I realize this might be simple to some, but I don't understand part of the deb guide for ia32 chroot. The deb guide tells me to: "1.8) You will also need to set up the relevant users in the chroot. Copy your /etc/passwd, /etc/shadow and /etc/group files to the chroot." Does this mean I just issue the command "cp /etc/passwd /etc/shadow /etc/group chroot" Or do I need to know the specific files in chroot to copy to: ie /etc/passwd in chroot? I'm a little confused. Specific instruction would be greatly appeciated.

Copy the files to the same location in the chroot, I'm not sure what guide you followed since I use a different method but if it was, for example, /debian32 you would cp /etc/passwd /debian32/etc/passwd etc.
Or if the chroot was something like /var/chroot/sid-ia32 it would be cp /etc/passwd /var/chroot/sid-ia32/etc/passwd.

modify depending where you installed your chroot

cp /etc/passwd /var/chroot/sid-ia32/etc/passwd
cp /etc/shadow /var/chroot/sid-ia32/etc/shadow
cp /etc/group /var/chroot/sid-ia32/etc/group

I used the Debian GNU/Linux AMD64 how to. It didn't tell me to set up a /etc/directory, so whe I issue the command you suggested I get this "cp: cannot create regular file `/var/chroot/sid-1a32/etc/passwd': No such file or directory".So do I have to create an /etc directory? Or do you know an easier way to do this? the guide I followed is here
http://alioth.debian.org/docman/view...d64-howto.html

The debootstrap command should have created the /etc directory in the chroot.
Note also that those cp commands need to be run as root user.
I had a browse through the guide you are following and I must say it somehow doesn't look complete to me, I remember having to link something being an important part but I'm afraid I can't remember the full steps I used (I actually had to do a bit of experimenting to get it working right).
In any case, you might want to replace any references to "sid" with "etch" which, in the case of debootstrap, may have caused it to not install correctly

I followed Jackie Brown's advice and chroot is now working. Thanks so much for your help, both of you. The tutorials I read leave out the trivial stuff like what files to copy exactly where. I hope this helps someone else too.

I'm coming in late on this but am wondering if it would apply to my problem.

I recently did a netinstall of etch on an AMD64 dual core using the installgui option. Unfortunately, the installation now won't let me do a normal log on as root and I can seem to do the things that I have to do (e.g., modify the samba.conf) from the superuser terminal.

I understand that I could have set up a normal logon for root had I done an expert install but don't want to have to go back now. Is there anyway I can get root normal logon privleges with Gnome?

Thanks for any help you can provide.