Lion won't install on my Mac mini. Why?

I have a 2 yr old Mac mini with 2.53 GHz Core Duo CPU, 4 GB of RAM and it's running 10.6.8. I just downloaded Lion but the installer says it can't install on my HD. Why not? I cannot find any info about what to do.
Is there some software on my computer that the installer does not like?
Does Lion need a completely new partition to install on?
If so, why is this not mentioned anywhere ?
Thankyou for your help.

Lion creates a recovery area with a minimal version of OS X and it may be unable to do so due to use over the years, and possibly other resizing operations (Boot Camp). It could just need more space, if you only have less than 8gb free. Lion shuffles and merges the two systems when it upgrades. You can burn the image downloaded from App Store by finding the dmg file inside the "Install Mac OS X Lion.app" bundle, dragging it into disk utility, then burning from there.
Otherwise, you can appropriate a MBR/BIOS formatted 4GB thumbdrive, 8GB of either EFI or MBR/BIOS thumbdrive, flash storage device, or external hard drive, and format it, using the restore operation through disk utility to copy the contents of the installer disk to the media. Exposed via the alt key before the Apple logo, should show the bootable media, where you can format over the former installation.
As always, backup your files when upgrading. I recommend if your installion is over a year old to wipe and upgrade if you can't make otherwise the media bootable, using your 10.6 recovery dvd.
If you cannot find an external medium to backup your files before the upgrade, if you need to format via disk utility (Through 10.6 media), you can consider Dropbox as an option (2GB free account).
It's not uncommon for the partition to simply refuse operations, including upgrades and resizing.

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