Installing XP with existing partitions

Problem: When I install windows, I end up with the boot files on another drive, i want them all on the 'C drive' not on my drive full of something else or my temp drive.

I have a raid0 array of 2x 250G drives, anyway I have one partition that is ~450 gigs and the rest I use for my system, the general idea is I want the setup like this

partiton #1 - Windows with all its boot files!
partition #2 - temp drive, IE cache, etc
partition #3 - my 450 gig partition of 'stuff'

For some reason i will end up with ntdl, msdos.sys, boot.ini and all those files on one of my other drives that i do not want that stuff on. It would be simple enough if I could just move that 450 gigs of stuff some where else for a bit, but I do not have the extra space for that.

So far my ideas have been to use linux fdisk and change the 2 digit partiton type ID thing to something else, then change it back after installing, but im not sure that will work and do not want to loose my data.

I also seem to think that having that 450 gigs as a extended/logical drive would get windows not to put crap there on install.. I also wondered if this had to do with what partiton was active, i can try most these options without screwing anything up but wanted to know if we knew why windows chooses to put crap on my other partition while installing windows on another.

any help would be appreciated, thanks

 

Does windows not ask you what partition you want to install it on?

Did with me.

For playing around with partitions without losing data you can use a program such as partition magic. Works very well.

 

its not that windows doesnt go where i want it to, its the boot-up files for windows-xp.

yes \windows ends up on the partiton i select, but the bootup files will end up it seems where windows wants to put them, from what i read i doubt it will put them on a logical drive, so thats what im going for. about 3 hours before i posted this i started partition magic changing that 450 gig partition to a logical drive, from what i read windows cant boot from a logical drive, so if all goes well enough i can keep it from screwing with that partition.

i just dont want those bootup files on my temp drive or other drives, for some obvious reasons and my own personal things lol. i want my 'big stuff drive' to have nothing but some folders there with all my crap sorted, not some bootup files for windows-xp when they can be on my 'c drive' where they belong.

one of my past installs it stuck the stuff on my temp drive, i compressed one of the files and ended up having to use a recovery console to uncompress it, lol. or i will end up deleting it.

this time i ended up with the boot files on my 'stuff' drive... its just annoying and i have a habbit of screwing, moving, sorting, deleting, etc stuff, espically stuff not in c:\ which is where i want these boot-up files..

i still have partition magic running atm, im sure it will want to run for another 3 hours or something.. yippie.

 

i still would like to know if anyone knows how windows xp decides where to put the files like ntldr, msdos.sys, boot.ini, etc when its installing, what makes it decide that.. that i guess is my real question.