make sure the windows xp cd isn't a dell... because i had a similar problem and i couldn't boot off the xp cd because dell made it only compatible with dell mobo's... and if that doesn't work, then make a 98 boot disk, and stick it in there... the choose the option 3 and delete everything... then click option 1 and create 1 main partition... and it should make it active automaticly... then when says restart press esc like it says and then type in format c: instead of fdisk... and then boot off the windows xp cd..