No Boot options

Question

Level 1

96 points

No Boot options

I have Mac OS and Win (Boot Camp) installed. This week it happened the second time that no boot option was available.
What have i done? I just choosed Windows to be the Startvolume in System preferences and did a reboot. A message appears "No bootable device - Insert boot disk and press any key ". I'm sure this message is from Windows wich has detected an error. So i tried to _start the Mac OS Startvolume by holding down the option key at power up. But that didn't worked._ I tried to hold down the X key at power up, to start the first Mac OS Startvolume. Same result = a grey screen.
I finaly solved the boot-problem by inserting the Windows Install-DVD and choosing the repair function. I guess it does something similar to the "Repair Volume" function of Mac OS Disk Utility. Now i can boot both Startvolumes and the Mac OS Install-DVD again.

I post this here (and not in Boot Camp Forum) because it is a Hardware or Firmware Problem. I don't know if this only happens on Mac Pros. But _the Startupmanager must allways show up regardless of a damaged Boot Camp partition!_
This is a problem wich can let a user believe, his Mac is damaged. Because he can't boot anything until he repaired the Windows partition with the Windows Install-DVD. And even this is really tricky because the Drive doesn't open unless the Tray-open-button is pressed for a great number of seconds (more than the usually two secs.!).

If somebody have any tips how to get the startupmanager working in this situations, i'd like to hear.

Mac Pro Quad (Mid2010)
Mac OS 10.6.6
Windows 7 Pro

Mac OS X (10.6.6), Allways got the latest updates installed.

Posted on Mar 15, 2011 9:23 AM

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Answer 1

Kappy

Level 10

361,741 points

Mar 15, 2011 10:09 AM in response to Tohu

I would be concerned about the status of the hard drive. The Boot Manager will not appear if there are no bootable volumes discovered. This suggests that neither volume on the hard drive were discoverable as valid startup volumes. That in turn suggests a problem with the drive's RDB where the partition information and boot sectors are stored.

What I would do in your shoes is backup both volumes then repartition and reformat the hard drive. Use Boot Camp Assistant to make your Windows volume, then restore both backups.

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Answer 2

Tohu Author

Level 1

96 points

Mar 15, 2011 10:42 AM in response to Kappy

Already foreclosed. Because:

A): the Mac OS volume was always intact (the Win Install-DVD can only repair the Win Partition)
B): the Mac OS Install-DVD wasn't booted too (but is ok)
C) other Mac OS Startvolumes on external harddrives wasn't booted (but are ok)

So if the startupmanager weren't showing up because all volumes were damaged, than why is everything fine after repairing the windows volume? No no! The problem is the startupmanager.

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Answer 3

Kappy

Level 10

361,741 points

Mar 15, 2011 11:07 AM in response to Tohu

Whatever.

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Answer 4

The hatter

Level 9

60,990 points

Mar 15, 2011 11:20 AM in response to Tohu

No, this is a Windows issue.

If you move the Windows drive to another drive bay; if you (make the mistake of putting Windows on the same hard drive) and move it.

Never a good idea to put both on the same drive, not when you have a Mac Pro.

Windows DVD does a good job and has its own system recovery features also.

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Answer 5

Tohu Author

Level 1

96 points

Mar 15, 2011 12:09 PM in response to The hatter

The hatter wrote:
If you move the Windows drive to another drive bay

I haven't moved the drive.

Aside from that, how should i install Boot Camp on another drive, seeing that the Boot Camp Assistent only lets me prepare a volume for Windows-Installation on the same drive i booted from! Explain how to bypass this problem.

this is a Windows issue

It may partly. But it is related to the Firmware of the Mac (EFI).

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Answer 6

The hatter

Level 9

60,990 points

Mar 15, 2011 12:58 PM in response to Tohu

Nonesense.

When you use Boot Camp Assitant, and I said it isn't needed with Windows 7 if you install on another drive, it does give the option to format a drive.

http://www.apple.com/support/bootcamp read the pdf and articles and look. Most of us with Mac Pro do not use Mac OS drive for Windows.

I've been using Vista on Mac Pro for over 4 yrs, and Windows 7 for over two.

Why do you want to blame UEFI? dont bother.

10.6.6 did make it worse, not sure why, longer boot times for both OS X and Windows, and for some people minutes longer.

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Answer 7

Mar 31, 2011 5:51 PM in response to Tohu

All Apple hardware is presently EFI 1.10, not UEFI. There are some pieces of UEFI 2.x Apple uses such as GOP instead of UGA on newer hardware (last couple of years). But it's still not UEFI 2.x compliant.

Windows 7 only groks BIOS and UEFI 2.x So your only option on Apple hardware is BIOS. In order to ensure BIOS emulation is used, instead of EFI, the disk needs an MBR, not GPT.

Bootcamp, on disks that are used for both Mac OS X and Windows, creates a hybrid MBR+GPT disk. It will act as GPT for Mac OS, and MBR for everything else.

If you are not going to install Mac OS on your extra drive, then you do not need Bootcamp at all. Just boot off the Windows DVD, point it to the extra drive and have it partition and reformat it (MBR + NTFS) and that will work.

This situation is a problem for > 2.2TB drive support. I'd like to see Apple at least give us the option to abandon BIOS entirely, and give us a fully compliant UEFI 2.x firmware.

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Answer 8

Mar 31, 2011 5:59 PM in response to Christopher Murphy

One other thing. MBR only supports 4 primary partitions. I don't know how Bootcamp negotiates this if a GPT disk has 4+ visible partitions (one partition, the EFI system partition is hidden. I'm not a big fan of the hybrid MBR+GPT partition. There aren't many tools that understand how to manage this, probably the best one is GPT fdisk (gdisk). You won't find Disk Utility, Tech Tool, Disk Warrior dealing with the partition tables or syncing them if they are hybrid MBR+GPT. They deal only with what they know which is the filesystem (volume format), the part inside each partition.

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