Q: Repairing Boot Camp after creating new partition

Hello Christopher Murphy, I am also looking for help to this problem. I was running Windows 7 (64 bit) fine off of bootcamp, until I wanted to try and run Fedora from Bootcamp as well. So I partitioned my Macintosh HD to run Fedora (off topic: is this actually possible? If so, then I'd like to keep this extra partition, otherwise it may as well be deleted), and found that Windows 7 would not show up upon restarting my PC, as well as getting the "No bootable device --- insert boot disk and press any key" page). This is something I really would like to get fixed without having to do a complete re-install of everything. I've executed the two commands you posted at the start of the thread, and would like to know if the instructions you posted to the orginal poster is pertinent to my case, or whether I need to go about this differently:

sudo gpt -r -vv show disk0

gpt show: disk0: mediasize=640135028736; sectorsize=512; blocks=1250263728

gpt show: disk0: PMBR at sector 0

gpt show: disk0: Pri GPT at sector 1

gpt show: disk0: Sec GPT at sector 1250263727

       start        size  index  contents

           0           1         PMBR

           1           1         Pri GPT header

           2          32         Pri GPT table

          34           6        

          40      409600      1  GPT part - C12A7328-F81F-11D2-BA4B-00A0C93EC93B

      409640   312453304      2  GPT part - 48465300-0000-11AA-AA11-00306543ECAC

   312862944     1269544      3  GPT part - 426F6F74-0000-11AA-AA11-00306543ECAC

   314132488   310968312      4  GPT part - 48465300-0000-11AA-AA11-00306543ECAC

   625100800      262144        

   625362944   624900096      5  GPT part - EBD0A0A2-B9E5-4433-87C0-68B6B72699C7

  1250263040         655        

  1250263695          32         Sec GPT table

  1250263727           1         Sec GPT header

sudo fdisk /dev/disk0

Disk: /dev/disk0

geometry: 77825/255/63 [1250263728 sectors]

Signature: 0xAA55

         Starting       Ending

#: id  cyl  hd sec -  cyl  hd sec [     start -       size]

------------------------------------------------------------------------

1: EE 1023 254  63 - 1023 254  63 [         1 - 1250263727] <Unknown ID>

2: 00    0   0   0 -    0   0   0 [         0 -          0] unused     

3: 00    0   0   0 -    0   0   0 [         0 -          0] unused     

4: 00    0   0   0 -    0   0   0 [         0 -          0] unused    

I really appreciate the help you're providing, thanks.

It is possible to triple boot Apple hardware, with caveats that it's non-obvious how to do this and I never use "Boot Camp" per se to do it. Fedora 17 is one of the only distributions that supports EFI booting Linux on Apple hardware. You will end up with a pile of GPT partitions as a result, although any more than 4 means you will need to build your own hybrid MBR (with something like gdisk) because the Apple tools will not do it.

Your disk now has five partitions, and Apple's tools only create hybrid MBRs for disks with 4 partitions or fewer. So what it did was it reset the hybrid MBR to a PMBR, removing the ability to boot Windows. So you probably have to deal with this in stages and decide what you want the final arragement to look like. And you have to realize how extraordinarily involved this is and that you're way way better off using VM for Fedora and Windows as guest, and Mac OS X as host.

If you have some requirement for native booting these OS's, the ideal situation for the highly non-standard hybrid MBR that's required to do this, is for Windows to be in the last partition. It's in the last partition now, but you need to resize that Windows partition *and* move it. Resizing shrinks a partition from the end toward the middle, making room for more partitions after it. You need free space in front of the Windows partition in order to install Fedora. That way you can place all partitions except Windows into the MBR 0xEE partition, thus they are protected. Mac OS X and Fedora will honor the GPT, and ignore the MBR. And Windows will have its own entry in the MBR (and GPT), and of course Windows only honors the MBR when it's booting in legacy BIOS mode.

You can use a Fedora Live CD, and yum install gparted, which can do a move/resize on NTFS volumes.

You have two HFS+ partitions? Why? Partition 2 is HFS+ as is partition 4. In between them is Recovery HD.

This is going to be complicated and take a while to move everything around. And then if it's not exactly correct, it'll take a lot of work to extract yourself out of a  partition scheme that will contain 7+ partitions. Again, I highly advise VM and having just a single Mac OS X partition.

The gist:

1. Backup Mac OS X volumes.

2. Get Windows bootable again so that you can back it up. This can be done with either gdisk (from sourceforge, search for GPT fdisk); or use the fdisk that comes with Mac OS X and add to partition 2 an entry identical to that of GPT partition 5. So, use the same start sector value and sector size value. The partition type should be 07. And you should set the active (bootable) flag on partition 2. You'll need to edit partition 1, keeping everything the same except you'll need to change its size so that it ends a sector before the Windows partition start sector.

3. Resize and move Window NTFS partition with gparted. This will take some calculation to find the sector start offset you want and get the final size right. Invariably this will remove the hybrid MBR in step 2. So you'll eventually have to fix it later.

4. Deal with the superfluous HFS+ volume?

5. Install Fedora 17 into the free space between the 2nd HFS+ partition and the Windows partition.

6. Create a new hybrid MBR to regain Windows bootability (needs to be done last because parted always writes out PMBRs not hybrid MBRs).

I think I'll take your inital advice of running Fedora from a VM. So how would I go about making Windows 7 bootable again, and set up my PC to be able to boot Fedora in a VM?

Christopher Murphy wrote:

 

You have two HFS+ partitions? Why? Partition 2 is HFS+ as is partition 4. In between them is Recovery HD.

I have no idea. Is this a problem, and can you help me fix it (if it is)? Thanks.

Please post the result from:

diskutil list

And also find, download, and install, gdisk from sourceforge. You're looking for GPT fdisk, 0.8.5 or later.

diskutil list

/dev/disk0

   #:                       TYPE NAME                    SIZE       IDENTIFIER

   0:      GUID_partition_scheme                        *640.1 GB   disk0

   1:                        EFI                         209.7 MB   disk0s1

   2:                  Apple_HFS Macintosh HD            160.0 GB   disk0s2

   3:                 Apple_Boot Recovery HD             650.0 MB   disk0s3

   4:                  Apple_HFS Fedora                  159.2 GB   disk0s4

   5:       Microsoft Basic Data                         319.9 GB   disk0s5

/dev/disk1

   #:                       TYPE NAME                    SIZE       IDENTIFIER

   0:     Apple_partition_scheme                        *84.0 MB    disk1

   1:        Apple_partition_map                         32.3 KB    disk1s1

   2:                  Apple_HFS Firefox                 84.0 MB    disk1s2

I've also downloaded gdisk 0.8.5. Thanks for the support.

What is this 160GB partition labeled Fedora? It's marked as HFS+. A default Fedora installation on Apple hardware doesn't produce an HFS+ volume of this size, it produces a very tiny one that contains the bootloader and some other files only, so that it appears as a boot option in Startup Disk. Is this an incomplete installation?

gdisk runs it interactive mode so you type

sudo gdisk /dev/disk0

And you'll end up in a program that reacts to lettered options. For example ? <return> will get you a list of commands. What you're after is:

r [recovery menu]

h [create a new hybrid mbr]

5 [add GPT partition 5 to the mbr, this is your windows partition]

y  [yes place 0xEE in the first MBR partition]

<return>  [accept default of 07 for Windows partition type]

y [set the bootable flag]

n [do not protect more partitions]

w [write out the new partition tables]

Once done, it will drop to a prompt and you should reboot and test your ability to boot Mac OS and Windows.

Christopher Murphy wrote:

 

What is this 160GB partition labeled Fedora? It's marked as HFS+. A default Fedora installation on Apple hardware doesn't produce an HFS+ volume of this size, it produces a very tiny one that contains the bootloader and some other files only, so that it appears as a boot option in Startup Disk. Is this an incomplete installation?

I partitioned my Macintosh HD into two, one for the Mac OS x system, and one for Fedora (which I did not install in the end, so it can be deleted); this was done through disk Utility. My other disk partition (named "Untitled") is for Windows 7 (it won't let me change the name; I don't suppose you have a solution for this as well?).

Well, you could use gdisk first to delete partition 4, assuming there's nothing on it. That will make it free space. Then reboot.

Then go to Terminal and type:

diskutil resizevolume /dev/disk0s2 limits

See if the resizer will see the free space as something it can use to merge back into the Mac OS X volume. Deal with this first before Windows because any activity that involves changing the GPT will cause the hybrid MBR to revert to PMBR.

I'm not too familiar with gdisk, so I deleted the partition in disk utility, but it's not allowing me to extend the Macintosh HD memory to the full width of the box. Here's an image to show:

http://postimage.org/image/8pny3du1t/

I've also tried the terminal command, but it's saying that the disk is at its current limit.

Back the partition up and delete it and all others, then make a new one.

Thanks for the respone; though that sounds like a hefty task, which is something I'd rather avoid. I've managed to repartition the Macintosh HD so that I'm only loosing 5-10GBs or so to the unknown, and my Windows 7 OS is now bootable (which was the main thing I needed to fix).

I'm personally having the same issue, I've confirmed that my iMac has only 4 partitions and it is the 4th

that has the GUID (under index) is EBD0A0A2-B9E5-4433-87C0-68B6B72699C7.

"gpt show: disk0: mediasize=320072933376; sectorsize=512; blocks=625142448

gpt show: disk0: Suspicious MBR at sector 0

gpt show: disk0: Pri GPT at sector 1

gpt show: disk0: Sec GPT at sector 625142447

      start       size  index  contents

          0          1         MBR

          1          1         Pri GPT header

          2         32         Pri GPT table

         34          6        

         40     409600      1  GPT part - C12A7328-F81F-11D2-BA4B-00A0C93EC93B

     409640  194306224      2  GPT part - 48465300-0000-11AA-AA11-00306543ECAC

  194715864    1269544      3  GPT part - 426F6F74-0000-11AA-AA11-00306543ECAC

  195985408  428894856      4  GPT part - EBD0A0A2-B9E5-4433-87C0-68B6B72699C7

  624880264     262151        

  625142415         32         Sec GPT table

  625142447          1         Sec GPT header"

So I was able to follow your specific set of instructions however when I get to the part of accepting the default hex code (which according to your post should be 07) mine is 03. If possible could you inform me of where I went wrong.

Thanks!

Randall

You've supplied a GPT, but 07 and 03 are MBR hex codes, not GPT hex codes. If you're fixing this in fdisk then the code would be 07, but it's not a default, you have to enter it in. If you're fixing this in gdisk's recovery > create new hybrid MBR option, the default code for your partition 4 will be 0700. So I have no idea what you're trying to fix this in.

Sorry for not supplying you with all the details

The results when I punch in sudo gpt -r -vv show disk0 are :

gpt show: disk0: mediasize=320072933376; sectorsize=512; blocks=625142448

gpt show: disk0: Suspicious MBR at sector 0

gpt show: disk0: Pri GPT at sector 1

gpt show: disk0: Sec GPT at sector 625142447

      start       size  index  contents

          0          1         MBR

          1          1         Pri GPT header

          2         32         Pri GPT table

         34          6        

         40     409600      1  GPT part - C12A7328-F81F-11D2-BA4B-00A0C93EC93B

     409640  194306224      2  GPT part - 48465300-0000-11AA-AA11-00306543ECAC

  194715864    1269544      3  GPT part - 426F6F74-0000-11AA-AA11-00306543ECAC

  195985408  428894856      4  GPT part - EBD0A0A2-B9E5-4433-87C0-68B6B72699C7

  624880264     262151        

  625142415         32         Sec GPT table

  625142447          1         Sec GPT header

The results I get when I punch in sudo fdisk /dev/disk0:

Signature: 0xAA55

         Starting       Ending

#: id  cyl  hd sec -  cyl  hd sec [     start -       size]

------------------------------------------------------------------------

1: EE    0   0   2 - 1023 254  63 [         1 -  195985407] <Unknown ID>

*2: 03 1023 254  63 - 1023 254  63 [ 195985408 -  428894856] XENIX /usr 

3: 00    0   0   0 -    0   0   0 [         0 -          0] unused     

4: 00    0   0   0 -    0   0   0 [         0 -          0] unused  

When I punch in diskutil I get

/dev/disk0

   #:                       TYPE NAME                    SIZE       IDENTIFIER

   0:      GUID_partition_scheme                        *320.1 GB   disk0

   1:                        EFI                         209.7 MB   disk0s1

   2:                  Apple_HFS Wendy Hd                99.5 GB    disk0s2

   3:                 Apple_Boot Recovery HD             650.0 MB   disk0s3

   4:       Microsoft Basic Data                         219.6 GB   disk0s4

/dev/disk1

   #:                       TYPE NAME                    SIZE       IDENTIFIER

   0:                            GRMCPRXFRER_EN_DVD     *3.2 GB     disk1

I then downloaded gdisk like instructed to and when I follow the process I get the following:

After typing in p<enter> I get

Disk /dev/disk0: 625142448 sectors, 298.1 GiB

Logical sector size: 512 bytes

Disk identifier (GUID): F932B20F-2EDE-420B-A677-C2EE508E9943

Partition table holds up to 128 entries

First usable sector is 34, last usable sector is 625142414

Partitions will be aligned on 8-sector boundaries

Total free space is 262157 sectors (128.0 MiB)

Number  Start (sector)    End (sector)  Size       Code  Name

   1              40          409639   200.0 MiB   EF00  EFI System Partition

   2          409640       194715863   92.7 GiB    AF00  Wendy Hd

   3       194715864       195985407   619.9 MiB   AB00  Recovery HD

   4       195985408       624880263   204.5 GiB   0700  DOS_FAT_32_Untitled_3

How should I proceed from here? Have I gotten all the steps down?

Thanks so much for your help.