ubuntu 8.10 error 22

[Dayfd]

I have an older dell that has been running kubuntu without any problems. I decided to switch to ubuntu 8.10. I have downloaded the iso and have attemped an install. The insallation goes normally, however in the last moments of starting up I get the tan desktop and a mouse, but it just hangs there. Now I am also unable to boot from the cd, in an attempt to reinstall. I get grub error 22. No amount of timkering withthe system bios, boot menu, etc enables me to get beyond the error 22. In a desprate attempt I removed the hard drive and attached it via usb adapter to my vista machine to try and remove any particians, make it a clean slate. Same issue.
I then used the same install disk to load ubuntu onto an older laptop without any problems.
What on earth could be causing this? Hardware failure? CD rom failure?

[Pumalite]

http://users.bigpond.net.au/hermanzone/p15.htm#22

[Dayfd]

Ok after digesting the information, I wasn't able to figure out my problem, however thanks for the site, I did learn quite a bit!

I am not trying to dual install ubuntu 8.10, I just want to start again with the hard drive, fresh install.

I am unable to get anything to boot from the CD rom, it automaticly starts grub and gives error 22. Is this a hard drive issue? Format issue? Can I format the hard drive using ubuntu on another computer?