hello, I installed PartitionMagic, tried the 'Install Another Operating System' option twice. It did not work. It asked me to reboot, but then nothing. I realised that I should do something after rebooting. On the help menu it said that, once I reboot, I still have to go through certain procedure in the PartitionMagic Anyway, I clicked on Start >Program> PartionMagic> PQBoot. I then received a black box asking me: " select the operating system partition you wish to boot using one of the partition IDs above....". I selected option 1 for drive E and rebooted. Since then it just keeps rebooting, and showing blue screen briefly. Before that i had C: partition and another partition which is called 'Recovery something'. please help.

See if you can boot into safe mode & change the boot setting. The recovery partition that you apparently deleted was necessary for reinstalling XP using the Sony recovery disks. "And that's the fishing line, because Sharkboy said so!"

What other operating system were you trying to install ?

Thank you both for the reply. jam, The recovery partition has not been deleted. they are both there. and probably other partition was created when i tried to install a win xp. as i mentioned i did not complete the process though. kx5m2g, It is window XP Media center. the existing OS is win xp home. I tried to keep both partitions(the C: driver for win xp and the Recovery partion, which i dont know what it is), and also, i wanted to add new one to install another Win xp which i don't know if it has been created. i tried to boot in save mode but press F8 doesn't do it. my computer is sony VGN-FS41

If i can boot even in safe Mode, I would just reverse the operation. i.e selecting different OS in the program menu. but i was not able to boot in safe mode. i tried F8, delete, and F1

I would try running the recovery console from an XP CD and then selecting fixboot and fixmbr. Hopefully that will allow you to boot into the C drive. You could also try bootcfg and see what the menu options give you. You could then try Partion Magic again, but from what I have read it is more difficult doing a dual boot with two versions of XP. Older versions of Partion Magic used to require installing boot magic to an FAT32 partition. I'm not sure what it requires now-I use Partion Magic myself, but not for dual booting.

thank you. I have gone thought the process of installing a new OS and noticed that drive C became drive E. I could recognise them because of the size difference. This is probably why I could not boot. i.e because the C partition became E, and what is now C was not bootable. What I did is installing an new OS in the new ‘C’ partition and I am able to boot up. I also changed the index.ini file to get the option to boot to the E partition (previously c ) I do not know if the Recovery Partition is still valid or not. Thank you for your assistance. Regards,