Looks like you got your partitioning wrong in some way. You got that error because the installer is trying to mount the swap space, which is incorrect. You should click on go back and check the partitions again, to see if you get them set up correctly.

Kind regards,

Eric

The disk has almost never been used and has been acquired very recently.

I wrote everything I saw and everything I did. I can't see how I did something wrong. Should I press go back anyway ?

Good to know but that doesn't rule out hardware errors sadly enough. Go back to the partitioning part and take it from there. You're still in the installer, so nothing has happened yet.

Kind regards,

Eric

Well the window in the background says 'installing system' and there's a bar that says 5% is done...
there's an underlying text that says "creating ext4 file system for / in parition #4 of SCSI1(0,0,0) (sda)..."
and beneath there's some advertisement about linux softwares.

Mmmm, that looks promising. That's the standard install screen I saw too. Let's hope it completes correctly, will take some time however. Fingers crossed. I'm not very happy with the error you got however, but let's take it from there when you get to that point. Let's see what the installer does

Kind regards,

Eric

Wait. Let me clarify what I'm seeing.
I pressed install. I got the installing system window, with an advancing bar.
Only then did I get the ERROR!!! popup window.
I pressed ignore as you said.
It advanced some more, and then the window untitled 'do you want to resume partitioning' appeared.
So, what do I do now ?

Right, so just when the installer wanted to start partitioning you got the error, but in regards to sda5, the swap space. Resume partitioning and check if your partitions are set up correctly.

Kind regards,

Eric

What ?

Should I press go back or continue then ?

Where are those options? Still in the window that asks you if you want to resume partitioning? If so, is there an option to select yes or no and then continue? If there's no option, try Continue and see if it takes you back to the partitioner.

Kind regards,

Eric

Sorry I had a phone call I had to take care of.
So let me reexplain.

I was on step 8 which recapitulated everything. I wrote the important parts (those I didn't understand , I didn't write that my name was displayed) on post 126.
Then I pressed install.
Then the installing system window appeared. This window includes software information (ads) and a bar which says the % of the installation that has been made.
The bar advanced a bit.
Then the ERROR!!! window appeared. I pressed ignore.
The bar advanced a bit more.
Then a window appeared, untitled 'do you want to resume partitioning ?'
It says :
the attempt to mount a file system with type swap in sci1 (0,0,0) partition #5 (sda) at none failed.
you may resume partitioning from the partitioning menu.
There are 2 buttons I can click on. The first one says 'go back' and the second one says 'continue'.
I can also close the window.
-> I did none of those. I'm stuck at this window and waiting for your instructions.

No problem. Click on Go back and post where you get send back to. I think you'll be back on the installer screen, where you can go back to the partitioning menu. Something is wrong with the swap space so you'll need to fix that in the partitioning menu, the same way you did with the other partition: delete it and recreate it in the free space.

Kind regards,

Eric

So i'm back on step 6 of 7. (weird, there were 8 steps I think the first time around).

I'm gonna write everything I'm seeing :

prepare disk space
this computer has several os on it
[===========][==============][=======]
(blue) (green) (orange)
windows (blue) (dev/sda1) || /dev/sda2 (green) || dev/sda4 (orange) || ubuntu 9.10 (9.10) (dev/sda5) (orange)

(yes, there are 2 consecutives oranges with different names)



Where do you want to put ubuntu 9.10 ?
1. install them side by side
2. erase and use entire disk
3. specify partitions manually (advanced).

By default, install them side by side is selected.

beneath these 3 options, there's another colored bar.
This bar is more messed up in the end (there's a darker orange in the middle of the orange part, and a white thingy in the middle. I'm gonna paint it if you think it's significant.
Beneath it :

[======][=======][==== || [====] ====]
<blue> <green> <orange <white weird ||> <darker orange> >
windows (blue) (sda1) sda2 (green) sda4 (orange) ubuntu 9.10 (darker orange I think, but I'm not sure because the square is quite small) ubuntu 9.10 (9.10) (sda5) (orange)

On the Bottom :
step 6 of 7.
options : quit, back, forward.


Also.
If I change the option to the 2nd radio.
the second bar gets all orange (ubuntu 9.10)
If I change the option to the 3rd radio.
the second bar gets all orange, and the orange is untitled : specify partitions manually (advanced).

Hi,

You'll have to go with the advanced option in order to keep your Windows partition safe.

I think I know where the error slipped in. When you clicked on continue after partitioning the first time you had the swap space selected (the last one created), so I assume that's where it went wrong.

So, let's take it from the top.

As said, select the third option, Specify partitions manually (advanced) and click on Forward button.

Next delete all the partitions that are not Windows by selecting them and clicking on the Delete button.

Then you'll have only the blue part and a weird white part if I'm correct. The weird white indicates the free space. On the lower part of the screen you should see something like:
Click on the free space and next on the Add button. In the popup set it to Primary, change the size to everything minus the equal or double of your RAM. Set the location to Beginning.
For example if your disk free space is 100 Gb and your RAM is 1 Gb, change the space to 98000, to keep 2Gb as free space to create your swap.

Set the Use as to ext4 and the mountpoint to / just like you did before. Then click on OK to confirm.

Next click on the free space again and next on the Add button. Now set the type to Logical and leave the size, that should show that what you have discounted from the total free space earlier. Set location to End and Use as to swap area. The mount point will be grey and unavailable. Click on OK to confirm.

At this point you should have your Windows partition, a ext4 partition and a swap partition listed below /dev/sda.

Next click on the ext4 partition and on the box below Format? to indicate the installer has to format that partition. Next click on Forward.

Then you'll be back at the following step where you have to put in your user details.

Kind regards,

Eric

I didn't do anything yet. I'd like to add some information, and then you'll tell me if I can still follow your instructions regardless of this new piece of information :
I wasn't the one that installed the OS's as you know, and there was a partition called data that I think is the green part of /dev/sda2 in the first bar, although the name is not mentioned. I don't remember using it, but I'm not sure it's empty either, so I'd rather not delete it just yet (though maybe I guess I could delete it afterwards because I'm not using it, but I guess this kind of admin tasks can be done in linux after the installation is done).
So basically I think you need to adapt your instructions so that this partition is not deleted.
I'll wait for your instructions, I'm still at the prepare disk space (step 6/7).