Quote Originally Posted by jmort
... I will probably need to reformat my FAT32 partition...
Why that ? You just need to install a win98se dos system. ME is not really apropriate since msft removed dos from it even though you can put it back, it is some kind of a hack. This is exactly why I suggested you to use a USB dongle: format the usb dongle with the tools I gave you, boot from it, use the sys.com I gave you in the previous link to install the dos 98se into your fat32 from the usb dongle, and now you can use grub.exe to boot various OS, including XP, Linux... But don't even try sys.com from windows. I can make a 98se dos floppy disk boot image if you really need to.

Quote Originally Posted by jmort
... Download a copy of freeDos from the net, install to the FAT32 partition and boot it from the boot.ini file, which by now is a procedure that I am VERY familiar with. From there, hopefully GRUB.EXE will work properly.
That will work just as good as the win98se dos (dos 7.1 or 7.10), but do not load emm386 before starting grub.

Quote Originally Posted by jmort
... Substitute LILO for GRUB, which may require more research. It appears that my system does not like grub. I have no clue as to why except for the hypothesis that it is due to the NTFS drive being compressed. Uncompressing it is not an option, as i don't think there is enough space to do so. Has anyone had success using LILO instead of GRUB?...
Well I have spend quite some time with both lilo and grub, and with my experience I like grub much better. Easier to install, to use, and to repair. Grub is much more powerfull (network boot, floppy/disk image boot, cd boot, chainload, ...) Lilo has a lot of limitations but one thing I like with loadlin.exe (lilo for dos) is that it can go back to dos if the boot fails. I have tried a couple of other bootloaders, each one of them have some goods and bads, but grub has my preference.
PS: the ntfs compression is only an issue to start grub from the XP bootloader ntldr. Once grub started from grub.exe via dos boot from your fat32, or from the disk/partition mbr, or from floppy or a usb dongle, grub can start and load everyting except files stored in a compressed ntfs partition, reason why you need to store your kernel, inird and iso file in your fat32 partition. And I can bet that lilo and other bootloaders will suffer the same problem. And btw, grub is the only bootloader I know which is capable to load files (like the kernel) from a (non compressed) ntfs partition.
Regards, Gilles