why wont grub open?

[cmlipe]

Hey there, I'm new to Linux but smart enough to do a search before I searched Still haven't had any luck though so hopefully someone can help me out.

My computer is:

ASUS P4C-800E
P4 2.8 Mhz 800 fsb
1GB Corsair RAM
ATI Radeon 9800 128MB
1 - 36GB Western Digital SATA drive (25GB running Windows XP, 10GB [empty] Reserved for Linux)
1 - 200GB Western Digital EIDE Drive (Split into 2 partitions)

While installing FC1 the computer would not reboot like many ASUS using people had trouble with but would freeze after it detected my monitor, keyboard and mouse. So instead of banging my head against the wall I was able to complete a successful installation using the 'linux text' command. Everything went fine but when I reboot the computer it immediately goes into Windows XP without grub loading.

When I was trying to fix the boot loader I noticed something strange. On the Boot Loader Config page it gives me the option to choose either DOS or Fedora as my default... but the DOS it lists is in the location /dev/hdb1 when I am almost positive that it should be in /dev/sda1 since I installed Fedora on the sda drive and it offers to boot Fedora from /dev/sda3.

/dev/hdb1 is the first partition on my 200GB drive (which I once ran XP off of but no longer do. I had thought I erased all traces of it but maybe not...) It even says my MBR is located on /dev/hdb.

If it can recognize the DOS option on /dev/hdb1 then why cant it find it on /dev/sda1?? Or am I way off and it in fact should be looking for DOS in the given location.

Either way, I cant get grub to load and its driving me nuts. Any ideas?

Thanks in advance.

[imdeemvp]

is xp on primary hd?

if so the GRUB should be install in the primary hd because there is where the MBR is located...

[cmlipe]

Yeah, XP is on my Raptor Drive. It used to also be on the 200 GB drive but I am almost positive that I deleted all of the XP system files from that drive.

[imdeemvp]

if you want to really wipe out you xp go to www.maxtor.com and download their utility tools to low level your hd again....do a quick low level format since you have a large hd...

and if you want you can start fresh....

[cmlipe]

Yeah... I just hate the idea of starting fresh since I have so many different tweaks done to windows and it would take forever to get it back to how it is now.

Is there any way I can get grub to look elsewhere for a mbr?