Partition Table Problem
 

I have recently modified the partition table with parted, but now every time i launch cfdisk i obtain something like the following message ( i have translated it in english ):

UNRECOVERABLE ERROR: Logical Partition 6 damaged: superimposition of growed logical partitions.

Press any key to exit

I report also the original italian message.

ERRORE IRREVERSIBILE: Partizione logica danneggiata 6: sovrapposizione delle partizioni logiche ampliate
Premere qualsiasi tasto per uscire da cfdisk

With parted i obtain the following datas:

GNU Parted 1.6.6
Copyright (C) 1998, 1999, 2000, 2001, 2002, 2003 Free Software Foundation, Inc.
This program is free software, covered by the GNU General Public License.

This program is distributed in the hope that it will be useful, but WITHOUT ANY WARRANTY; without even the
implied warranty of MERCHANTABILITY or FITNESS FOR A PARTICULAR PURPOSE. See the GNU General Public License
for more details.

Using /dev/hda
Information: The operating system thinks the geometry on /dev/hda is 7299/255/63. Therefore, cylinder 1024
ends at 8032,499M.
(parted) print
Disk geometry for /dev/hda: 0.000-57259,125 megabytes
Disk label type: msdos
Minor Start End Type Filesystem Flags
1 0,031 24999,587 primary ntfs boot
3 24999,587 27046,933 primary
4 27046,934 43002,114 primary ext3
2 43002,114 57255,095 extended lba
6 43002,176 54454,702 logical ext3
5 54454,733 57129,587 logical reiserfs
7 57129,618 57255,095 logical linux-swap
(parted)

And i don't know what's wrong and how can fix it.

Thanx in advance.

logical paritition 6 starts before 5.
6 43002 - 54454
5 54454 - 57129

Are you able to mount both 5 and 6 partitions?
Does linux boot at all?
What were you trying to accomplish?

Besides deleting the partitions and reinstalling linux the only other method
would be to use a disk editor and modify the partition information in the extended partition.

Could you post the results of fdisk -l /dev/hda ? ( that's a lower case L )

I'm not sure what I see from what you posted and hope it makes more sense from the fdisk command.

Here it is:

Disk /dev/hda: 60.0 GB, 60040544256 bytes
255 heads, 63 sectors/track, 7299 cylinders
Units = cilindri of 16065 * 512 = 8225280 bytes

Dispositivo Avvio Inizio Fine Blocchi Id Sistema
/dev/hda1 * 1 3187 25599546 7 HPFS/NTFS
/dev/hda2 5483 7299 14595052+ f Win95 Ext'd (LBA)
/dev/hda3 3188 3448 2096482+ b Win95 FAT32
/dev/hda4 3449 5482 16338105 83 Linux
/dev/hda5 6943 7283 2739051 83 Linux
/dev/hda6 5483 6942 11727387 83 Linux
/dev/hda7 7284 7299 128488+ 82 Linux swap

Partition table entries are not in disk order

fdisk ouputs the same info as parted which is what I expected.

But you have not answered my questions.
What were you trying to accomplish?
Does linux still boot and does hda5 and hda6 mount correctly?

Linux still works fine and everything else works fine, but i can't use cfdisk to modify the partition table. That's the problem.

(occurs when u create the partition placed last on the disk before or in the middle of creating other partitions i.e. not after them all)

if u want to get rid of this, then type
fdisk /dev/hda
press 'x' to go the the expert menu
press m (for help) :P
there's a command for "re-ordering partitions" (or "re-label"). it's either 'f', 'v' or 'r' (sorry, i forgot) but it's clreary described like that so it shouldn't be hard to find. then exit expert mode.

verified it, the f was right. here are the exact steps:

• fdisk /dev/hda
  press p to view the partition table. this one will give u the "Partition table entries are not in disk order" message.
  press x to go to expert menu
  press f to fix partition order
  press r to return to the normal menu
  press p to view the new/changed partition table, this time the message shouldn't come.
  press w to write to partition table and exit (or q if u made a mistake and want to discard any changes u made)

(it's better to view the table in the normal menu coz in the expert mode, it gives other details)

Thank you. I have fixed it, but cfdisk still doesn't work. Here is the fdisk -l /dev/hda output


Disk /dev/hda: 60.0 GB, 60040544256 bytes
255 heads, 63 sectors/track, 7299 cylinders
Units = cilindri of 16065 * 512 = 8225280 bytes

Dispositivo Avvio Inizio Fine Blocchi Id Sistema
/dev/hda1 * 1 3187 25599546 7 HPFS/NTFS
/dev/hda2 3188 3232 361462+ e Win95 FAT16 (LBA)
/dev/hda3 3449 4972 12241530 83 Linux
/dev/hda4 5483 7299 14595052+ f Win95 Ext'd (LBA)
/dev/hda5 5483 6942 11727387 83 Linux
/dev/hda6 6943 7283 2739051 83 Linux
/dev/hda7 7284 7299 128488+ 82 Linux swap

[ meanwhile i have changed something ]

The error when i launch cfdisk is the same.

perhaps parted wrote to the partition table badly due to the ordering. try running it again. if it doesn't give u any messages in the beginning then increase and decrease a partition (maybe the hda5 or 6) just so that it writes the partition table again (and maybe this time it'll do it right).

Thank you A LOT!!!

This time the solutions is the right one ;).

lol "this time"? those were steps to the final solution :P

hehe. glad it worked :D