I had this on my wifes machine with 9.10 so I got a 9.04 live cd and loaded it
in then upgraded it
works fine now.

9.04 works
9.10 does NOT..................

IIRC they did move to a different version of grub in 9.10 - perhaps your
hardware is one of those corner cases where the new grub has a problem?

Suppose that's possible - but what do I do about it?

I'm afraid there isn't much you can do... I have an ongoing problem with the
flashing display on my MS Wind with 9.10 which I've been unable to resolve
and have had to go back to 9.04.
There will hopefully be a resolution included in 10.04 LTS. If not there
will be a bleak future for Ubuntu as there seem to be quite a few serious
issues with 9.10!

Combine this issue with (a) no sound; (b) no video from webcam and
things do, indeed, look bleak for Ubuntu. Could be time to move on . . .

Well, perhaps not so bleak for ubuntu. The thing to remember is that
9.10 works well for 99% of the users, but things do indeed look bleak
for the 1% of users with the problematic hardware...

It could well be fixed in 10.04 though, so even for those users there
might be hope.

I hope so because the "i" series (i3, i5, i7) is pretty much Intel's
product line going forward.

Problematic hardware?

I know it's the old "whose on first base" thing - is it the hardware or the
software that is at fault? However, every previous version of Ubuntu worked
flawlessly on my MSI Wind. I don't know any percentages but it isn't a piece
of rare, "niche," hardware; it has sold quite well. If Ubuntu's devs are
going to discount this platform, and quite a few others, as not important
enough to fix big problems that render their OS unusable then I have no
respect for them.

Three months after the release of the "final" version there has been no fix
that I am aware of. Frankly I'm really disappointed in Ubuntu over this.
I'll still use it if they fix 9.10, but until I'm sure that is done I'll
have to stick with 9.04. I really tried to make it work and installed
Ubuntu, Kubuntu, Xubuntu and several 9.10 based variants about 10 times. All
had the same flashing screen problem. Until this is really fixed Ubuntu has
no future as far as I am concerned.

Having said that I think there is a good chance that the LTS version will be
useable again. I certainly hope so.

Have you filed bug reports on this regression. If not then what are
the developers going to work on?

Btw if a new MS does not work on your old machine they say upgrade.
not their problem. linux development tries to fix problems even if it
is on 5 year old hardware.

Very doubtful that the ubuntu devs have discounted this platform - it
may well be that they haven't heard of the problems with that specific
platform, or haven't got the fixes pushed to mainline yet.

FWIW I'm running 10.04 alpha on 2 boxes and find it stable enough to use
as my main OS - I'd be curious to see if 10.04 likes your hardware.

On this fresh install I had to change the boot order in the BIOS to get
grub working and my webcam now works for the first time. BTW the latest
grub is installed. I am happy with this install.

try the options available during boot, ie no acpi, etc this may be enough
to get you thro' the hoop!

Have you thought of contacting 'Launchpad' who may be able to fix your problem
in a stroke and also improve for everyone else.

I have 9.10 loaded and working fine on 3 different machines one is 100% and the
other two have small niggles. For example I don't know why my netbook always
starts up with audio muted. But I'm not crying over that, I expect the next
installation will have it sorted. The other problem is being considered by
Launchpad.

To be fair it must be the LTS 8.04 that is the stable/solid version so roll on
10.04!