troubled installations

[Avraham Hanadari]

K. Mandla wrote:
> If I could make one suggestion, I once installed Ubuntu in a dual-boot 
> and set up each partition beforehand. That tended to confuse me (and the 
> partitioner), and XP reported the other partitions as faulty.
> 
> It's probably too simple a suggestion, but I would try unpartitioning 
> those "bad" sections, either with a Windows partition tool or with the 
> built-in installer partition. Maybe it will work. Good luck! :)
> 
> On 3/18/06, *René* <list.account at gmx.net <mailto:list.account at gmx.net>> 
> wrote:
> 
>      > Am 17.03.2006, 13:01 Uhr, schrieb Avraham Hanadari
>      > <hanadari at zahav.net.il <mailto:hanadari at zahav.net.il>>:
> 
>      > I have tried to install Ubuntu or Kubuntu twice. Unfortunately both
>      > times there was such a catastrophic result that I had to reformat my
>      > hard disk. I do not want this to happen again, so I am imploring
>     you to
>      > help me. I really do want to get started learning the system.
>      >
>      > Here's what happened both times. The installation of 5.1 in a
>     dual boot
>      > with my XP Home went without a hitch. Or so I thought. I was able to
>      > work within both Ubuntu or Windows after choosing at boot-up.
>      >
>      > I have my hard disk partitioned in C: NTFS for XP, and two other data
>      > partitions. (By the way, I never did succeed in mounting the data
>      > partitions for access from Ubuntu!) When I viewed the partitions
>     later
>      > using Partition Magic 8 in Windows, instead of the partitions I
>     expected
>      > to see plus the Linux ones, all I saw was a long "mask" covering the
>      > entire HD and labeled BAD.
>      >
>      > Since both OS's worked, in spite of the "BAD" label, I was able
>     to save
>      > everything before the reformatting, but I would prefer a clean
>      > partitioning, as I have been able to achieve with Fedora and
>     Suse. With
>      > the mask in place, I cannot resize the partitions or otherwise
>     work with
>      > the disk. I suspect this has something to do with not being able
>     to see
>      > the data partitions and mount them in Ubuntu.
> 
>     hello Avraham
>     for what ever reason, to me it sounds like a 'mixed salad' on the
>     harddisk, or even some hardware failure.
>     as i do not know much about how to 'check and repair' failures on a
>     harddisk (except to use tools you have in Windows itself), i would start
>     once again in the following way:
>     0. save your data (you told, you have done that successfully)
>     1. use 'dban' (search it on the internet) to format your harddisk on a
>     much deeper level
>     if the outgoing is fully successful:
>     2. install once again Windows (it has to be installed before Ubuntu).
>     3. use software tools in Windows (maybe you also find some free software
>     on the internet) to check your harddisk as thouroughly as possible
>     4. do not make any partition for the upcoming Ubuntu installation
>     (Ubuntu
>     will do it itself during the installation)
>     5. install Ubuntu
>     that does not sound simple, thats what i would do, but i guess in
>     this way
>     it can come to work.
>     regards,
>     René
>     5
> 
>     --
>     ubuntu-users mailing list
>     ubuntu-users at lists.ubuntu.com <mailto:ubuntu-users at lists.ubuntu.com>
>     https://lists.ubuntu.com/mailman/listinfo/ubuntu-users
> 
> 
Forgive me for being unclear. I now have no faulty partitions. The 
problems I described were encountered during two installations of Ubuntu 
that resulted in evident partition confusion (see description in my 
first letter). I reformatted the entire hard disk on both occasions and 
started from scratch. I wish to find out why I had the difficulties. It 
seems that others did not have such difficulties, and I cannot 
understand why this is so. It may be because no one has actually checked 
their partitions with Partition Magic 8, instead of the XP tools.

Yesterday I resized my existing three partitions (XP, data fat32, data 
fat 32) and created an unallocated 15 GB section awaiting the arrival of 
a guest (XP, Unallocated, data, data). Since the normal installation 
resulted in problems, I shall try it this way, later today when I can 
accumulate the courage to make the attempt.

Wish me luck!

Avraham Hanadari