Libparted Bug Found - Error informing kernel about modifications to partition

[Mr_JMM]

Hi Again,

Somehow I managed to bork something and now everytime I try to use Gparted Libparted Bug Found - I get the following error:
Error informing the kernel about modifications to partition /dev/sda4 -- Device or resource busy. This means Linux won't know about any changes you made to /dev/sda4 until you reboot -- so you shouldn't mount it or use it in any way before rebooting.
Trying to perform any task other than labelling partitions results in GParted crashing.
Also, trying to install any other distro's fails when at the partition stage. Currently, only Ubuntu runs (the original Linux OS, all others were removed).

This happens regardless of how I access GParted.

fdisk (via booted Ubuntu session):

Disk /dev/sda: 250.1 GB, 250059350016 bytes
255 heads, 63 sectors/track, 30401 cylinders, total 488397168 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: 0x00000080

Device Boot Start End Blocks Id System
/dev/sda1 63 80324 40131 de Dell Utility
/dev/sda2 81920 20561919 10240000 7 HPFS/NTFS/exFAT
/dev/sda3 * 20561920 146391039 62914560 7 HPFS/NTFS/exFAT
/dev/sda4 146393087 488396799 171001856+ 5 Extended
/dev/sda5 146393088 150586446 2096679+ 82 Linux swap / Solaris
/dev/sda6 150589440 151638015 524288 83 Linux
/dev/sda7 151640064 176811389 12585663 83 Linux
/dev/sda8 225044480 488396799 131676160 83 Linux
/dev/sda9 176814080 189396991 6291456 83 Linux
/dev/sda10 189399040 214564863 12582912 83 Linux
/dev/sda11 214566912 225042431 5237760 83 Linux

Partition table entries are not in disk order


blkid (via booted Ubuntu session):

/dev/sda1: SEC_TYPE="msdos" LABEL="DellUtility" UUID="07D7-0615" TYPE="vfat"
/dev/sda2: LABEL="RECOVERY" UUID="AAB6D921B6D8EEB7" TYPE="ntfs"
/dev/sda3: LABEL="WINDOWS" UUID="E4144F86144F5AA6" TYPE="ntfs"
/dev/sda5: UUID="9f08f683-1ce1-41a5-bce7-18a944fff1ce" TYPE="swap"
/dev/sda6: LABEL="LinuxBoot" UUID="9665c622-b5e7-4d40-9c0c-d016a46cf9a0" TYPE="ext4"
/dev/sda7: LABEL="UbuntuRoot" UUID="66d71d79-1a1d-4a4b-beaa-05536a4c2dea" TYPE="ext4"
/dev/sda8: LABEL="LinuxHome" UUID="8941143b-2bb7-4ce5-8780-c7e01049646c" TYPE="ext4"


Any ideas how I fix this?

Many thanks.

[Mr_JMM]

Update: I may have fixed this.

I forgot to check at each stage so I'm not sure hich of the following fixed this issue but as it stands, I think both of these steps should be done as a matter of course (hindsight).

1. Since I have an extended partition containing many logical partitions including swap and boot, I used a USB install of GParted to add the label "lba".

2. I booted into Windows Vista and ran chkdsk /f twice. The first time showed a lot of errors / bad sectors but the second run was clean.

Since these steps, touch wood, I haven't had the libparted error again.