more than 185 different file types from various storage media such as hard drives, external hard drives, iPods, etc, this hard drive recovery software is capable of recovering deleted emails from Outlook Express and MS Outlook. In addition, this software is compatible with Windows 7, Vista, Server 2003, XP, 2000, and NT4(SP6).