Fedora 5 is running on my Dell Inspiron 1300 laptop. I need to put WinXP back and dont care if I reformat the entire HDD. I burnt GParted image to a CD using another computer, intending to reformat my laptop's entire HDD to a single NTFS partition. My laptop BIOS setup to look at the CD drive first. The CD drive spins but the HDD ends up rebooting Fedora from the HDD. How do I reformat my HDD to NTFS, so I can then let it read the XP installation CD's?

so you want to erase everything on your disk and install windows? during the windows install it will ask you to format, just do it then.

if the windows or GParted disks arent being loaded at boot as you want, burn the images again and make sure you create a bootable/system/iso disk.

Pop the bootable WinXP cd in the drive and boot from it. Follow its instructions and create/modify/delete the partitions.

Windows XP installation program has a problem formating a HD which has only linux on it. It may be due to the data structure of ext3 or something that linux use that makes the HD unformattable for windows. U need to do a low level format using bootable Disk Utility Program. U may want to use the the Disk Utility Program from the HD manufacturer from thier website or u can use a progam like Active Kill Disk from http://www.killdisk.com/.

Nah, if the 1300 is anything like the Inspiron 1100, you have to hit a pf key even if the CD is listed first in the BIOS.
In my case pf12 - check the splash screen on boot. Then you can select the CD as the boot device; the gparted disk should be fine for doing the work.

Thanks for the various answers. None of them work, in my situation.

- GParted was ignored, even when on a bootable CD

- Win XP CD does not get to the point where it asks if I want to format my HDD. I just get a black screen with flashing cursor. (These CD's still work on another laptop, which has NTFS format)

- I downloaded Kill Disk, unzipped then burnt onto CD in bootable format. It whirred in the drive, but Fedora appeared, again.

- F12 does indeed stop the Fedora boot process. I then select the option to boot from CD Drive. The drive whizzes, but Fedora booting appears, again.

- I did the Kill Disk again, after intervening with F12, but Fedora appears ... again.

I have a desktop with Fedora and am a true Linux convert. But I HAVE to get XP back on this laptop.

Any other suggestions, I will definitely try.

Appreciat your collective help.

From a (root) FC terminal session do they following (this will destroy your access to any data on the disk - you have been warned)Adjust the target (OutFile) in need. This erases your bootloader code and partition table - the XP installer will see it as an uninitialized disk, and quite happily install to it.

Not sure what you mean by "Adjust the target (OutFile)". So I entered the suggested command in root, verbatim. Got response :

dd: opening 'dev/hda': No such file or directory

I like the idea and hope you can get me across the line mate.

What I meant was, substitute the correct device - might be /dev/sda if you have S-ATA, might even be /dev/hdc on a laptop. "df" should tell you.

Yes, it was '/dev/hda1' and the command was accepted. It gave a message about "..510 in" followed by "...510 out", I should have written it down but it did seem to work.

I put the XP Reinstallation CD in the CD Drive, did a shutdown, then turned it back on. F12 made sure it looked at the CD, which whirred for a few seconds, then the screen just went black, no cursor visible. I waited 15 minutes in case it was doing something. Stoll no sign of life.

p.s. I took the CD out and it still boots Fedora ok.

If we can fix one thing here, it may get you out of the woods. You say that you are able to boot the XP install disks, but not the others---eg GParted. This may mean that something is wrong with how you are making these CDs. Look at one in you desktop and make sure it has many files and not just the one .iso file. Also, try to boot your desktop or any other computer with the CD(s)

Does the laptop have a floppy? If so, you can also get DBAN and put it on a floppy and boot the laptop from that. DBAN is at Sourceforge.

Can you get a utility disk from the manufactory and use it ti wipe the hard drive

Maybe--but things like DBAN will do just fine
BTW, I think DBAN is also on the Ultimate Boot CD--a handy thing to have in its own right.

pixellany, I cannot boot from the XP Reinstallation disks. They are the originals that came with the Dell laptop and are good. The drive whirrs, but the screen stays blank.

The Dell doesn't have a floppy drive so I'll pursue DBAN/Ultimate Boot CD. Thanks for your suggestions.

Do as I suggested - cut and paste the command, looks like you dropped the first "/".