GRUB, MBR and NTLDR confusion

[Gary W. Swearingen]

Alan McKinnon <alan at linuxholdings.co.za> writes:

> Grub can be installed on the MBR of a disk, or the boot sector of a 
> partition. What you want is to install it to the MBR of /dev/hda. 
>
> Do not try and make NTLDR the primary boot loader - that way lies 
> madness.

(Side comment: whatever NTLDR is, it's not the primary boot loader;
that's whatever code is (or maybe just begins, in the case of grub) in
the MBR.  On most PC's it's the little program in the MBR which boots
the secondary boot loader in the partition marked active.)

(Second side comment: It's "try to", not "try and".)

Please explain why using NTLDR is madness.  I'd think a MSFT supporter
might want to reserve the MBR for MSFT code to abuse as much and as
often as it will.  Then configure the MSFT boot loader to boot Grub or
Linux or whatever off some non-MSFT partition.  If the MSFT code too
stupid to boot a partition's boot code (eg, grub), it can surely boot
Linux.  No?