Model: ATA ST1000LM024 HN-M (scsi)
Disk /dev/sda: 1000GB
Sector size (logical/physical): 512B/4096B
Partition Table: msdos

Number Start End Size Type File system Flags
1 1049kB 808GB 808GB primary ext4
3 808GB 932GB 124GB primary ext4
2 932GB 1000GB 68.0GB extended
6 932GB 983GB 51.1GB logical ext4 boot
7 983GB 992GB 8463MB logical linux-swap(v1)
5 992GB 1000GB 8468MB logical

I think you're right, here's my results of an ls -al when I'm in /media:

joshandkaren@joshandkaren-X750JA:/media > ls -al
total 12
drwxr-xr-x 3 root root 4096 Apr 12 21:43 .
drwxr-xr-x 23 root root 4096 Apr 14 06:31 ..
drwxr-x---+ 4 root root 4096 Apr 14 06:21 joshandkaren


Root owns everything, I think perhaps I just need to chown it and see how that flies.....

I always get Mint (or anything else) to manually partition my install.

I have a strong preference for a decent size '/' partition and a separate /home partition.
That way I can do upgrades without having to restore my /home directory (if all goes well).

Not meaning to get too far off topic, but this setup is almost certain to get you into trouble in certain cirumstances, one of which is e.g. if you were installing a second distro on the same computer that also shares the home partition.
Which is something you'll eventually want to do to upgrade Mint to a newer release: Install new release on separate partition -> Make sure everything runs ok -> Possibly manually take over some of the config files for home directory -> Once everything runs as expected the old install can be wiped.

It leaves you with something to fall back to if the install goes wrong.

Just my two cents

Fair comment - but it is still important to have control of partioning during an install.

Some of these installers try to be too clever.

Agreed. I'd never trust any installer to do the partitioning for me.

If you have another bootable distro and enough space to clone the files on the existing partition, you could rsync the contents of the partition you want to expand. Then delete it from the partition and re-add it in the desired girth. Format the newly redone partition with the desired filesystem. Then rsync the files back. And chroot to that and re-install the bootloader. Reboot and carry on like nothing ever happened. As long as you keep the other bootable distro around you can fix things you might have skipped or overlooked.

I'm not much for installers myself. I do the debootstrap install method with debian based distros. And various other installing linux while running linux methods (chroot style). It gives you control over partitions and filesystems, and network drivers before you ever boot into and use said installation. Plus you can start with a minimal base installation and avoid some bloat for stuff you weren't going to use anyway. And take a snapshop of said install before you ruin it with users and browser cache.

This was it: the partitions were owned by root; a couple of chown's later and I can do what I want with them. Problem solved; thanks everyone for your input, as a result there's still plenty of commands and ideas for me to get familiar with for future use!