Ok, I know there's about a million threads on dual boot issues with Windows/Linux, but none of them seem to help. Here's a description of what's going on:

A while ago I was told to get Linux, so I got it (Fedora Core 2-test2) and dual booted (via GRUB) with Windows XP. (I had XP installed before FC2, XP was on hda, FC2 on hdb) Everything worked fine, I just used default settings for GRUB, and never ran into an issue.

Fast foward a few weeks to when FC2-test3 was released. At this point I'm comfortable with Linux, so I decide to install Linux on a partition of hda (the faster drive), and install Windows again on hda later. So I format hda (through the FC installer), and install FC to it.

A few weeks goes by, and I get my hands on Adobe Premere, which I need Windows for. So I decide to install WinXP again, not anticipating issues, since it worked the first time. At this point, I have FC2 on hda1 (ext3), and I've got hda2 (FAT32) all ready to sit WinXP on. Starting with Win98 (because WinXP install wasn't booting itself), I install Windows. Once Windows is installed, I use GRUB to boot to Win98 to finish the installer (it copies the files, then the final config stuff happens after a reboot). When I select Windows from the GRUB menu, I get "SYSTEM DISK ERROR"

After unsuccessfully looking for a solution to my issue, I attempt to install Windows XP again. I can't get the CD to boot itself, but I find winnt.exe in the /i386 directory, which appears to be the WinXP installer. I run it, it copies files over, then it reboots (to finish setup). I select Windws from the GRUB menu, and now I get "Disk Error".

A few days goes by, and I finally come across a bug in FC2 that messes up dual boot w/ WinXP, so I decide to move to Mandrake 10 instead. In the Mandrake 10 install, I format each one of my partitions, and repartition. At the moment, I have my Linux partition as hda2, my Windows partition as hda1, and a swap partition. After doing that, I ran winnt.exe again, it reinstalled itself, and I'm still getting the same error.

My windows entry for GRUB (although I've tried just about every combination I could find, including map, and rootnoverify) is:
root (hd0,1)
chainloader +1

I've been bashing my head over this issue for the last week, and I've finally decided to post here. Any help would be quite appriciated.

Thanks,
Adam A Flynn

I believe it should be this

rootnoverify (hd0,0)
chainloader +1

try that and see what happens...try this one too

root (hd0,0)
chainloader +1

On my laptop it works with
title Windoz
root (hd0,3)
chainloader +1

My windows partition is the 4th primary partition (starting at 0)

bye

As I said, I've tried a number of GRUB configurations. rootnoverify has no effect, nor does pointing it to hd0,0.

installing windows after linux should have converted your system to the windows bootloader. grub should have been wiped out (you may be trying to modify the nt bootloader???). the easiest way to go about setting up a dual boot system is to install windows before linux.

also, you may not be entirely installing winxp by executing winnt.exe on the disc. i suggest you configure your bios to boot from cd before booting from the hard drive to be able to properly install windows.

I've reinstalled GRUB after installing winXP [using setup(hd0)], and I've made my BIOS boot from CD, but it's being a bugger about it. (It keeps saying that there's a system disk error, so there's probably something wrong with my XP CD).

What's the Linux equivilant to format C: under DOS? I'm trying to completly wipe hda so that I can be sure my install is from a 100% clean system. Also, is parted any good at messing with the partition table without formatting the drive? (So that I can install Windows, then partition, then install Linux)

to completely wipe all your partitions run "cfdisk" and if you want it on a disk other than /dev/hda you much type "cfdisk /dev/hdb" for /dev/hdb Delete all the partitions, write it to the disk, and then install windows, then install linux(es)