GRUB GRand Unified Bootloader, a multiboot bootloader that is easy to install and configure. It can boot from the Master Boot Record on a hard drive or from a CD. Especially easy to set up for Puppy. http://wiki.linuxquestions.org/wiki/GRUB∞

To learn about the GNU GRUB project, please see: http://www.gnu.org/software/grub/∞

The manual for "legacy" GRUB, including 0.96 installable from Puppy installer, please see: http://www.gnu.org/software/grub/manual/∞

GRUB (short for GRand Unified Boot Loader) is a boot loader, similar in overall function to LILO. It is the standard way to boot into an operating system (or several) used by most recent Linux distributions, but capable of being loaded on any Linux distro.

Go here∞ for a comparison of Lilo & Grub, written by Laurence Bonney (IBM).

From TheBabbs - I run Puppy Linux 1.0.6 (soon to be 1.0.7) and Fedora Core 3 on the same desktop machine. Each has its own partition on different drives. When I first added Puppy Linux to this system, I had the hardest time configuring the GRUB install which Fedora had previously installed. It was not until someone provided me a sample configuration that I was able to hack "/boot/grub/grub.conf" to add an option to choose which Linux I wanted to use. In light of that, here is what I presently have in my grub.conf file:

# grub.conf
#
default=0
fallback=1
timeout=5
splashimage=(hd1,0)/grub/splash.xpm.gz
hiddenmenu
password --md5 xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx
title Puppy Linux (1.0.6)

title Fedora Core (2.6.11-1.35_FC3)

MBR Solving problems with

if grub is more or less working, you should be able to boot Win XP by booting, press C to get a grub command line interface, then type:

root (hd0,0)
chainloader +1

you should be able to fix the mbr by booting the Win XP installation cd, getting the recovery console interface, then typing

fixmbr

but your Windows cd may not have a recovery console

i'm not sure, but i think you can install any standard mbr ... all the mbr should need to do is transfer control to the boot sector of the partition that Windows is installed on

one way to install a standard mbr from Puppy is to download mbr.bin and type:
dd if=mbr.bin of=/dev/hda
see: pclinuxos wiki∞
i think this should work without overwriting your partition table, because mbr.bin is 446 bytes

if it were to over write the entire 512 bytes of the mbr, your partition table would be gone, and everything on your drive would be lost ... you should be able to backup the entire mbr sector first by typing something like:
dd if=/dev/hda of=mbr.save bs=512 count=1
you should be able to restore it by typing:
dd if=mbr.save of=/dev/hda bs=512

you should be able to burn a bootable floppy or floppy image to a cd using any burning program, so if you don't have a floppy drive but you do have a cd drive, it should not be a problem

Ultimate Boot CD should be able to install a standard mbr:
http://www.ultimatebootcd.com/∞