Hi,
Trying to fix a laptop for someone and an error message comes up when I turn it on. Error message is: "Non-System disk or disk error" I upgraded the hard drive to a 40GB from a 20GB to see if this would help. What happened originally was that the 20GB hard drive had fallen out while the owner was at the airport. Any suggestions on how to fix this?

Welcome to SAF!

If you just installed a new harddrive there is nothing on it to boot to. You will need to install the Operating system and all programs. You may need to change the Boot Order in the bios to boot from floppy, usb, or optical drive first to not get the error message. You then use the whatever bootable media you have to start the install.

We can give you some specific help, but need to know:
What is the make/model of laptop?
What configuraiton (cdrom, dvd, floppy, usb drive, etc)
What operating system do you have to load?
DO you only have restore cd's (that might be a problem)?

The fish,

I would like to know how the hard drive "fell out" !!!!!

Most notebook hard drives are a "buster" to remove, even if you know what you are doing.

P.S. Was that "non-system disk" error message from the 20 gig HD or the 40 gig HD, OR both ???