Sarge install rc2 hangs during GRUB installation

[Martin Fuzzey <mfuzzey@tele2.fr>]

Hi all,

I'm having trouble installing Sarge rc2 on my laptop (HP pavilion zv5340EA)

The system had Windows XP Home French edition on an NTFS partition which 
I wanted to keep.

I therefore resized the NTFS partitiion using System Rescue (the Sarge 
Installer wouldn't do it but thats another issue)
That went OK and I started the Sarge installer and used auto 
partitioning to create an ext3 and swap partitions for debian in the 
free space.

Everything was fine up until the GRUB installation phase where it seemed 
to hang after the OS detection
[Installing GRUB Boot Loader / Determining GRUB Boot Device] 33%

Running with DEBCONF_DEBUG=5 gave this at the end of my syslog :

Jan 30 16:30:18 debconf: --> SUBST grub-installer/with_other_os OS_LIST 
Microsoft Windows XP dition familiale
Jan 30 16:30:18 debconf: Adding [OS_LIST] -> [Microsoft Windows XP 
dition familiale]
Jan 30 16:30:18 debconf: <-- 0
Jan 30 16:30:18 debconf: --> PROGRESS STEP 1
Jan 30 16:30:18 debconf: <-- 0 OK
Jan 30 16:30:18 debconf: --> PROGRESS INFO 
grub-installer/progress/step_bootdev
Jan 30 16:30:18 debconf: <-- 0 OK
Jan 30 16:30:18 debconf: --> INPUT high grub-installer/with_other_os
Jan 30 16:30:18 debconf: <-- 0 question will be asked
Jan 30 16:30:18 debconf: --> GO

From this and ps it seems it is blocked in this part of posinst of grub

db_progress STEP 1
db_progress INFO grub-installer/progress/step_bootdev

while : ; do
       if [ "$state" = 1 ]; then
               db_input high $q || true
               if ! db_go; then
                       # back up to menu
                       db_progress STOP
                       exit 10
               fi

Itr appears that db_go never returns...

I'm afraid I don't know enough about debconf to figure this out.
Could it be something to do with the non ascii character (e-acute) in 
the Windows OS name??
Microsoft Windows XP (e-acute)dition familiale

Any help much appreciated


Martin