[ubuntu-uk] Cannot install Feisty Fawn

[Martin Thomas]

Matthew Larsen asked:

> Looks like you might have a problem with your Hard Disks, 
> can you explain your hard disk setup (including size, 
> arrangement and types and what partitions are on them)

I am pretty sure that you are right. I have installed several distros and I
think that the partition table is in a confused state. Partition Magic
rejects the entire disk, claiming there is just one partition of type
'bad'. 

I have used sfdisk to adjust the (c,h,s) values to the correct values 
and I have used gparted to move the partitions apart so that they are 
no longer in any danger of being seen as overlapping, but this has not 
fixed the problem.

The partitions are used as follows:

hda1  Software to return the machine to the factory settings. If nothing
else works, I could try that.
hda2  Windows XP
hda3  Ubuntu 6.06
hdb4  extended partition including hda5 and hda6
hda5  Linux partition, misc. data 
hda6  Ubuntu swap partition. 

hda6 is before hda5 on the disk; I do not know why.

hdb1  A FAT32 partition for data I can access from Linux and Windows
hdb2  Debian Linux
hdb3  Extended partition, including hdb5
hdb4  An empty partition? I have no idea how that got there.
hdb5  Debian swap 


This is the current state of the discs:

 $ sfdisk -lV -uS

Disk /dev/hda: 116374 cylinders, 16 heads, 63 sectors/track
Warning: extended partition does not start at a cylinder boundary.
DOS and Linux will interpret the contents differently.
Units = sectors of 512 bytes, counting from 0

   Device Boot    Start       End   #sectors  Id  System
/dev/hda1            63   6466319    6466257   b  W95 FAT32
/dev/hda2   *   6474195  68180111   61705917   7  HPFS/NTFS
/dev/hda3      68195925  85787099   17591175  83  Linux
/dev/hda4      85803165 117290564   31487400   5  Extended
/dev/hda5      86574285 117290564   30716280  83  Linux
/dev/hda6      85803291  86558219     754929  82  Linux swap / Solaris
Warning: partition 2 does not start at a cylinder boundary

Disk /dev/hdb: 33525 cylinders, 16 heads, 63 sectors/track
Warning: extended partition does not start at a cylinder boundary.
DOS and Linux will interpret the contents differently.
Warning: The partition table looks like it was made
  for C/H/S=*/255/63 (instead of 33525/16/63).
For this listing I'll assume that geometry.
Units = sectors of 512 bytes, counting from 0

   Device Boot    Start       End   #sectors  Id  System
/dev/hdb1            63  15550919   15550857   b  W95 FAT32
/dev/hdb2      15550920  32965379   17414460  83  Linux
/dev/hdb3      32965380  33784694     819315   f  W95 Ext'd (LBA)
/dev/hdb4             0         -          0   0  Empty
/dev/hdb5      32965443  33784694     819252  82  Linux swap / Solaris
Warning: partition 1 does not end at a cylinder boundary



Martin
mptxyz at yahoo.co.uk


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