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Protomotion Author

Level 1

8 points

Boot camp partition option is greyed out

Just got my late 2012 Imac back from a 3tb hard drive replacement recall. Running Maverick 10.9.5 (prior to replacement was 10.9.1). First thing I did after getting it back was trying to run boot camp. I've done this before without issues. This time around though, I can't install windows. Boot camp doesn't give me the option to partition my drive as the option is greyed out. Boot camp assistant creates the windows bootable usb & downloads the windows support tools, but right after that, there is just a button that says "quit". When you press it, it just closes the boot camp window and that's it. It doesn't do anything else. I have screenshots but it won't let me insert pics of the screenshot on here.

iMac, OS X Mavericks (10.9.5)

Posted on May 27, 2016 5:56 PM

23 replies

Protomotion Author

Level 1

8 points

May 29, 2016 10:04 PM in response to Loner T

I rebooted after taking the previous pics. I still get the same things running BCA as the first set of pics in the original post. The 3rd option is unclickable. I just rebooted again prior to this reply. Still the same.

Loner T

Level 9

59,513 points

May 30, 2016 4:15 AM in response to Protomotion

Can you disconnect all external peripherals and reset SMC and NVRAM and test?

If that does not work, connect the USB Installer, shutdown your Mac, power it back up and hold Alt/Option key. Select the Windows icon from the USB and and try to install Windows. Your USB installer must be a USB flash drive, because USB HDDs will not work properly.

Protomotion Author

Level 1

8 points

May 30, 2016 10:43 AM in response to Loner T

Reset SMC & NVRAM and still getting the same results. I don't know if this is related, but I noticed every time I shut down, I never click the checkbox that say to reopen the windows I have open. But it always boots up showing whatever windows I had up previously.

So I tried to install off the usb until encountering the following:

Could not install windows in the BC partition. When I click to show details it said it had to be installed in an NTFS formatted partition.

When I look at the setup in disk utility, I noticed on the left column:

3 TB APPLE HDD ST3000...

Macintosh HD

Boot Camp

Macintosh HD 2

Whereas on the previous setup before the HD replacement, it was something like:

Macintosh HD

Don't remember what the name was

Boot Camp

Don't remember name

with the mac side having 1.5TB and BC having 1.5TB. Which is how I'm trying to get it to be again.

Loner T

Level 9

59,513 points

May 30, 2016 11:26 AM in response to Protomotion

Protomotion wrote:

Reset SMC & NVRAM and still getting the same results. I don't know if this is related, but I noticed every time I shut down, I never click the checkbox that say to reopen the windows I have open. But it always boots up showing whatever windows I had up previously.

This is normal and expected behavior in OS X. It preserves application states.

So I tried to install off the usb until encountering the following:

Could not install windows in the BC partition. When I click to show details it said it had to be installed in an NTFS formatted partition.

This is expected behavior as well. You will need to format it, because OS X does not have the license to write to an NTFS partition or create one. It can read NTFS.

When I look at the setup in disk utility, I noticed on the left column:

3 TB APPLE HDD ST3000...

Macintosh HD

Boot Camp

Macintosh HD 2

Whereas on the previous setup before the HD replacement, it was something like:

Macintosh HD

Don't remember what the name was

Boot Camp

Don't remember name

with the mac side having 1.5TB and BC having 1.5TB. Which is how I'm trying to get it to be again.

On a 3TB disk, a CoreStorage volume can be created that can combine Macintosh HD and Macintosh HD 2. This is how your original disk was setup. We can set it up after you install windows. This is the reason we split the disk the way we did.

Protomotion Author

Level 1

8 points

May 30, 2016 2:49 PM in response to Loner T

Ok I did the above & was able to install windows, except that the actual BC did not install. During the final phase of win installation when it says that it has to restart, it restarted into mac. Once I'm in there, the BC app (the one with the box turned on it's side) is nowhere to be found. The only way to get to the win side is the alt/option hold down on the reboot. Vice versa once I'm in Win7, I have no direct way to get back to the mac side via the BC control that used to be on the lower right corner. I have to restart each time.

One thing I noticed this time around that wasn't an issue previous time when I had BC before, is how the mac mouse does not work on the win side. I had to use another mouse even during the win install phase. Also currently no internet connectivity on the win side. Not even a wifi option.

Loner T

Level 9

59,513 points

May 30, 2016 2:56 PM in response to Protomotion

Your BC drivers did not install correctly. Re-run setup.exe from the Bootcamp folder to try and get all your devices with yellow triangles and exclamation mark working. Then we can create the CS volume for OS X.

Windows has a known issues of pairing with BT devices which may already be paired with another device. Try to un-pair the BT devices that do not work, from the OS X side, so they no pairings left, pair with Windows first, and then pair with OS X.

Protomotion Author

Level 1

8 points

Jun 3, 2016 10:26 PM in response to Loner T

Sorry for the delay in replying Loner T. I ran into some other issues after I installed the Win side. Somebody suggested I reinstall OSX. That seemed to have done the trick as I finally got the 3rd option available. Was able to install boot camp easily. I just wanted to say thank you for your help.

Loner T

Level 9

59,513 points

Jun 4, 2016 2:25 AM in response to Protomotion

Glad it worked out. Please remember to back up OSX, Windows and create a Windows System Restore point.

Boot camp partition option is greyed out