[serious] I have CentOS installed on my laptop, and it won't boot on an XP cd

I think the title about sums up my problem. I want to reinstall XP on my laptop, but for some reason, it can't boot onto an XP cd. I've tried a generic Student edition install, along with the recovery install specifically for my model laptop, and neither one works. Anyone know how to make it work?

p.s. Wossy, please don't kill me...

And off you go to General PC.

- Download GParted and burn it onto a cd
- Remove the partition(s)
- Reboot and it should load the Windows cd.

I would say thanks, but it's being a little on the 'tarded side... it keeps loading at some absurdly huge size, to the point where I can't make head or tails of what's going on or what I need to do, and I can't figure out how to shrink the size down any... given that there's only one partition, is there a certain set of keystrokes that'll accomplish what I need?

[right click] -> remove?
otherwise just format it to NTFS.

As in, I can't see ANYTHING. If I could see my partition in a list, I would have already removed it, but I can't. I can barely see below the menu bar, and it's rather annoying.

Have you tried the vesa driver or another option that applies to the situation? (in the cd boot loader)

I've tried all of them, and none of them let me see anything.

don't want to sound insulting, but have you tried setting it to boot directly from cd in the bios?

Naturally. My roomie suggested it was an OEM issue and gave me his external drive to try. I have yet to plug it in, since it would require fetching the USB cable from under my desk, but I shall let you know how it goes.