Ubuntu 11.04 Install CD Doesn't Recognize Partitions

[drucifer]

I'm having trouble installing Ubuntu in my Dell Inspiron 630m.

I inherited this laptop, and it was full of evil, evil software. So, immediately upon getting it, I installed Natty Narwhal. For a whole week, I've been successfully dual-booting Ubuntu 11.04 and Windows XP as I cleaned the computer up--no problemo. But yesterday, I decided to do a fresh install of Windows XP Pro, and that's when everything went wrong. XP now works fine, but as is the wont of Windows, it blew Linux away. When I go to re-install Linux, the live CD does not recognize any partitions on the harddrive at all; in fact, it seems to think that the entire harddrive is unformatted. The same goes for GParted.


I've looked at previous posts regarding partition problems upon install, but I can't find any solutions that really fit the bill. I've defragmented my Windows partition to no avail, and fdisk knows that the partitions are there (see the output below). When reading the fdisk output, it looks to me like I have a corrupted partition table, which I would have no clue how to fix. Any help here would be much appreciated--anything, anything that might save me from the horror of primarily proprietary bootage :|


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

Disk /dev/sda: 78.7 GB, 78732380160 bytes
255 heads, 63 sectors/track, 9572 cylinders, total 153774180 sectors
Units = sectors of 1 * 512 = 512 bytes
Sector size (logical/physical): 512 bytes / 512 bytes
I/O size (minimum/optimal): 512 bytes / 512 bytes
Disk identifier: 0x41ab2316

Device Boot Start End Blocks Id System
/dev/sda1 * 63 128262959 64131448+ 7 HPFS/NTFS
/dev/sda2 128278526 153772031 12746753 5 Extended
/dev/sda3 149600256 153772031 2085888 82 Linux swap / Solaris
/dev/sda5 128278528 145424383 8572928 83 Linux
/dev/sda6 145426432 149598207 2085888 82 Linux swap / Solaris

Disk /dev/sdb: 1048 MB, 1048051712 bytes
33 heads, 61 sectors/track, 1016 cylinders, total 2046976 sectors
Units = sectors of 1 * 512 = 512 bytes
Sector size (logical/physical): 512 bytes / 512 bytes
I/O size (minimum/optimal): 512 bytes / 512 bytes
Disk identifier: 0x6f20736b

This doesn't look like a partition table
Probably you selected the wrong device.

Device Boot Start End Blocks Id System
/dev/sdb1 ? 778135908 1919645538 570754815+ 72 Unknown
Partition 1 has different physical/logical beginnings (non-Linux?):
phys=(357, 116, 40) logical=(386555, 11, 23)
Partition 1 has different physical/logical endings:
phys=(357, 32, 45) logical=(953624, 6, 61)
Partition 1 does not end on cylinder boundary.
/dev/sdb2 ? 168689522 2104717761 968014120 65 Novell Netware 386
Partition 2 has different physical/logical beginnings (non-Linux?):
phys=(288, 115, 43) logical=(83800, 2, 1)
Partition 2 has different physical/logical endings:
phys=(367, 114, 50) logical=(1045562, 23, 53)
Partition 2 does not end on cylinder boundary.
/dev/sdb3 ? 1869881465 3805909656 968014096 79 Unknown
Partition 3 has different physical/logical beginnings (non-Linux?):
phys=(366, 32, 33) logical=(928902, 28, 32)
Partition 3 has different physical/logical endings:
phys=(357, 32, 43) logical=(1890665, 16, 36)
Partition 3 does not end on cylinder boundary.
/dev/sdb4 ? 0 3637226495 1818613248 d Unknown
Partition 4 has different physical/logical beginnings (non-Linux?):
phys=(372, 97, 50) logical=(0, 0, 1)
Partition 4 has different physical/logical endings:
phys=(0, 10, 0) logical=(1806868, 19, 53)
Partition 4 does not end on cylinder boundary.

Partition table entries are not in disk order

[drucifer]

Bump.

[Hakunka-Matata]

EDIT: Never mind, go to post #6

You have 65+ GiB for Windows and only 13+ for all your Linux partitions.


there are two swap partitions, only need one
the windows NTFS partiton should be shrunk and the Extended partition enlarged, allowing enough room for a reasonable Linux system.
But before you do anything else, please post the output of
sudo sfdisk -luM I don't know if that will work if you're using liveCD if not repost the output of
sudo fdisk -lu
It would be great to see a screenshot of gparted's view of your disk too.
do you know how to take and post a screenshot? (no offense intended, only asking)


/dev/sda 153,774,180 * 512 = 78,732,380,160

blocks | sectors=blocks*2 | sectors * 512 = bytes

sda1 64131448 128,262,896 * 512 = 65,670,602,752 Primary – boot flag set – WindowsXP

sda2. 12746753 25,493,506 * 512 = 13,052,675,072 Extended ID 5

sda3 2085888 4,171,776 * 512 = 2,135,949,312 Logical – swap ID 82 sda3 is a primary, delete it

sda5 8572928 17,145,856 * 512 = 8,778,678,272 Logical – Linux ID 83

sda6 2085888 4,171,776 * 512 = 2,135,949,312 Logical – swap ID 82

[Hakunka-Matata]

EDIT: Overlapping partitions, sda2 & 3, both primary

omitting empty partition (5)

that part bothers me

[Hakunka-Matata]

Overlapping partitions, sda2 & sda3 are overlapping: they're both primary partitions. delete sda3.

Do me a favour, I'd like you to run
sfdisk -luM and post the results before you fix it. I want to see how sfdisk -luM reports the partitions. thanks if you can.

Boot your liveCD/USB and open gparted, delete sda3, then we'll have a look at resizing

# sda1, 2, 3, & 4 are always primary partitions, even if you create sda1 as an extended, then create a logical inside that extended, it will be created as sda5, the first logical partition in the mapping.

[maclinux]

Hi. this is what i found out as well.

renatohe@renatohe-1005PE:~$ sudo sfdisk -luM

Disk /dev/sda: 30401 cylinders, 255 heads, 63 sectors/track
Units = mebibytes of 1048576 bytes, blocks of 1024 bytes, counting from 0

Device Boot Start End MiB #blocks Id System
/dev/sda1 * 1 102406- 102406- 104863263+ 7 HPFS/NTFS
/dev/sda2 102401 107168 4768 4882432 82 Linux swap / Solaris
/dev/sda3 107169 238474 131306 134457344 83 Linux
/dev/sda4 0 - 0 0 0 Empty


but the gparted app says there are one whole unalocated partition and here is the pict to prove it

[Hakunka-Matata]

that's right, sda1 ends @ sector 102,406, and sda2 begins @ 102401, they are overlapping. sda2 is a swap partition, fortunate. Delete it and make a new one.

How to delete?, since GParted won't do it? Is that a valid question?

[oldfred]

Not sure if testdisk would do it, sometimes it has issues also.

I would first backup partition table.

Backup partition table to text file & save to external device.
sudo sfdisk -d /dev/sda > PTsda.txt

And since we can just delete sda2 I think we can edit a copy to PTsda.txt to zero out sda2 entries and read it back in.

Post PTsda.txt

Using sfdisk to fix partition table problems - not without risk
http://ubuntuforums.org/showthread.php?t=1192598

sudo sfdisk --no-reread -f /dev/sdc -O PTsda.save < PTsda.txt
"--no-reread" means don't check if disk is unmounted
-f force
"-O PT.save" means save a backup of original partition table in PT.save. PT.save is in binary format.



This may also work.
this occasionally fixes issues and is worth trying:
you do the following :
fdisk /dev/sda
use option : x (expert mode)
use option : f (fix partition order)
use option : r (return)
use option : p (to print)
use option : v to verify partition
if it is ok
then you can do
option : w ( to write table to disk)
option : q to quit

Fix overlaping partition error srs5694
http://ubuntuforums.org/showthread.php?t=1667614