Windows XP bootmgr missing?

[SirCyber]

ok, I've been looking for a solution for this for a friend of mine. cannot really find any useful information, even on the few instances it has come up on this forum. My friend has not installed windows vista at all! he tried to install windows 7, it had hardware incompatabilities *it's an older machine* so he then used the format utility off the windows 7 disk and reinstalled windows xp. ok, he got his system up and going yesterday, 03aug09, and was stable until today, 04aug09. since he installed all his drivers he has not restarted it until today, after uninstalling a codec pack. his hardware config is as follows:
80GB IDE hdd
500 GB SATA hdd
AMD Athlon 64 3000
2 GB RAM *he can't remember brand*
ATI Radeon X1600
Antec *maybe 350 watt? he's confused lol*

Now, I have his hardware config in here because there seems to be some pointers towards SATA drivers. Also RAID drivers? one more thing, he does NOT have a floppy disk drive. now that you know everything that I can think of putting in here, you are going to tell me more that I don't know and hopefully along the run someone will have the answer that I need! Thanks all!

 

[KSoD]

Here is something.

Windows 7 and Vista use the same bootloader. So if he tried to install Win7 and it failed for whatever reason that would be why the BCD loader is taking preference over the XP bootloader.

The first problem is that he used the format of Win7. That is only a quick format and it stinks. If he was going to install XP he should have used the XP Format options and did a full format. There is probably some junk left over from the Win7 install that is messing with his XP Install. I have had that happen. He will need to do a full format with Gparted or the XP CD.