[Tfug] Grub Rescue

[charles at kissbrothers.com]

Thanks for your help. 
 
I managed the problem by creating some disks, a RescueDisk, KNOPPIX, 
etc. to back up data onto a thumb drive. 
 
I installed a fresh version of kubuntu10.10.  But I didn't risk a 
manual partitioning of the hard disk because the laptop already 
contained the manufacturers version of Vista. 
 
The new install was successful. The GRUB2 did a very fine job of 
keeping previous installations of kubuntu, as well as the Vista.  
Vista boots, haven't checked the older kubuntus. 
 
So, right now, the problem is that I would like to maybe risk a "manual 
partitioning of the hard drive" : removing the older linux operating 
systems, which I think are complete and taking a lot of hard disk 
memory (30GB), and use the resulting free space as a FAT partition for 
general storage, exchanging files between different filesystems, etc.  
Any tips?
 
I have to say that the original problem was created by my editing of 
GRUB2 files that weren't supposed to be edited; I ignored the warnings, 
and it finally caught up with me. 
 
Now, I'll have to read up on GRUB2, and edit the appropriate files, 
create new ones, etc.  Fortunately, the documentation is substantial. 
 
Thanks for the help!
 
Charles