I get a different error when using qtparted. I've never seen this error before this school year, but now I see it on about 33% of my hdinstalls!

When I try to resize the XP partition (VFAT32) from roughly 40GB to about 20GB to make room for the linux installation, I get the following error:

Code:
An error happen during ped_file_system_open call
after resizing but before creating or committing, or:

Code:
An error happen during ped_file_system_resize call
after creating the an ext3 (19GB) partition and a linux-swap partition (whatever's left) and committing the changes.

I tried the cheat given above

Code:
knoppix nofstab noswap
on the outside chance that this would help (I've been pulling my hair out for months over this and am now desperate to get these PCs up and running dual-boots) but it didn't help. I get the same errors.

What's wrong with this?

Please help,
AJG