There errors that I'm getting are apparently because the remaining partitions are not being mounted.
The root partition is obviously being mounted because it's booting from that and fstab is being read because it tries to mount the other partitions but there is a message for each of the other partitions along the lines of 'special device /dev/sda7 does not exist'.
The devices in /dev for the other partitions do exist and have the correct permissions and just to be sure I deleted and re-created them with the same result.
Suggestions welcomed.
Barry Samuels http://www.beenthere-donethat.org.uk The Unofficial Guide to Great Britain