Ubuntu 11.04 won't boot

[zoombie]

Hello,
I've got a lenovo laptop with just one hd, the hd comes with one of those recovery software built into it. The recovery software is in a different partition to windows. I've erased windows with ubuntu (only the partition that have windows not the entire HD) but now ubuntu won't boot. On boot, the recovery software is booting up.
How do i solve this problem without formatting my HD as I've put some files into another partition that I like to keep

 

[Ijack]

Boot from a Ubuntu Live CD and use fdisk to change the Acitve Partition on your disk. It looks like the recovery partition is the active one currently; it should be the Ubuntu boot partition.

 

[zoombie]

fidsk? how do i do that?? im on the net through ubuntu live cd now, could you provide some more instructions please

 

[Ijack]

Open a command prompt and type

sudo fdisk /dev/sda

(or, possibly, /dev/hda)

Then type "p", which will show your partition table. Something like:

Device Boot Start End Blocks Id System
/dev/sda1 * 1 2071 16635276 83 Linux
/dev/sda2 2072 2167 771120 5 Extended
/dev/sda5 2072 2167 771088+ 82 Linux swap / Solaris

Though I'm guessing your sda1 will be different (the recovery partition) so that your 2 corresponds to my 1, etc. Anyway, you are interested in the entry with the * next to it, which should be the Linux one (probably /dev/sda2 in your case). If it isn't the Linux one then type "a" and when prompted enter the number of the Linux partition. Then type "w" to write the Partition Table and exit the program. Then try rebooting.

If the active partition is already the Linux one, then your problem is something else.