GParted keeps crashing

[matt11601]

First a little background about my problem: I updated my Ubuntu server box with "apt-get update" and got the GRUB Error 18 problem after reboot. I am trying to fix this GRUB error by creating a new partition at the beginning of the hard driveand copying the existing boot folder to this new partition (as outlined on this website). To create this new partition I am using GParted. The largest partition on the drive is also the first partition on this drive. It is also the boot partition. I am taking some free space from this partition and putting it at the front of the drive to fix this GRUB problem. My problem is that gparted crashes somewhere in this process. I shrink the partition, format the partition as "ext2" and then click apply. When I come back to the comp, gparted is gone. When I restart gparted, no changes have been made. I do not see an error message or anything. I am using the latest stable release of gparted and have no clue what to do.

I am trying to create a new ext2 partition at the front of the drive and cannot seem to do it.

Anyone have any ideas?

Thanks.

-Matt

[markwolfe Veteran]

If your partition is mounted (for example, if you had ever viewed files on it during that boot), you won't be able to make changes on it.

Not sure, but that could easily be the problem.

[matt11601]

I'm sorta linux newbie so this may be a dumb question but I booted off a LiveCD. So nothing should be mounted correct?

[markwolfe Veteran]

Some distros may scan and mount, so you can view your files. If you browsed, it most certainly mounted partitions to show the contents.

[matt11601]

I double-checked, the partition is not mounted. When I click the partition, it has an option to "unmount" but this option is greyed out. Also, I do not see a lock symbol for any of the partitions.

[markwolfe Veteran]

Maybe something is messed up in your partition table for some reason.

Can you post the output of a

sudo fdisk -l (that's a lowercase letter "L" not the number one)

That will help see what your current drive partition status is.

[Fred Derf Veteran]

I have had good luck with the Gparted Live CD. That may not solve your issue on why it is crashing from within Ubuntu but it may get your overall task done.

[hopp58902 Member]

Alternately, do everything in GParted one step at a time (What to do -> Apply, What to do -> Apply), I've found that GParted crashes often when I give it an entire list of this to do.

[matt11601]

I think it's working now. I downloaded an older, but stable release of the gparted live cd and now it's shrinking & moving my partition as we speak (only several more hours to go). Looks like the latest stable release has a bug.