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bootcamp assistant refuses to assist

This on my trusty old early 2007 20" iMac (2.16Ghz Core2Duo)-3GBRAM-250GB HD-RadeonX1600(256MB)


Previously, this machine ran the latest version of OSX Lion.



I did a full system restore on this machine to pass it on to my son. So restore from original system discs (Tiger), download and install all updates, upgrade to Leopard from DVD, download and install all updates, upgrade to SnowLeopard, download and install all updates. Finished.


I do not want to upgrade back to Lion yet, because it will not allow me to install WinXP, and Win7 is not supported on this hardware (technically a late 2006, last of the white ones).


I open Bootcamp Assistant, but when I click continue on the first window, I get this:



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.



So I run Disk Utilities, 'Verify Disk', everything checks out, of course the disk is formatted as Mac OS Extended (Journaled). Yet Bootcamp won't let me continue.


What do I do?

Mac Pro, Mac OS X (10.6.8), '09/2.66GHz quad/12GB RAM

Posted on Mar 16, 2013 5:54 PM

Reply
5 replies

Mar 16, 2013 6:10 PM in response to zephonic

Hold the ff-ing phone, I start up the computer holding the alt (option) key and I see there is a recovery partition???


Is that why Bootcamp says the disk is not a single partition?


My best guess is that when I upgraded this machine to Lion, it automatically created this recovery partition. When I did the system restore I told it to format the internal drive but I guess it did not touch this partition.


This is hidden in Disk Utilities so cannot be removed.



I understand Apple feels it needs to protect unwitting users from themselves, but man, why can't I do what I want with my machine?



So can I somehow get rid of this recovery partition, or do I really need to boot up from an external drive, wipe out the internal disk and start all over?

Mar 17, 2013 8:39 PM in response to Funkey Monkey

I have a suspicion that our Mid 2007 iMacs are simply not supported by the latest (5.0) version of BootCamp.
Apple's support page shows here that Bootcamp 5 will only run 64-bit versions of windows, but the 64-bit versions won't run on Mid-2007 iMacs:
http://support.apple.com/kb/HT5634


So, maybe Bootcamp 5 simply won't work at all on our old iMacs, and it gives this stupid error instead of simply saying it's incompatible.

Sep 15, 2013 12:17 PM in response to zephonic

I have a baffling problem as well. There's no error message, it's just that boot camp assistant will not continue forward with anything once I have checked "install Windows 7" and click the continue button. The button isn't greyed out, it's functional but nothing happens at all.


I have the Windows support software downloaded. I'm on an iMac running 10.8.5, with the fusion drive (not partitioned yet, was waiting for bootcamp to do it). My Windows 7 dvd is in an external USB drive.


Boot camp assistant will continue forward if I also check the "download support software," but I don't need that anymore. All I need to do is install Windows.

bootcamp assistant refuses to assist

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