I goofed.
First there was no /dev/sda1 on this drive, because space was previously from removed Windows, free space allocated back to Linux /dev/sda2 which is Linux /
Resized / partition to get 10gb free space back to install WindowsXP on.
and I made free space as a NTFS partition. I have WinXP installed, BUT!!
Windows is on /dev/sda2 and Linux / is on /dev/sda1, which causes problem
for Linux to boot off of /dev/sda2.

How do I change Partitions around for.

Windows /dev/sda1
Linux / /dev/sda2 ??

Can I use Fdisk or Gparted to change Partition numbers. ? And how would I do that ??

There is not reason why Linux can't boot off sda2. What are you using to boot, Grub or windows bootloader? I assume after you re-installed xp you can boot to it? You know that it wrote over your master boot record entry for Linux (you neglected to mention which Linux distribution you are using) for whatever bootloader you were using. If you were using Grub previously, you now have the xp bootloader and you need to either modify it to boot Linux or re-install Grub.

FC 10
Here is my Fdisk;


DEv BOOT START END Blocks ID SYSTEM

/dev/sda1 1 5099 40957686 83 Linux
/dev/sda2 * 5100 6374 10241432+ 7 HPFS/NTFS
/dev/sda3 6375 14815 67802332+ 83 Linux
/dev/sda4 14816 14946 1052257+ 5 Extended
/dev/sda5 14816 14946 1052227 82 LinuxSwap

The sda1 is really the / Linux boot partition.

When I resized the /dev/sda2 / partition to get 10gb of free space to
make a partition, /dev/sda1 for WindowsXP NTFS, Gparted changed the Partition number.

From what I can see is delete /dev/sda2 and change /dev/sda1 Linux / to /dev/sda2 to get back to Linux / as Boot.

I don't know a whole bunch about Linux, so please be very definitive on what I need to do to get these partitions straighten out.

FC10 is a new install and I don't want to loose /home and My sister has just got to have Windows

sda2 is /
sda3 is /home

If I understand your situation correctly, you originally had xp, removed it, put Fedora on, re-installed xp??? If that's the situation, xp has overwritten your master boot record which is why you can't boot Fedora. I am assuming that is the problem??

If that is the problem, you need to either modify your xp boot files or re-install Grub to the mbr from Fedora. You could use the install disk for Fedora or any Linux OS. If you don't know how to do this, post back.

If that's not the problem, could you be more specific about exactly what it is, what you can boot and not.

Your assumptions are all correct.

If I had NTFS on sda2 and the linux boot / on sda1 and I changed Grub setup to boot off sda1 instead of, "Originally" sda2, and I did a grub-install /dev/sda ,
Would the Windows Partition be seen and booted from in the Linux boot Menu ??

And just exactly what and how do I edit in Grub to boot off sda1 instead of sda2 ??

I would like to put the Linux / boot back at sda2, and WindowsXP at sda1 but I don't know how to do that

sda1 / linux boot
sda2 NTFS WindowsXP
sda3 /home
sda4 Extended
sda5 Linux Swap

I don't have time to dig into this at the moment, but the "booting" link below in my sig might help.

I expect there was. That's where windows was before you installed Fedora and deleted windows. When you delete a partition, my understanding is that the other partitions get re-numbered.

You installed Fedora. If you had run fdisk -l at this point, you would have seen sda1 as a Linux partition. You then re-installed xp by shrinking the Fedora / (root) partition which is why xp is sda2 not sda3 (/home).

In an earlier post you had this:
No, it's not. Look at the fdisk -l output you posted. sda1 and sda3 are your Linux partitions and sda2 is xp.

In the above statement, is sda1 a separate /boot partition or is it just the root partition with sda3 as a separate /home partition? Makes a difference.

It would but you need to manually enter, I think. Haven't used Fedora lately and am not sure if it manually detects windows installs.

Why? Doesn't matter which partition either are on as long as xp is on a primary. If you want xp to be default, OS that can be easily changed. Following instructions assume sda1 is your "ROOT" partition.

Put the Fedora CD in the drive, log in as root, type 'grub' when you get the root prompt. Your prompt should change to 'grub>' (without quotes). Here you enter:

root (hd0,0) (hit enter key)
setup (hd0) (hit enter key)
quit (hit enter key)

The first command shows Grub on which partition to find bootloader files. The second command puts stage1 file of Grub in the master boot record pointing to sda1. Third command exits Grub.

You should then be able to boot Fedora. If so, Fedora has a file in /boot/grub directory called menu.lst, maybe grub.conf. You may need to put an entry there for xp like:

rootnoverify (hd0,1)
chainloader +1

Let usn know how things go. If your sda1 is actually a boot partition and not root, instructions will be different.

I'm assuming you are only able to boot xp now??

or simply get super grub disk and fix it automatically

Thanks for your help