Comment 5 for bug 898040

It was bare hardware, looks like a nightmare I know:

lance@lance-desktop:~$ sudo parted -l
[sudo] password for lance:
Model: ATA WDC WD5000AAKS-0 (scsi)
Disk /dev/sda: 500GB
Sector size (logical/physical): 512B/512B
Partition Table: msdos

Number Start End Size Type File system Flags
 1 32.3kB 43.3GB 43.3GB primary ext4 boot
 2 43.3GB 86.2GB 42.8GB primary ext3
 3 86.2GB 129GB 43.0GB primary ext3
 4 129GB 500GB 371GB extended
18 129GB 151GB 21.8GB logical ext4
14 151GB 172GB 21.1GB logical ext3
15 172GB 193GB 21.1GB logical ext4
16 193GB 215GB 21.4GB logical ext4
17 215GB 236GB 21.4GB logical ext4
13 236GB 258GB 22.0GB logical ext4
12 258GB 280GB 21.6GB logical ext4
11 280GB 301GB 21.7GB logical ext4
10 301GB 323GB 21.8GB logical ext4
 5 323GB 374GB 50.8GB logical ext3
19 374GB 377GB 3208MB logical fat32
 6 378GB 432GB 53.6GB logical ext3
 7 432GB 487GB 54.9GB logical ext3
 8 487GB 498GB 10.7GB logical ext3
 9 498GB 500GB 2517MB logical linux-swap(v1)

Model: ATA WDC WD800JB-00JJ (scsi)
Disk /dev/sdb: 80.0GB
Sector size (logical/physical): 512B/512B
Partition Table: msdos

Number Start End Size Type File system Flags
 1 1049kB 39.3GB 39.3GB primary ext4
 2 39.3GB 80.0GB 40.8GB extended
 6 39.3GB 75.8GB 36.5GB logical ext4
 7 75.8GB 77.9GB 2132MB logical linux-swap(v1)
 5 77.9GB 80.0GB 2136MB logical linux-swap(v1)

I had just completed an entire disc install on /dev/sdb followed by an auto-resize on /dev/sdb, then I was performing a manual install on /dev/sda17 when this error popped up. No problem with the earlier image but based on those earlier bug reports this may be one of those pesky intermittent bugs that's hard to reproduce.