Barncore
Level 1 (1 points)

Q: Boot camp: "The startup disk cannot be partitioned or restored to a single partition"

Hey guys,

Would really appreciate some help on this!

I used to successfully use bootcamp and have an extra partition so i could use Windows aswell, until my HD crashed and i had to take it to the Apple Hospital. When i got the computer back and restored my old backup Time Machine clone, i couldn't create a new partition for Windows. It doesn't let me get passed the first screen.

 

What happens is: I load up Boot Camp as usual, push Continue passed the Introduction screen, then i get a msg pop up that says:


The startup disk cannot be partitioned or restored to a single partition.

The startup disk must be formatted as a single Mac OS Extended (Journaled) volume or already partitioned by Boot Camp Assistant for installing Windows.


Then i push Ok and it goes back to the BootCamp introduction screen. I.e. i can't get passed this msg.

I looked in Disk Utility and of course my internal HD already is Mac OS Extended (Journaled) so i have no idea why it isn't being recognised as one partition.

 

What do i have to do to be able to install windows on this computer without having to format my entire Mac and installing everything again? I really need the exact clone of what i have right now. I do have an external HD for making backup clones using Time Machine though.

 

Some specs:

- Boot Camp Assistant version is 3.0.1

- Mac OSX 10.6.2 (yeah i guess i'm old school now)

- 2.66 GHz Intel Core i5, 4 GB RAM

- I have no other partitions currently, just my current mac one

 

Any questions just ask. I would love to resolve this tonight.


iMac (27-inch Late 2009), iOS 6.1.2

Posted on Oct 8, 2014 4:05 AM

by Loner T,Solvedanswer
Loner T Loner T
Level 7 (23,908 points)
Safari
A:

1. It is not necessary. Leave it at 10.6.2. If there are any other issues, they can be tackled, if necessary. There may be driver issues if you choose a Windows7/Windows8+ OS and try it on SL 10.6.

2. Apple Hospital may be the answer.

3. You can use diskutil mergePartitions disk0s2 disk0s3. Please be aware that order is very important. Please ensure you have a full backup of OSX.

4. Recovery HD is used for recovering OSX, if necessary, when there are issues with your OSX partition. The explanation here is a bit incomplete but you can look at http://support.apple.com/kb/HT4848 .

 

Here is the help (man page) for diskutil mergerPartitions. Please see the highlighted Example section.

 

diskutil mergePartitions

Usage:  diskutil mergePartitions [force] format name

        DiskIdentifier|DeviceNode DiskIdentifier|DeviceNode

 

Merge two or more pre-existing partitions into one.  The first disk parameter

is the starting partition; the second disk parameter is the ending partition;

this given range of two or more partitions will be merged into one.

 

All partitions in the range, except for the first one, must be unmountable.

 

All data on merged partitions other than the first will be lost; data on the

first partition will be lost as well if the "force" argument is given.

 

If "force" is not given, and the first partition has a resizable file system

(e.g. JHFS+), it will be grown in a data-preserving manner, even if a different

file system is specified (in fact, your file system and volume name parameters

are both ignored in this case). If "force" is not given, and the first

partition is not resizable, you will be prompted if you want to erase.

 

If "force" is given, the first partition is always formatted. You should

do this if you wish to reformat to a new file system type.

 

Merged partitions are required to be ordered sequentially on disk.

See diskutil list for the actual on-disk ordering; BSD slice identifiers

may in certain circumstances not always be in numerical order but the

top-to-bottom order given by diskutil list is always the on-disk order.

 

Ownership of the affected disk is required.

 

Example: diskutil mergePartitions JHFS+ NewName disk3s4 disk3s7

         This example will merge all partitions *BETWEEN* disk3s4 and disk3s7,

         preserving data on disk3s4 but destroying data on disk3s5, disk3s6,

         disk3s7 and any invisible free space partitions between those disks;

         disk3s4 will be grown to cover the full space if possible.

Posted on Oct 8, 2014 7:36 AM

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Barncore

Q: Boot camp: "The startup disk cannot be partitioned or restored to a single partition"

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  • by Csound1,

    Csound1 Csound1 Oct 8, 2014 9:41 AM in response to Barncore
    Level 9 (50,439 points)
    Desktops
    Oct 8, 2014 9:41 AM in response to Barncore

    I think that you should run Boot Camp Assistant and read the directions carefully. Did you make a backup of your Mac yet?

  • by Barncore,

    Barncore Barncore Oct 8, 2014 9:43 AM in response to Csound1
    Level 1 (1 points)
    Oct 8, 2014 9:43 AM in response to Csound1

    You obviously haven't read the thread.

    I will wait for Loner T's response, since he knows where things are at.

    Cheers

  • by Csound1,

    Csound1 Csound1 Oct 8, 2014 9:48 AM in response to Barncore
    Level 9 (50,439 points)
    Desktops
    Oct 8, 2014 9:48 AM in response to Barncore

    I thought that as you got this far without knowing that Windows drivers need Windows you may be getting lost.

     

    I'll leave it up to you.

  • by Loner T,

    Loner T Loner T Oct 8, 2014 10:06 AM in response to Barncore
    Level 7 (23,908 points)
    Safari
    Oct 8, 2014 10:06 AM in response to Barncore

    You may run into an issue with W7 install, but it should be tried.

     

    1. Put the .zip file of 4.0.4033 on a USB stick.

    2. Run Bootcamp Assistant 3.0.1 on the OSX side, partition and start W7 installation.

    3. If you do not run into any new issues during Windows installation (like Keyboard/Graphics/Mouse), let it finish.

    4. Once completed, switch to Windows 7 using System Preferences -> Startup Disk -> Bootcamp, if necessary (it may not be, because W7 installation will have you running W7).

    5. Plug the USB stick with the 4.0.4033 .zip with Windows running.

    6. Unzip it if necessary on the USB. The USB should be 601.76MB+ (as indicated by 4.0.4033 DL link - Boot Camp Support Software 4.0.4033 ).

    7. Run setup.exe from the USB Bootcamp folder, which should install the W7 drivers on Windows necessary for Apple Hardware on your iMac.

    8. You will restart and should see a Boot Camp item in Control Panel -> System -> Boot Camp.

    9. Use it to switch back to OSX to verify that everything works properly.

    10. Now you are all set. Please make a backup of Windows. One option is to partition an external HDD into two, HFS+ and MSDOS-FAT. Plug in this external disk with Windows running. Format the external DOS partition to NTFS via Windows. This partition can now be used to run a Windows backup. It should be sufficiently large to accommodate the Windows C: drive.

    11. Windows Bootcamp drivers should allow you read-only access to OSX, and OSX has read-only NTFS drivers so you can read the NTFS partition(s). Finder can read the Bootcamp Windows partition.

     

    Please post back if you run into any issues in any of the steps.

  • by Barncore,

    Barncore Barncore Oct 8, 2014 10:46 AM in response to Loner T
    Level 1 (1 points)
    Oct 8, 2014 10:46 AM in response to Loner T

    Ok, i will try all that tomorrow, and let you know how i go. Thanks for your time & help.

  • by Barncore,

    Barncore Barncore Oct 8, 2014 7:50 PM in response to Loner T
    Level 1 (1 points)
    Oct 8, 2014 7:50 PM in response to Loner T

    Frustratingly, i have reached a new hurdle, lol.

     

    I was about 1 minute into the partitioning process when i got a new error that said:

     

    The disk cannot be partitioned because some files cannot be moved.

    Backup the disk and use Disk Utility to format it as a single Mac OS Extended (Journaled) volume. Restore your information to the disk and try using Boot Camp Assistant again.

     

    So close...

  • by Loner T,

    Loner T Loner T Oct 8, 2014 8:02 PM in response to Barncore
    Level 7 (23,908 points)
    Safari
    Oct 8, 2014 8:02 PM in response to Barncore

    This is a fairly common issue and arises because you do not have enough contiguous disk space.

     

    1. Try to run a Verify (and Repair, if necessary) via Disk Utility, then attempt partitioning.

    2. If #1 fails, boot in Safe Mode (Use Shift Key during power-up. Reference - OS X: What is Safe Boot, Safe Mode?), then attempt partitioning.

    3. If #2 fails, take a full Time Machine Backup of your Mac. Because you have an older Mac, you will need to find the "Grey" disks which are the system restore disks. Booting from the OS X Installation Disk allows you to erase the internal drive and restore it from a Time Machine Backup. You want to ensure that you do not have any directory or volume excluded from TM, because it will not be backed up and hence will not get restored. This is secondary text the error message has.

  • by Barncore,

    Barncore Barncore Oct 8, 2014 8:13 PM in response to Loner T
    Level 1 (1 points)
    Oct 8, 2014 8:13 PM in response to Loner T
    1. Try to run a Verify (and Repair, if necessary) via Disk Utility, then attempt partitioning.

    Do i run a Verify of the entire parent disk (i.e. 1 TB APPLE HDD HUA722010CLA330)? Or just my main (and only visible) mac partition?

  • by Loner T,

    Loner T Loner T Oct 8, 2014 8:27 PM in response to Barncore
    Level 7 (23,908 points)
    Safari
    Oct 8, 2014 8:27 PM in response to Barncore

    You can run it on the entire disk. It will skip the EFI portion automatically.

     

    My edited response is not there any more. This is another Discussions software bug.

     

    I had added the following in my edited response.

     

    "The Backup/Restore can take quite a long time, so plan accordingly. You will need to have the "grey" disks that came with the Mac originally, to be able to erase your internal disk and restore from a TM backup. Make sure you have not excluded any files/folders from TM's backup, otherwise they will be lost. Also, Software Update may try to force your to upgrade to 10.6.8 but your restore from the backup should stay at 10.6.2".

  • by Barncore,

    Barncore Barncore Oct 8, 2014 8:50 PM in response to Loner T
    Level 1 (1 points)
    Oct 8, 2014 8:50 PM in response to Loner T

    I just ran the verify... these are the results...

    Checking volume information.

    Invalid volume file count

    (It should be 1148269 instead of 1148284)

    Invalid volume directory count

    (It should be 218221 instead of 218206)

    Error: The volume Macintosh HD was found corrupt and needs to be repaired. ...then use Disk Utility to repair this disk.

    However the "Repair Disk" option is greyed out so i can't click on it. What do i do?

  • by Barncore,

    Barncore Barncore Oct 8, 2014 8:52 PM in response to Loner T
    Level 1 (1 points)
    Oct 8, 2014 8:52 PM in response to Loner T

    P.s. is this a valid option? https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=qNqn3c5c0Xw

    I.e. these are the steps the video suggests...

    1. Reboot the Mac into Single User Mode by holding Command+S during boot

    2. At the command prompt, type:

    /sbin/fsck -fy

     

    3. When fsck is complete, type "exit" or "reboot" to reboot

    4. Boot the Mac as usual, verify the disk again in Disk Utility, and partition as usual

  • by Loner T,

    Loner T Loner T Oct 9, 2014 4:04 AM in response to Barncore
    Level 7 (23,908 points)
    Safari
    Oct 9, 2014 4:04 AM in response to Barncore

    Item#2 (Safe Mode) that I mentioned earlier does the fsck and a bit more. Try the Safe Mode.

  • by Barncore,

    Barncore Barncore Oct 9, 2014 7:03 AM in response to Loner T
    Level 1 (1 points)
    Oct 9, 2014 7:03 AM in response to Loner T

    Ok I just tried to boot in safe mode and then create a partition in there, unfortunately i got the same error.

    Does that mean i have to do item#3 now? Is there nothing else we can try before i opt for the "erase and restore" measure?

  • by Loner T,

    Loner T Loner T Oct 9, 2014 7:12 AM in response to Barncore
    Level 7 (23,908 points)
    Safari
    Oct 9, 2014 7:12 AM in response to Barncore

    Before you embark on a time-consuming sojourn, download iDefrag (http://www.coriolis-systems.com/iDefrag.php). There is Demo version, which you can run on your disk. It would be good to see a screen shot of what it shows.

  • by Csound1,

    Csound1 Csound1 Oct 9, 2014 7:19 AM in response to Loner T
    Level 9 (50,439 points)
    Desktops
    Oct 9, 2014 7:19 AM in response to Loner T

    The demo won't defrag anything, for that you have to pay. In my experience it will fail to do what the OP needs, but refunds aren't too arduous to obtain. And an erase and restore usually will fix the issue.

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