My wasn't a suggestion for you to follow now, it was a suggestion to follow when re-formatting/re-partitioning, and a (needed) clarification about the fact that you can format and repartition all the times you want, but still some data (that may actually prevent an install of some picky OS on some particular hardware/BIOS) will remain untouched.

Now, in order to help you in troubleshooting and hopefully solve the problem:

Can you tell us WHICH BSOD STOP code do you get?

Can you check with a disk editor/viewer whether sectors 2-63 are all 00's or not?

jaclaz

OK I'll try that and get back to you - cheers

I'm not sure how to do this. Can anyone tell me?

http://linux.softpedia.com/screenshots/bsod_1.png

You should see something like that

I'm not sure how to do this. Can anyone tell me?

For the first part, just read what numebr the BSOD is and report it.

For second part, get a freeware hex/disk editor, like, as an example this one:

http://www.mitec.cz/hex.html

http://www.mitec.cz/Data/XML/data_downloads.xml

http://www.mitec.cz/Downloads/HEXEdit.zip

Open the DISK - not the partition(s) - loading first 63 sectors.

Apert first ones, all the others should be filled with 00's.

jaclaz

Back to basics... Does your XP install cd include Service Pack 1 or higher ? If not, you will have a problem installing on a partition that goes beyond the 127Gig on your disk.