Does Grub Boot Windows XP on NTFS?

[Carlos Fernando Scheidecker Antunes]

Hello GRUB team,

 

I've recently acquired another notebook that, like my previous Compaq Presario, comes with Windows pre-installed. This time is the XP with NTFS partition. So I will use Partition Magic to shrink it so that I can have Red Hat 7.2 installed on it as well. Since BootMagic won't work because it cannot be installed on a NTFS partition I wonder if I have GRUB installed on the MBR it would boot Win XP as well.

 

Previously I've used LILO and I've noticed that if the ext partition is not on the first part of the HD it won't boot. So, because of that, I've used partition Magic to move Windows ME to the end of the HD and had Linux on the first part of the HD. I believe that is not a problem with GRUB, right?

 

After that, Red Hat released 7.2 which came with GRUB and I've noticed that it could boot Windows ME as well which LILO didn't.

 

My question is, since Win XP is quite different from Win ME and that it is installed on a NTFS partition, can I use GRUB on the MBR so that it could boot Linux and XP?

 

Is it possible?

 

Thank you,

 

Carlos Fernando Scheidecker Antunes.

The University of Utah.

Linux User #207984