Problem: My hard drive partitions are corrupt or missing or something

[topcat]

(First off, I'm not entirely sure where to put this. If someone feels it needs to be moved, feel free.)

I have recently installed Ubuntu. Now, the installation wasn't the smoothest of processes-- I chose expert installation mode, because I was informed by the CD packaging that if I did not, all my data would be deleted, and I didn't want this to happen. Whilst installing (aside from the partitions, I chose defaults for everything, btw) the installer told me that the files ide-mod, ide-probe-mod, ide-detect and ide-floppy were unavailable, but that this was no real problem and they might become available later. When partitioning, I chose to use the largest continuous empty space and ended up with a 118 GB FAT32 partition (Windows), a 1.6 GB Ext3 partition (Ubuntu) and a 118 MB (I think?) Swap partition. I installed everything fine, and chose to install Grub to the MBR. On reboot, Error 17. OK, I thought, I'll load up the LiveCD and try to find a solution. One of my friends told me to reinstall the system- I did this, putting the new install over the "old" Ubuntu partition and making sure it left my Windows partition alone. This time I installed the LILO loader to the Linux thingy (bad idea, yes, but I'm green at all this). This time on reboot I was greeted with "No Partition Active DISK BOOT FAILURE, INSERT SYSTEM DISK AND PRESS ENTER". Not having a Windows boot disk, and not knowing if the Ubuntu install CD could be used as one, I just put the LCD in again and consulted my friend. The partitions at this point were still distinct-- hda1 with Windows, hda2 Linux, hda5 swap. However, on reboot, they had seemingly morphed into just the one hard drive. Neither fdisk nor cfdisk picked up the partitions. I have been running on a LiveCD since Sunday searching for answers.
Now, my problem is: I need to fix these partitions. I know that there are tools available, ie gpart. However, I don't know how I can write gpart to disk- any disk- and then run it whilst using a LiveCD version of an OS, and I don't know specifically how to do it. Neither OS will boot and afaik neither has a boot disk. Unless the recovery mode (which I only found out existed, alas, after my problem had reached this far) on the Ubuntu install cd can fix this problem or I can use gpart/ another simialar tool, I dont know what I can do! =/

[greenpenguin]

Outch
Good luck!