Installing Windows XP - will it delete existing data?

[samsayit]

If I choose to install Windows XP on a drive/partition that already has data on it, will those data be deleted during installation?

Problem in a nutshell:
I have installed my new motherboard with four SATA drives in RAID0+1, leaving no other driver connectors available. I have all my data backup on a fifth SATA drive and now have no way to transfer them.
I have just bought an external USB backup drive however, and my plan is to disconnect my RAID set, hook up the fifth drive which contains the backup data, install Windows XP on it WITHOUT of course deleting the existing data. Then from XP, transfer the backup data to the external USB drive. And finally disconnect the fifth drive again and reconnect the RAID set, and from the OS there get the data from the USB drive :-S

 

[g-paw]

You're likely to lose the data when installs because I believe Windows would have to format the drive before installation because it has to install on a Primary rather than a Logical dirve. I'm not really familiar with RAID, i.e., never set it up, but I think the best way to do this is to uninstall all but one drive, install Windows, put in the data drive and transfer the data to the external drive and then set up your RAID

 

[samsayit]

You know what that is so obvios what you suggest I should have thought of it my self.
I will have to delete the RAID set, disconnect all but one of the drives and then do it on that.

Thanks!

 

[g-paw]

Glad it helped, at least I find, I usually miss the obvious when I'm trying to solve a problem. Why it's good to talk to others