Bootcamp disappears after creating third partition

Question

Bootcamp disappears after creating third partition

I use my Mac mini as a secondary computer for home use and wanted to expand the partition space on the Windows side. I carved a third partition out of the Mac side to create 64GB to extend on the Windows side, but when I restarted the computer, the Windows partition doesn't show up--even though Disk Utility shows the partition still exists and the files are still there.

Here is the partition dialogue window (the 160GB space is the Bootcamp space; the smaller slice of the pie is the 64GB third partition):

Is the Bootcamp partition recoverable in any way?

Mac mini, OS X El Capitan (10.11)

Posted on Sep 30, 2015 7:41 PM

Reply

Answer 1

Kappy

Level 10

361,849 points

Sep 30, 2015 7:44 PM in response to AppleinWilmington

If you read the Boot Camp documentation then you would have learned that there can be only two partitions - OS X and Boot Camp. Adding a third partition will effectively prevent Boot Camp from booting up.

Reply

Answer 2

Sep 30, 2015 7:52 PM in response to Kappy

Unfortunately I did not read that documentation--poor planning on my part. 😟 Are there any steps I can take to reinstate Boot Camp?

Reply

Answer 3

Loner T

Level 9

59,513 points

Oct 1, 2015 6:36 AM in response to AppleinWilmington

Can you post the output of the following Terminal commands?

diskutil list

diskutil cs list

sudo gpt -vv -r show /dev/disk0

sudo fdisk /dev/disk0

The "sudo" commands will prompt for your password, and it will not be echoed back. You may also see a warning about improper use of "sudo" and potential data loss due to "abuse" of the command.

Reply

Answer 4

Oct 1, 2015 2:31 PM in response to Loner T

Thanks for reaching out Loner T--sorry for the wait.

diskutil list:

/dev/disk0 (internal, physical):

#: TYPE NAME SIZE IDENTIFIER

0: GUID_partition_scheme *500.1 GB disk0

1: EFI EFI 209.7 MB disk0s1

2: Apple_HFS Macintosh HD 274.9 GB disk0s2

3: Apple_Boot Recovery HD 650.0 MB disk0s3

4: Apple_HFS Untitled 64.2 GB disk0s4

5: Microsoft Basic Data BOOTCAMP 160.0 GB disk0s5

diskutil cs list:

No CoreStorage logical volume groups found

sudo command 1:

gpt show: /dev/disk0: mediasize=500107862016; sectorsize=512; blocks=976773168

gpt show: /dev/disk0: PMBR at sector 0

gpt show: /dev/disk0: Pri GPT at sector 1

gpt show: /dev/disk0: Sec GPT at sector 976773167

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 536977800 2 GPT part - 48465300-0000-11AA-AA11-00306543ECAC

537387440 1269536 3 GPT part - 426F6F74-0000-11AA-AA11-00306543ECAC

538656976 125355824 4 GPT part - 48465300-0000-11AA-AA11-00306543ECAC

664012800 262144

664274944 312498176 5 GPT part - EBD0A0A2-B9E5-4433-87C0-68B6B72699C7

976773120 15

976773135 32 Sec GPT table

976773167 1 Sec GPT header

sudo command 2:

Disk: /dev/disk0 geometry: 60801/255/63 [976773168 sectors]

Signature: 0xAA55

Starting Ending

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

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

1: EE 1023 254 63 - 1023 254 63 [ 1 - 976773167] <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

Reply

Answer 5

Loner T

Level 9

59,513 points

Oct 1, 2015 3:40 PM in response to AppleinWilmington

Do you want to set up a shared partition or do you want to extend the existing Windows partition?

Reply

Answer 6

Oct 1, 2015 4:35 PM in response to Loner T

Extend Windows, if at all possible.

Reply

Answer 7

Loner T

Level 9

59,513 points

Oct 1, 2015 4:49 PM in response to AppleinWilmington

1. Backup OSX and Windows (we can make it bootable as it is now, if you want).

2. Convert the 64Gb to Free Space.

3. Check Windows Disk Management to ensure the 64Gb chunk shows up as Free Space. Resize using either diskpart ( https://technet.microsoft.com/en-us/library/cc731894.aspx ) or Disk Management and test.

Reply

Answer 8

Oct 1, 2015 5:29 PM in response to Loner T

Sounds good! How do we make it bootable again?

Reply

Answer 9

Loner T

Level 9

59,513 points

Oct 1, 2015 5:42 PM in response to AppleinWilmington

We need to check a few things first.

1. The first block of the current partition using the following command.

sudo dd if=/dev/rdisk0s5 count=1 2>/dev/null | hexdump -C

2. Verify that

a. Bootcamp volume is visible in OS X Finder.

b. Files are visible in the Bootcamp volume.

c. Files are familiar Windows files.

You have done some parts of step 2 already.

Reply

Answer 10

Oct 1, 2015 5:47 PM in response to Loner T

Got it:

1.

00000000 eb 52 90 4e 54 46 53 20 20 20 20 00 02 08 00 00 |.R.NTFS .....|

00000010 00 00 00 00 00 f8 00 00 3f 00 ff 00 00 08 98 27 |........?......'|

00000020 00 00 00 00 80 00 80 00 ff 47 92 12 00 00 00 00 |.........G......|

00000030 00 00 0c 00 00 00 00 00 02 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 |................|

00000040 f6 00 00 00 01 00 00 00 0c e7 4f 12 29 50 12 3c |..........O.)P.<|

00000050 00 00 00 00 fa 33 c0 8e d0 bc 00 7c fb 68 c0 07 |.....3.....|.h..|

00000060 1f 1e 68 66 00 cb 88 16 0e 00 66 81 3e 03 00 4e |..hf......f.>..N|

00000070 54 46 53 75 15 b4 41 bb aa 55 cd 13 72 0c 81 fb |TFSu..A..U..r...|

00000080 55 aa 75 06 f7 c1 01 00 75 03 e9 dd 00 1e 83 ec |U.u.....u.......|

00000090 18 68 1a 00 b4 48 8a 16 0e 00 8b f4 16 1f cd 13 |.h...H..........|

000000a0 9f 83 c4 18 9e 58 1f 72 e1 3b 06 0b 00 75 db a3 |.....X.r.;...u..|

000000b0 0f 00 c1 2e 0f 00 04 1e 5a 33 db b9 00 20 2b c8 |........Z3... +.|

000000c0 66 ff 06 11 00 03 16 0f 00 8e c2 ff 06 16 00 e8 |f...............|

000000d0 4b 00 2b c8 77 ef b8 00 bb cd 1a 66 23 c0 75 2d |K.+.w......f#.u-|

000000e0 66 81 fb 54 43 50 41 75 24 81 f9 02 01 72 1e 16 |f..TCPAu$....r..|

000000f0 68 07 bb 16 68 52 11 16 68 09 00 66 53 66 53 66 |h...hR..h..fSfSf|

00000100 55 16 16 16 68 b8 01 66 61 0e 07 cd 1a 33 c0 bf |U...h..fa....3..|

00000110 0a 13 b9 f6 0c fc f3 aa e9 fe 01 90 90 66 60 1e |.............f`.|

00000120 06 66 a1 11 00 66 03 06 1c 00 1e 66 68 00 00 00 |.f...f.....fh...|

00000130 00 66 50 06 53 68 01 00 68 10 00 b4 42 8a 16 0e |.fP.Sh..h...B...|

00000140 00 16 1f 8b f4 cd 13 66 59 5b 5a 66 59 66 59 1f |.......fY[ZfYfY.|

00000150 0f 82 16 00 66 ff 06 11 00 03 16 0f 00 8e c2 ff |....f...........|

00000160 0e 16 00 75 bc 07 1f 66 61 c3 a1 f6 01 e8 09 00 |...u...fa.......|

00000170 a1 fa 01 e8 03 00 f4 eb fd 8b f0 ac 3c 00 74 09 |............<.t.|

00000180 b4 0e bb 07 00 cd 10 eb f2 c3 0d 0a 41 20 64 69 |............A di|

00000190 73 6b 20 72 65 61 64 20 65 72 72 6f 72 20 6f 63 |sk read error oc|

000001a0 63 75 72 72 65 64 00 0d 0a 42 4f 4f 54 4d 47 52 |curred...BOOTMGR|

000001b0 20 69 73 20 63 6f 6d 70 72 65 73 73 65 64 00 0d | is compressed..|

000001c0 0a 50 72 65 73 73 20 43 74 72 6c 2b 41 6c 74 2b |.Press Ctrl+Alt+|

000001d0 44 65 6c 20 74 6f 20 72 65 73 74 61 72 74 0d 0a |Del to restart..|

000001e0 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 |................|

000001f0 00 00 00 00 00 00 8a 01 a7 01 bf 01 00 00 55 aa |..............U.|

00000200

2.

Reply

Answer 11

Loner T

Level 9

59,513 points

Oct 1, 2015 7:38 PM in response to AppleinWilmington

The following steps are non-standard because there is a third user-visible partition. Typically, there are two such partitions in a normal configuration on a single-disk Mac with OS X and Bootcamp. This is fragile and lack of proper backups can lead to potential data loss. Download GPT Fdisk from http://sourceforge.net/projects/gptfdisk/ and install it on the OS X side. The following steps are executed when booted in OS X. If the 64G is converted to Free Space, these numbers (3 4 5) will change back to (2 3 4).

Rebuild MBR to match the new GPT information thus resetting the Hybrid MBR. Use defaults for other questions (like partition codes). The only values that need modifications are the Boot flags and step 10. Accept all other defaults that Gdisk offers. Please see thesample Q&A as an example. These steps can be repeated if you make a mistake before you get to Step 12, otherwise start from Step 1 for these steps. Step 6 has numbers which are typed with a space between the numbers. Please see the sample Q&A before you execute these steps.

Sudo gdisk /dev/rdisk0
P (Print list of parts)
R (Recover)
O (print current Hybrid MBR)
H (chooses Hybrid)
Partitions numbers to be hybridized: 3 4 5
Y (Good for GRUB question)
N (part 3 boot flag)
N (part 4 boot flag)
Y (part 5 boot flag make NTFS bootable partition)
O (print current Hybrid MBR)
W (Write the new MBR)
Y (Yes! write the new MBR)
Reboot

Here is sample Q&A for this section. Please notice the Press Enter/Return. Accept defaults offered by Gdisk.

Place EFI GPT (0xEE) partition first in MBR (good for GRUB)? (Y/N): Y

Creating entry for GPT partition #3 (MBR partition #2)

Enter an MBR hex code (default AF or AB): Press Enter/Return

Set the bootable flag? (Y/N): N

Creating entry for GPT partition #4 (MBR partition #3)

Enter an MBR hex code (default AB or 0B or 0C): Press Enter/Return

Set the bootable flag? (Y/N): N

Creating entry for GPT partition #5 (MBR partition #4)

Enter an MBR hex code (default 07): Press Enter/Return

Set the bootable flag? (Y/N): Y