When I turn on my laptop I get a black screen saying "NTLDR is missing. Press CTRL ALT DLT to restart." I can press F2 to enter setup or F12 to enter boot menu, but after I save and exit is goes back to the same black screen with grey text. I can't get my laptop to boot up.

I've searched google and it said that only XP and early Windows' OS's use NTLDR, but I had Vistax32 and Ubuntu installed. XP (or anything earlier) was never installed on this laptop.

Originally Posted by richc46

Welcome
Although normally an XP problem, this notice may be due to a boot problem. One fo the many causes of a boot problem is a failing HD. Be sure to back up your stuff on an external hard drive as soon as possible. You should then test your hard drive.

But how do I back up my files if I can't get my laptop to boot?

Originally Posted by richc46

If you cannot use Ubuntu to back up your stuff or it cannot load you probably have a hardware problem such as hard drive
Use Ubuntu Live CD to Backup Files from Your Dead Windows Computer - How-To Geek

Ok. Thank you for the help.

I didn't specify this in my original post, but my HDD makes a clicking noise when I turn on my laptop. I recently learned that this is called "the click of death." So disk failure is the obvious culprit. I just hope I'm able to recover my data, or at least some of it.

Originally Posted by richc46

Do it as soon as possible. After you have given up and feel all is lost, take the hard drive put it in a baggie and then put that into another baggie and put the whole thing in the freezer overnight. This is not a joke.

Yes, I did read up on the freezer trick. I'm going to try it.

But since it's now known my HDD is failing/failed. I guess I should start looking into buying a new one. Is it cheaper to buy a new HDD and install it in my current laptop or would I be better off just buying a completely new laptop?