Issues with creating a partition

Question

Issues with creating a partition

Hey Guys!

Hope your all well :)

I'm trying to create a partition / install windows 10 to my Mac (2015/2016 model, running high sierra).

It's doing the process, but then fails upon completion, I get a dialogue box saying 'error occurred while copying the windows installation files' - I've re-downloaded the windows install but it's happened again & again!

Also the space / memory has been taken from the hard drive & I cannot also seem to remove it through Disk Utility / Partition - It's showing a 'free space' portion (the size of the windows partition attempted), but when I try to remove / apply it's saying 'operation failed'.......& it's created a phantom quest user upon restart??

Can anyone give any sort of advice......I have no idea what to do next? :(

Cheers Campbell

MacBook Pro 15″, OS X 10.11

Posted on Mar 6, 2021 4:27 AM

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Answer 1

Top-ranking reply

Loner T

Level 9

59,536 points

Mar 7, 2021 8:11 AM in response to Campbell J NZ

You do not seem to have APFS corruption, but you have two snapshots, which can interfere with partition creation.

Can you post the output of

diskutil apfs listsnapshots /

Here is an example...

diskutil apfs listsnapshots /
Snapshots for disk1s1 (18 found)
|
+-- B9531C7F-CB56-4B5F-9C42-16D7968921D3
|   Name:        com.apple.TimeMachine.2021-03-06-122148.local
|   XID:         296972
|   Purgeable:   Yes
|   NOTE:        This snapshot limits the minimum size of APFS Container disk1
|
+-- F4BDDC44-87FE-4FEA-808A-9368CE8373D8
|   Name:        com.apple.TimeMachine.2021-03-06-142406.local
|   XID:         297753
|   Purgeable:   Yes
|
+-- A929CE97-BE6C-406A-8B87-E36E84BEB055
|   Name:        com.apple.TimeMachine.2021-03-06-153201.local
|   XID:         298246
|   Purgeable:   Yes
|
+-- B48C9D6C-3CFD-4650-8417-CEE50BEB1916
|   Name:        com.apple.TimeMachine.2021-03-06-170856.local
|   XID:         298644
|   Purgeable:   Yes
|
+-- 060A9E0D-26E5-4BAC-995A-449BAC390DBF
|   Name:        com.apple.TimeMachine.2021-03-06-180703.local
|   XID:         298902
|   Purgeable:   Yes
|
+-- 63B6E635-25FF-4600-9566-53F076926BAC
|   Name:        com.apple.TimeMachine.2021-03-06-192159.local
|   XID:         299052
|   Purgeable:   Yes
|
+-- AD68B1F2-BCF4-488C-B845-0001CBB223E2
|   Name:        com.apple.TimeMachine.2021-03-06-211017.local
|   XID:         299771
|   Purgeable:   Yes
|
+-- 6D51E082-1493-4F66-95F0-57C14B0EE32B
|   Name:        com.apple.TimeMachine.2021-03-06-221402.local
|   XID:         300258
|   Purgeable:   Yes
|
+-- 897A97D6-E249-4B72-B7B8-1B28E732A109
|   Name:        com.apple.TimeMachine.2021-03-06-233553.local
|   XID:         300554
|   Purgeable:   Yes
|
+-- 0D84CBCA-5479-4DF4-85D5-2CB5C0657FE8
|   Name:        com.apple.TimeMachine.2021-03-07-010512.local
|   XID:         301026
|   Purgeable:   Yes
|
+-- E2294B36-F496-4B1B-A63C-A767F6645A61
|   Name:        com.apple.TimeMachine.2021-03-07-021932.local
|   XID:         301177
|   Purgeable:   Yes
|
+-- C018FD4C-A8BC-4E9D-80E8-CCEEA8519347
|   Name:        com.apple.TimeMachine.2021-03-07-031702.local
|   XID:         301381
|   Purgeable:   Yes
|
+-- C9EF8D50-B369-41E5-8E72-BEC2B6C613D7
|   Name:        com.apple.TimeMachine.2021-03-07-050744.local
|   XID:         301718
|   Purgeable:   Yes
|
+-- 01D10F77-02C7-4A0D-942E-092D76D22E73
|   Name:        com.apple.TimeMachine.2021-03-07-062804.local
|   XID:         301815
|   Purgeable:   Yes
|
+-- 8FBB0C9F-8494-4BE7-9F8A-DC51BCCAF850
|   Name:        com.apple.TimeMachine.2021-03-07-081742.local
|   XID:         301894
|   Purgeable:   Yes
|
+-- 729FA455-078A-45F8-B2DA-3EBE1633020B
|   Name:        com.apple.TimeMachine.2021-03-07-091635.local
|   XID:         302372
|   Purgeable:   Yes
|
+-- D73A7681-BE5C-4276-8E5F-42104F6AFA73
|   Name:        com.apple.TimeMachine.2021-03-07-100526.local
|   XID:         302485
|   Purgeable:   Yes
|
+-- 6DA3C216-5C95-4F4F-804C-26236BE8A349
    Name:        com.apple.TimeMachine.2021-03-07-110826.local
    XID:         302612
    Purgeable:   Yes

The output will help us delete unnecessary snapshots.

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Answer 2

Loner T

Level 9

59,536 points

Mar 6, 2021 7:09 AM in response to Campbell J NZ

macOS High Sierra and older versions have issues with W10 1903 and later ISOs. See https://twocanoes.com/using-larger-windows-10-isos-with-boot-camp-assistant/ for reference.

In order to address your disk issues, can you post the output of

diskutil list

from macOS Terminal?

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Answer 3

Loner T

Level 9

59,536 points

Mar 7, 2021 5:40 AM in response to Campbell J NZ

It may not work, after we addressed the disk space issue. Your current file system - APFS - is prone to corruption. Run

sudo fsck_apfs -n -l /dev/rdisk1

This command will prompt you for your password, which will not be echoed back to you. The output should tell us if there any file system issues.

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Answer 4

Loner T

Level 9

59,536 points

Mar 6, 2021 10:48 AM in response to Campbell J NZ

If you enter

diskutil list

and press Enter/Return, you should see output similar to the example I have posted. We should look at the output. What is the current macOS version on your Mac? Your screen shot shows ~48GB of free space.

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Answer 5

Loner T

Level 9

59,536 points

Mar 12, 2021 5:11 PM in response to Campbell J NZ

Assuming you have a current Time Machine backup, consider a clean install of macOS Sierra, a W10 installation using a W10 1903 or older ISO, and then upgrade to macOS High Sierra and then use Migration Assistant to restore your files from the Time Machine backup.

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Answer 6

Loner T

Level 9

59,536 points

Mar 6, 2021 2:49 PM in response to Campbell J NZ

Run

diskutil apfs resizeContainer disk1 0g

and post the output. If this works properly, you should get your 48GB disk space back.

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Answer 7

Loner T

Level 9

59,536 points

Mar 6, 2021 8:54 AM in response to Campbell J NZ

The Terminal version provides much more information. Click on Applications -> utilities -> Terminal, and run

diskutil list

Here is an example...

diskutil list 
/dev/disk0 (internal, physical):
   #:                       TYPE NAME                    SIZE       IDENTIFIER
   0:      GUID_partition_scheme                        *251.0 GB   disk0
   1:                        EFI EFI                     314.6 MB   disk0s1
   2:                 Apple_APFS Container disk1         218.7 GB   disk0s2
   3:       Microsoft Basic Data                         31.8 GB    disk0s3
   4:                 Apple_Boot Boot OS X               134.2 MB   disk0s4

/dev/disk1 (synthesized):
   #:                       TYPE NAME                    SIZE       IDENTIFIER
   0:      APFS Container Scheme -                      +218.7 GB   disk1
                                 Physical Store disk0s2
   1:                APFS Volume Macintosh HD - Data     58.1 GB    disk1s1
   2:                APFS Volume Preboot                 84.4 MB    disk1s2
   3:                APFS Volume Recovery                528.9 MB   disk1s3
   4:                APFS Volume VM                      7.5 GB     disk1s4
   5:                APFS Volume Macintosh HD            11.2 GB    disk1s5

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Answer 8

Loner T

Level 9

59,536 points

Mar 12, 2021 8:23 AM in response to Campbell J NZ

Create a Time Machine backup after you run BCA and remove the currently non-working Windows partition. I suggest upgrading to macOS Mojave (avoid Catalina and Big Sur) and try to install Windows. High Sierra APFS is fairly buggy compared to Mojave.

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Answer 9

Loner T

Level 9

59,536 points

Mar 7, 2021 2:23 PM in response to Campbell J NZ

You will need to run

diskutil apfs deleteSnapshot disk1s1 -xid <TheXIDValueInYourOutput>

except the one that sets the minimum size (the last one in your list).

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Answer 10

Loner T

Level 9

59,536 points

Mar 7, 2021 11:34 AM in response to Campbell J NZ

Using diskutil apfs deleteSnapshot and delete all except the one that sets the minimal size of APFS Container.

The syntax is

diskutil apfs deletesnapshot 
Usage:  diskutil apfs deleteSnapshot|deleteVolumeSnapshot <apfsVolumeDisk>
        -uuid <snapshotUUID> | -xid <snapshotXIDNumber> | -name <snapshotName>
        where <apfsVolumeDisk> = APFS Volume DiskIdentifier
              <snapshotUUID> = an APFS Snapshot UUID string (preferred)
              <snapshotXIDNumber> = an APFS Snapshot ID Number in decimal
              <snapshotName> = an APFS Snapshot Name (not mountpoint)
Remove the specified APFS Snapshot from the specified APFS Volume. The ability
to restore the state of the APFS Volume to that point in its evolution is lost.
The APFS Volume must be unlocked and mounted; the Snapshot must not be mounted.
Ownership of the affected disks is required.
Example:  diskutil apfs deleteSnapshot disk5s1 -uuid <UUID>
          diskutil apfs deleteSnapshot disk5s1 -name MySnap1

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Answer 11

Loner T

Level 9

59,536 points

Mar 8, 2021 6:09 AM in response to Campbell J NZ

Do not delete the snapshot that sets the minimum side of the APFS Container. The others can be deleted.

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Answer 12

Loner T

Level 9

59,536 points

Mar 13, 2021 10:21 AM in response to Campbell J NZ

You may want to consider a VMware Fusion Personal Use license (https://my.vmware.com/web/vmware/evalcenter?p=fusion-player-personal) as an option, if your Windows needs can be sufficiently met with a Virtual Machine.

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Answer 13

Loner T

Level 9

59,536 points

Mar 8, 2021 3:04 PM in response to Campbell J NZ

Your command should be

diskutil apfs deleteSnapshot disk1s1 -xid 11028377

not

diskutil apfs deleteSnapshot disk1s1 -xid <11028377>

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Answer 14

Mar 6, 2021 9:50 AM in response to Loner T

Ahhh thank you so much!

I've tried in terminal but it just indicates past login's.........I can run first aid however?

I see on the link you provided, that it indicates in the note in pink that apple updated boot camp, is that the case?

Many thanks again!

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Answer 15

Mar 6, 2021 12:22 PM in response to Loner T

Ahhh thank you so much!

Ok this is what it's showing, I have restarted after the last attempt to partition, so maybe it doesn't show enough?

I'm on High Sierra 10.13.6.....the 48GB is the hangover from the last attempt to install / partition.

I have tried 3 times, the first 2 I was able to remove the allocated space / it appeared as 'Bootcamp' etc, but on the 3rd it now refers to it as 'Free space' & created a quest user as well?

I read an article on Apple Support re Time Machine, so have tried disabling that / restarting etc but the 'free-space' still remains!

Thank you so much for trying to help me!

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