grub-install fails on partition created by windows

[nitraw]

I've recently installed a WinXP/LinuxMint Dualboot on a new PC for a friend of mine.
The Installer always quit at 94% with the message "grub-install failed [...]" as posted by some other people. But no solution I found on the net worked. When I tried to install grub from the console with "grub-install" there was an error message stating that "stage1 not read correctly". So I redownloaded the image and burned it with a different program but the error remained.
I found the problem when I finally ran fdisk. The partition I chose for Mint was shown as FAT16. After changing it to Linux everything went as smooth as it should. My mistake must have been to create the partition for Linux in Windows.
Perhaps future Versions of the installer's partition editor should check for the correct flag in the partition table. Or perhaps I'm wrong and there was a different problem. If I find some time, I'll wipe my current gentoo installation and try to verify this by installing Mint on my laptop.

I hope this was helpful for someone.

[Husse]

As a general rule - don't make the partition in Windows for Linux. You can make it if necessary to make room if you can't from Linux - but then always format and possibly remove the partition and add it again from Linux. I think that gives the least trouble.

[nitraw]

Well, of course you're right. But in my humble opinion it would be better if the installer could take care of re-creating the partition if it is of the wrong type. Nowadays there are many people who want to try out Linux and if they encounter problems like this they're probably gonna abandon linux for good.
But I wonder if the installer is Mint-specific or the same as ubuntu? Then I should probably mention this on the ubuntu forums as well.

[Husse]

MInt and Ubuntu use the same Ubiquity installer.
But as Scorp123 says you are in command and decide what to do.
But I agree that the installer is a bit "cryptic" when it comes to partitioning and this is the part that gives problems

[scorp123]

The partition I chose for Mint was shown as FAT16. After changing it to Linux everything went as smooth as it should. My mistake must have been to create the partition for Linux in Windows.
Perhaps future Versions of the installer's partition editor should check for the correct flag in the partition table.

I agree here. It should at least throw an error message early on so that you don't have to waste so much time and know already before copying begins that something isn't 100% right. But this odd behaviour seems to be present in Ubuntu too. I wonder if this is a bug or if they did this with a specific purpose in mind?

[Husse]

Or possibly the part about partitioning is too difficult to get right...
This seems to be the part that gives most problems in the installation - as stated it is a bit cryptic