A Recent attempt to load 10.10 on an existing partition left the partition inaccessible to the 9.10 system that created it. Copying files back and forth between partitions seemed to solve the problem whereas chmod did not...
However, the 10.10 installation failed somewhat. The boot drops to the "intraramfs" prompt. --- If I let the box sit for perhaps a minute --- then type exit, the boot will continue with the ubuntu splash screen. Supposedly the drive is not ready. Other attempts where I have not waited left the machine in a loop with the intraramfs prompt. My new 750 GB drive sounds like its leaving for Heathrow whenever it's in use and this may be the problem. It's refurbished but Smart Monitor says its ok. I might be able to send you any logs from both systems if you were interested. 9.10 has been secure since i started using it some two years ago.
The other problem with the new installation is that the internet connection does not come up, but a wired connection to a remote 9.10 does. The 10.10 OS is internet dead for some reason.
If I'm feeling brave I may retry the 10.10 installation with the internet download option enabled, which it wasn't in the first attempt.
Regards
Regarding the state of the partition: it contains script files for which the permissions got scrambled. After using chmod, they were still unusable as executables: "permission denied". ...As I recall... the permissions appeared to be changed by chmod according to ls, but generated the "permission denied" message regardless. By copying the files across partitions and back again the files were once again usable as executables.