Reinstalling XP, odd question...

In my main computer, I have a 20gig wich has XP installed on it, and a 40gig wich contains most of my graphics apps and space hogging programs, plus a large amount of varoius works in progress.

Now, I need to take out the 20gig drive for a linux box I am building for a room mate. I plan on keeping the 40gig, as it provides ample space and better performance than the older 20gig.

What I am wondering is if it possible to install XP on the 40gig without wiping everything that is currently on it before I remove the 20gig from the system, wich currently contains the XP root directory.

Backing up 5gigs of graphics work wont take an impossible ammount of time, but it would be lengthy, but its the reinstalling everything after sitting through the XP install process that I dont want to deal with.

So what it comes down to is if I try to install an XP root directory onto my 40gig, can it be done without wiping current data and installed programs?

yes....but Id use Norton Ghost

What id do, is since you not going to use the 20gb

Id use norton ghost to ghost the 40gb to the 20 gb (not disk to disk) but (disk to image) but the data on the 40 gb must no be bigger that 20gb

if so then norton will not work.. unless you back up on cd's

anywho once you get the back up, Id install xp on the 40 wiping out everything, then install ghost explorer..hookup the 20 gb as slave then open the ghost.img file form ghost explorer and extract all the files you want to restore :)

I know I could never live without my Norton Utilities. But Ghost is one I still do not have. Looks like I really am missing out on a good one.

got 2003 here, its full of things that are handy.
even has support for IM's