Running FC5/WinXP Dual Boot, need to reformat WinXP but keep FC5

[SideshowMel]

If the title didn't already tell you, I need to reformat my WinXP partition but leave FC5 just the way it is. I currently have a dual-boot scenario using GRUB. I know that once I run the WinXP installer, it will overwrite the boot partition and I will be unable to access my FC5 partition. So would it be best to create a GRUB floppy bootable disk or burn an FC5 recovery disc instead? I'm concerned mainly with losing my FC5 partition, but if I do, oh well, I'll just run the FC6 installer once I have WinXP up. I just thought I could save some time by posting here first. System specs:

Intel D915GAV mb with 1GB RAM
3.00 GHtz P4 processor
2 SATA Seagate HDD's (one has two OS partitions: WinXP and FC5 (and of course a boot partition), the other is just for data storage)
WinXP SP2 and FC5. Dual-boot with GRUB.

So everything is working fine now except that I majorly F'ed up my Win partition and it's extremely sluggish, so no rush on the MUCH-APPRECIATED assistance. Thanks.

[joe.pelayo]

Just be careful in the XP installation program. Effectively it will overwrite the MBR and you will need to reinstall GRUB. If you have the DVD/CD from where you installed FC you won't need any floppy. There are many thread showing how to reinstall GRUB in this forum. Make sure you don't delete the Linux partitions!

[SideshowMel]

Thanks.Thanks.Thanks.

[joe.pelayo]

Your welcome, good luck.

[SideshowMel]

Well the snag now is that I can't get the WinXP disc to see the partitions, and since I only have SATA, GParted isn't working. MAybe I could boot to the FC5 install disc in resuce mode and fdisk the WinXP partition and the boot partition, then immediately boot to WinXP install disc, run installer, then go back and reinstall grub with the FC5 install disc in rescue mode. What is the prompt to do that again?

[joe.pelayo]

It is a good plan indeed. I hope you can carry it out. To reinstall GRUB you only have to type:
chroot /mnt/sysimage
grub-install /dev/<your device>
There are some threads dealing with this already in the forum, so if you want more information you can use the Search function.

[SideshowMel]

is "<your device>" the boot partition on the primary drive, right?

EDIT:
is it possible that sda6 is my /boot partition? The Fedora 5 LVM says that is it, but I thought the boot partition was always first. Either I'm wrong about that or the LVM is misinforming me. Also, when I boot the FC5 disc in rescue mode, would you suggest I format only the WinXP partition (sda1) or both sda1 and sda6?

[joe.pelayo]

By <device> I referred to the hard drive that boots first in your BIOS.

[joe.pelayo]

If the problem is with XP you'd better format his partition only. I don't know how is you computer configured but in my case I have my drive hda with XP, NTFS (hda1), storage, NTFS (hda2), my root partition for FC "/" (hda3), then starts my extended partition (/hda4) which contains both my swap (hda5) and my /home (hda6). When reinstalling XP I only format hda1 and reinstall GRUB in hda.
Hope this helps.

[SideshowMel]

Disk /dev/sda: 120.0 GB, 120034123776 bytes
255 heads, 63 sectors/track, 14593 cylinders
Units = cylinders of 16065 * 512 = 8225280 bytes

Device Boot Start End Blocks Id System
/dev/sda1 * 1 10010 80405293+ 7 HPFS/NTFS
/dev/sda2 10011 14593 36812947+ f W95 Ext'd (LBA)
/dev/sda5 10011 12627 21021021 b W95 FAT32
/dev/sda6 12628 12640 104391 83 Linux
/dev/sda7 12641 14593 15687441 8e Linux LVM

Disk /dev/sdb: 120.0 GB, 120034123776 bytes
255 heads, 63 sectors/track, 14593 cylinders
Units = cylinders of 16065 * 512 = 8225280 bytes

Device Boot Start End Blocks Id System
/dev/sdb1 2 14593 117210240 f W95 Ext'd (LBA)
/dev/sdb5 2 7298 58613121 83 Linux
/dev/sdb6 7299 14593 58597056 7 HPFS/NTFS

Disk /dev/dm-0: 13.9 GB, 13925089280 bytes
255 heads, 63 sectors/track, 1692 cylinders
Units = cylinders of 16065 * 512 = 8225280 bytes

Disk /dev/dm-0 doesn't contain a valid partition table

Disk /dev/dm-1: 2080 MB, 2080374784 bytes
255 heads, 63 sectors/track, 252 cylinders
Units = cylinders of 16065 * 512 = 8225280 bytes

Disk /dev/dm-1 doesn't contain a valid partition table

[SideshowMel]

That's the results from
# /sbin/fdisk -l

My sdb partitions are for storage only, and I don't plan to change them.

[SideshowMel]

And according to the Fedora 5 LVM, /dev/sda6 is set as /boot.
When I first set this up, I really didn't know what I was doing, but it works.

[joe.pelayo]

You are running Windows in FAT32, ehh? I don't think you have to format anything else than the XP partition. However I can not assure you the Windows installed will like it very much.

[SideshowMel]

No that FAT32 is just so I can easily transfer files between the two OS's. WinXP is running off the NTFS partition, /dev/sda1.

[SideshowMel]

Well I'm going to do it today, so thanks so much for your help.