boot camp assistant? how to reinstall

[sixty9m3]

so i recently installed windows 7 on my mbp through boot camp and decided that i wanted to move back to xp. i then went ahead and formatted the partition thinking i could run the xp setup through boot camp again. however, every time i try to run boot camp i get the error message "The startup disk cannot be partitioned or restored to a single partition."

my question is, how can install xp w/o having to wipe the entire hdd to restore to a single drive.

thanks in advanced for any help

 

[iLog.Genius]

I don't see why Boot Camp Assistant can't merge back to a single drive but if you can't, boot off the XP disc and then select the Windows 7 Partition and reformat just that partition to NTFS or FAT32 and install XP on that. It won't affect the Mac side. You don't even need to use Boot Camp Assistant, it's just there to make it easy.

 

[srl7741]

Disk Uitlity

Can you use disk utility and delete the windows partition and just start over with boot camp?

Applications-Utilities-Disk Utility

 

[iLog.Genius]

Can you use disk utility and delete the windows partition and just start over with boot camp?

Applications-Utilities-Disk Utility

That is also an alternative if you want to delete the partition. OP would need to boot off the installation DVD to do so. But if he just wants to install XP over 7, the partition is already there, it's easier to just install over 7.

 

[sixty9m3]

thanks for all the replies. the problem i'm having is booting xp from the disc because i formatted the partition as mac os extended. when i try to boot from the disc all i get is a flashing line but the disc itself won't boot

 

[iLog.Genius]

I don't think or it shouldn't matter what the partition is, you should be able to boot of the XP installation disc. A partition is a partition and it isn't critical at your stage because you're going to have to change the file system anyway. I could be wrong but I've never heard of a file system of a partition preventing boot off an installation disc.

 

[kastenbrust]

Go to disk utility, choose the partition you accidentally formatted in HFS+, and click 'eraze' then choose fat32. This isnt your problem though, it could be anything including a defrag error.

 

[sixty9m3]

Go to disk utility, choose the partition you accidentally formatted in HFS+, and click 'eraze' then choose fat32. This isnt your problem though, it could be anything including a defrag error.

thx a lot! i was able to install through bootcamp once i formatted the drive as a fat32.