I was using Win XP and fedora 6 with mbr of linux,now Xp has corrupted and need to reinstall it.During installation the system hangs after the message "setup is checking hardware configuration".I guess it is becoz of mbr or fedora.
Win Xp was in C: and linux is in D:, other datas are in E:,F: drives.

The little clues I hv got is
1>to delete D: using fedora 6 dvd and then install XP ;or
2>to use partion magic or UBCD and change filesystem to NTFS or FAT32 ;or
3>change MBR(dont know how....)
4>unplug the hardisk intially and connect it after setup checks hrdwr confg(seems risky....)
in first two (or three) cases linux will be deleted which I dont want,and I am not sure about last two cases.
All I want is to save my data in E: and F: drives and avoid deleting linux,if possible.

System: lenovo laptop,512 ram,1 hrdsk(80gb),intel core duo prosr.

Please help me out

I recommend not to install XP. use a Virtual Machine under Fedora 6 if you would like to have W$ndows running on your machine.

Good Luck bud!

thanks for ur reply Ceantuco,it will be grt if u can be more descriptive.I m new to all these and cudnt get u properly.If possible,please tell me the steps I exactly need to do.
Thanks..

I do not see how a Linux partition 'is in D': Windows recognizes Linux partitions internally (as 'unknown'), but does not give them drive letters.

So if you really have C, D, E and F partitions, there should be either at least one other, the one that has Fedora, or there are only three ntfs/fat32 partitions C D E.

If your Fedora still works, open a terminal and do:
/sbin/fdisk -l

This should list your partitions and their file systems (ntfs, ext3, whatever).

All you really need for reinstalling WinXP is your C partition (shown as sda1 or hda1 by, e.g., fdisk -l).
You would not have to touch the other partitions.
Note however that you have to watch carefully what you tell the WinXP installer to do when you do a customized install.

I cannot remember exactly all the steps I took, but I have indeed reinstalled WinXP on my machine, without any trouble, and with a Linux bootloader in my MBR.

Writing a new generic MBR: you can do that by booting from a WinXP rescue CD and doing
fdisk /fixmbr
from a terminal (console).
But check documentation, I am not sure about the exact command.

Another option: use a SuperGRUB Live CD. This also has an option to write the generic MBR that WinXP likes.

In both cases you will have to reinstall your Linux bootloader. You can again use SuperGRUB to achieve this.

Finally, is your WinXP corrupted, or is the configuration of the bootloader corrupted? If the latter, checking this first can save you lots of time and trouble.

see this how to
" HOWTO Reinstall XP Without Destroying Fedora When the XP CD Balks"
http://forums.fedoraforum.org/showthread.php?t=167302
And fedora 6 hit END OF LIFE a long,long,long time ago and is no longer supported
install fedora 9 or 10