I am currently in the process of trying to install Mandrake 10.1 on my laptop and keep getting an error message when I try to resize my partition (80gb HDD) saying that there are bad sectors and that this problem is not supported yet by Mandrake. I have tried running the usual windows (gasp) utlities to try to fix this problem but have had no luck. Any advice on what I should do? I've been thinking about using a partitioning tool such as partition magic before I start the install agian, but I'm not sure if this will help much. Any help would be appreciated!

have you tried using a file system other than ext2? try ReiserFS or ext3. Both are journalist file systems and restore good from fails.

Ok, if this doesn't help an you really need to have your MDK up and running as soon as possible, then use 5 partitions: 1 for root (/) 4/5Gb, 1 for Swap (size depends on your needs) as SECOND partition just after root partition, then one for /usr and other for /home, trying not to reach the bad sectors area, and then make the 5th partition as fat32 using the space left and mount it @ /mnt/fat (or the directory you'd like to name under /mnt)

It might sound like too much but, as a matter of fact, having the swap partition near the root helps in performance, and having /home and /usr in different partitions helps in fragmentation. That's the way i have my MDK 10.1 and it runs great.

Hope this helps
triaydev