My Windows XP installation is a bit messed up so I want to re-install it without having to re-install Linux too.

I'm dual booting with XP and Debian using LILO boot loader.
I don't want to make any changes to partitions, just simply delete everything in the Windows partition and re-install into the same partition.
I don't know if any more info would help but I have 2 hard drives. The first is split into 2 partitions, one for Windows and one for Linux/Windows backups.
The second contains Debian, split over 2 partitions plus another spare partition for future use.

Can anyone give me a any help with this or point me to a simple tutorial? Any tuts I've found so far all assume you are changing partitions and stuff.

I would download the windows xp setup disks (floppy) from the microsoft website and do it that way. If that doesnt work for some reason because of a "A newer version of windows is already installed on this computer error", then get into llinux and reformat the windows partition and run the boot disks again.



How to obtain windows xp setup boot disks

Ah, thanks. I think it should be a fairly easy process this way.

Just out of interest. Would it also be possible this way?
1) Manually create a LILO boot disk.
2) Install Windows the normal way.
3) Boot into Linux using the LILO boot disk.
4) Run LILO to re-write it to the mbr.
5) Start up computer and everything works perfectly as before.

I ask this because after following the link and downloading the startup disk file, I realised that my XP disk is an upgrade disk, not the full installation so I have to install Windows 98 first then use the upgrade disk.
I can use the startup disks to install Win 98 fine but I'm not sure how things will work with the upgrade, I'm assuming it will write to the mbr and wipe out LILO.

That should work windoze doesn't have the option of not overwriting the MBR
sigh
As far is I can remember you only need to insert win98 disk
during installation of XP when it asks you. The last upgrade
disk I had was for '95