Error loading operating system

[Zenovka]

Hey, guys, I think I just broke everything forever.

So, a little background here, I've been fooling with Linux for a while, mainly with Ubuntu, and always went back to Windows because Ubuntu never recognized my ethernet cables or wireless adapters. I saw that Ubuntu was based on Debian, so I decided I'd give it a try, and now everything's dead.

I started by downloading the Debian install CD image for the i386 architecture, burned it to a disc, and then booted it on my desktop (writing from the laptop right now.) Was afraid of the scary partitioner, figured I'd just go back to Windows and make my partition there. Made a 30 GB partition for Debian, and booted from disc again. Debian saw the partition, and the installation was underway.

But then I started to hit some bumps. Apparently, some of the files on the Debian CD were corrupt. I hit continue every time it happened, hoping they weren't anything serious. Eventually Debian found some sort of enormous pothole on my CD, and then promptly fell into it, turning my screen red and yelling about not be able to finish the installation. Dissapointed, I rebooted my computer, to go back to Windows in shame.

However, Windows wasn't there. It was telling me there was an error loading my operating system. I got kind of afraid, but figured at worst I'd just have to reformat, and I've been needing to anyway. So, in an effort to try and recover anything I could off of the hard drive before I raped its women and pillaged its towns, I burned me a Ubuntu LiveCD, and tried to boot off of that.

No dice.

It was kind of confusing. I had set the correct boot priority on my BIOS, had the disc in the right drive, it was the right kind of disc.. what could've been wrong? Figuring it was corrupt, I burned a new one.

Yet again, no dice.

I then tried booting off of the discs on the laptop, and it worked perfectly. It isn't like I can't boot from disc on my desktop, I mean I just did that twice in a row with the Debian install CD.

At this point, I don't know what else to do. I've pretty much gone to the farthest reaches of my troubleshooting abilities. I'm hoping that you guys, the kind gurus of LinuxForums.org, will be able to help me out of the hole I've tossed myself into.

[jledhead]

to fix winders you need to boot off of your windows install cd. when it comes up to the options choose R for repair and then once you get logged into the command prompt you need to use this command

fixmbr

this will install a winders mbr and you should be able to boot back into windows

for your debian problem. you can try and burn another CD, maybe that was a bad disc. you could also try to burn it slower. There is also the possibility if both fail that you have a failing cd drive.

Either way, at least the top part should get you back

[devils casper]

In case fixmbr doesn't work, boot up from SuperGRUB CD and select Fix Windows Boot Loader option. Windows Installation Media will work after that.

Have you verified MD5SUM of downloaded Debian .iso image?

[iwanabeguru]

It seems to be a hardware problem.
I think the ide connectors on the board or on the cd reader are corroded or maybe the cable are broken.

so check the cable and pull out and plug back some times to remov the oxyd layer