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PaulKemp

macrumors 6502a
Original poster
Jun 2, 2009
568
124
Norway
Hi everybody, I need some input. Since close to all my computer knowledge is from the Windows side of town, I need some input.

I currently have a 50 gb partitioned bootcamp disk that i installed windows 8 on. I want to remove this and install windows 7 due to some buggy Apple drivers on windows 8.

  1. Can I safely delete the bootcamp partition in Disk Utility?
  2. I want to keep the win partition for the future windows 7 install
  3. Can I then just run the normal bootcamp or rEFIt (etc) and install windows 7 from a dvd/usb afterwords?
  4. What do I do if i want to repartition that space (50 gb) and merge it with my current OS X disk in the future?

Any tips greatly appreciated. Regards
 

heisenberg123

macrumors 603
Oct 31, 2010
6,496
9
Hamilton, Ontario
Hi everybody, I need some input. Since close to all my computer knowledge is from the Windows side of town, I need some input.

I currently have a 50 gb partitioned bootcamp disk that i installed windows 8 on. I want to remove this and install windows 7 due to some buggy Apple drivers on windows 8.

  1. Can I safely delete the bootcamp partition in Disk Utility?
  2. I want to keep the win partition for the future windows 7 install
  3. Can I then just run the normal bootcamp or rEFIt (etc) and install windows 7 from a dvd/usb afterwords?
  4. What do I do if i want to repartition that space (50 gb) and merge it with my current OS X disk in the future?

Any tips greatly appreciated. Regards

you can remove it with bootcamp assitant
 

logana

macrumors 65816
Feb 4, 2006
1,396
8
Scotland
All you need do is number 3 - run Bootcamp assistant (install Windows) - put your Windows 7 dvd in and off you go.

You can format your 50GB partition before you install (from Windows setup)

I don't see any point in deleting the partition and then creating it again.....

When you get fed-up of W7 then use Bootcamp assistant to remove the partition and the free space will be available to OSX.
 

PaulKemp

macrumors 6502a
Original poster
Jun 2, 2009
568
124
Norway
Sounds easy enough! Very happy that its just to run Bootcamp assistant and reenable the space afterwords. Sweet. Thanks for the help guys.
 

murphychris

macrumors 6502a
Mar 19, 2012
661
2
  1. Can I safely delete the bootcamp partition in Disk Utility?
  2. I want to keep the win partition for the future windows 7 install

These two appear to be mutually exclusive (contradictory) options. If you delete the partition, it is gone, you can't keep it for a future Windows 7 install.

Perhaps what you want to do is simply erase that partition, in effect blowing away Windows 8, but maintaining the partition intact so you can simply boot off a Windows 7 DVD and install? That would seem to be the least amount of work. If you use Bootcamp Assistant, it will merge the two partitions together. To reinstall Windows 7, you'll need to resize again.

Considering the rather extreme limitations of Apple's GUI tools when it comes to partitioning and resizing, I would recommend against using Bootcamp Assistant to merge the two partitions back together again. I would either leave Windows 8 alone, and let the Windows 7 installer reformat (and thus delete) that volume. Or I'd use Disk Utility to "erase" that volume if you really want it blanked out now for some reason.
 
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