This computer has no operating system on it

[xihad76]

my motherboard crashed and i had to change it yesterday. Before recognizing the motherboard issue i had only ubuntu 10.04 installed in my hard disc. after changing my motherboard i installed xp on another drive and then tried to restore grub. but it didnt work. so i decided to install ubuntu again. i was using live usb cd and at stage 4 it says that "This computer has no operating system on it". if i go to the manual partition option it only shows the entire hard drive as one. but from xp or live usb > places option from the upper task bar i can see all the partitions. i guess my partition table is corrupted and don't know how to solve it without formatting the whole drive.

the output of sudo fdisk -l are as follows:


ubuntu@ubuntu:~$ sudo fdisk -l
omitting empty partition (5)

Disk /dev/sda: 40.0 GB, 40019582464 bytes
255 heads, 63 sectors/track, 4865 cylinders
Units = cylinders of 16065 * 512 = 8225280 bytes
Sector size (logical/physical): 512 bytes / 512 bytes
I/O size (minimum/optimal): 512 bytes / 512 bytes
Disk identifier: 0xab3fab3f

Device Boot Start End Blocks Id System
/dev/sda1 1 1541 12375040 83 Linux
Partition 1 does not end on cylinder boundary.
/dev/sda2 1541 4864 26692993 f W95 Ext'd (LBA)
Partition 2 does not end on cylinder boundary.
/dev/sda3 * 1785 2804 8193118+ 7 HPFS/NTFS
Partition 3 does not end on cylinder boundary.
/dev/sda5 1541 1784 1951744 82 Linux swap / Solaris
/dev/sda6 2805 3824 8193118+ b W95 FAT32
/dev/sda7 3825 4864 8353768+ b W95 FAT32

Disk /dev/sdb: 4009 MB, 4009754624 bytes
145 heads, 48 sectors/track, 1125 cylinders
Units = cylinders of 6960 * 512 = 3563520 bytes
Sector size (logical/physical): 512 bytes / 512 bytes
I/O size (minimum/optimal): 512 bytes / 512 bytes
Disk identifier: 0xc3072e18

Device Boot Start End Blocks Id System
/dev/sdb1 * 1 1126 3915752 b W95 FAT32


seeking help for the issue. thnx in advance.

[dino99]

http://ubuntuforums.org/showpost.php?p=10161428&postcount=2

https://help.ubuntu.com/community/Installation/FromUSBStick#Ubuntu%20CD%20or%20ISO

[xihad76]

http://ubuntuforums.org/showpost.php?p=10161428&postcount=2

https://help.ubuntu.com/community/Installation/FromUSBStick#Ubuntu%20CD%20or%20ISO

thnx for the quick response. but i think u didn't understand my problem. i m looking for a way to fix my partition problem without formatting the whole drive and keeping existing xp installation intact. thnx.

[dino99]

you might look closer: your bootable partitions are either ntfs or fat32 !!!

[xihad76]

you might look closer: your bootable partitions are either ntfs or fat32 !!!

well, i did install ubuntu with the same live usb cd two days ago :-s

[xihad76]

and under System>administration>GParted 40gb hard disc is shown as " unallocated"

[oldfred]

I have had gparted not see a drive at all and solved it by running chkdsk on the NTFS partition even though XP booted ok.

Run chkdsk on any NTFS partitions even if they currently work.

Some other info:
http://www.rodsbooks.com/missing-parts/index.html