Boot Camp Issue on Mac Pro 2009

[scmaster53]

hey guys, bear with me as im new here xD

OK so I have a Mac Pro (2009 model) running Snow Leopard and I have Windows 7 Ultimate 32 bit on a 200 GB Bootcamp parition. Ive had windows on it for some time now, ever since November and ive never had an issue until today.

Heres what happened. I was in windows 7, I chose the bootcamp option in the taskbar and told it to restart in Mac OS X. It restarted fine. Then I needed to go back into windows. So i restarted the computer and hit the alt key... but windows never showed up. It just booted OS X. I tried again and the same thing. So I tried to boot from the startup disk option in System Preferences.. but the bootcamp partition did not show up, only the OS X did. So i checked my desktop and finder. Lo and behold the bootcamp disk was still on my desktop and still in the finder. Then i ran the bootcamp utility and it detected a windows partition also.

I tried to restart again to no avail. It WONT detect the bootcamp partition, but its THERE :|

Can anyone help? im totally lost and perplexed. Not to mentiont the fact that i have a LOT of games and work on my windows side.. :[

thanks in advance guys

 

[balamw]

On the Mac Pro, you are usually better off using a separate drive for Windows instead of using Boot Camp Assistant to move it.

You may have some disk corruption, try and boot from your OS X install disc and verify and repair your HDD. The boot loader just isn't seeing the partition as there or active/bootable.

Using a separate drive allows you to keep Mac OS on a GPT partitioned drive and have Windows on an MBR partitioned drive so you limit any issues.

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[Thraun]

Also, in your System Preferences there's a pref-pane called Startup Disk. You should hopefully see the Windows partition there, and should be able to click it and hit restart. If you don't see it there, then it's pretty sure there's an issue with the partition.

 

[bcrguy]

did you adjust anything on the mac part of that disc with the partition on it??

if you tried to create another partition on the disc with bootcamp it causes an error in the partition map.. i had this happen a few times to me on my macbook pro..

if you did modify the partition map then you have to reinstall windows from scratch..

 

[balamw]

So I tried to boot from the startup disk option in System Preferences.. but the bootcamp partition did not show up, only the OS X did.

Also, in your System Preferences there's a pref-pane called Startup Disk. You should hopefully see the Windows partition there, and should be able to click it and hit restart. If you don't see it there, then it's pretty sure there's an issue with the partition.

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[JediMeister]

Do you know if you installed NTFS-3G or MacFUSE? I have heard of issues recently with the startup manager having trouble detecting the Windows partition with that installed but I do not know the particulars since I don't use either of those pieces of software...

 

[balamw]

Do you know if you installed NTFS-3G or MacFUSE? I have heard of issues recently with the startup manager having trouble detecting the Windows partition with that installed but I do not know the particulars since I don't use either of those pieces of software...

I thought in those cases you could still get there with alt?

Here's a link about this issue: http://www.macosxhints.com/article.php?story=20080116093511246

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[scmaster53]

allow me to clarify a tad

The Bootcamp partition is on my primary HD. So Windows shares the same HD as OS X.

I attempted to use startup disk, it did not detect windows. Bootcamp assistant did, as it gave me options to change things. I didnt do anything with the bootcamp assistant aside from using it to see if it could detect the windows partition.

finder also finds it and the icon is still on the desktop. All my files are intact also.

The only thing i cant do is boot into it.

Ill try to repair the permissions and such with the disk utility.

 

[balamw]

You didn't answer the NTFS-3G (or similar) question.

That is something that has similar symptoms. e.g. https://forums.macrumors.com/threads/854399/ minus the fact you can't get to it using the Alt/Option key. (EDIT: Did you by any chance change keyboards since it last worked?).

My point in the first response was: You have a Mac Pro, you would be better off having Windows on a separate drive if possible.

EDIT: Since no one else has mentioned it yet, you could consider rEFIt http://refit.sf.net as an alternative boot loader, but it would be good to understand what is going on here first.

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[scmaster53]

ah yes sorry. no i didnt use MacFUSE, i just installed it like normal. Chose the main HD, partitioned and installed.

ill check the keyboard. but i doubt its the keyboard b/c i cant find the disk in the startup panel :|

 

[balamw]

ah yes sorry. no i didnt use MacFUSE, i just installed it like normal. Chose the main HD, partitioned and installed.

ill check the keyboard. but i doubt its the keyboard b/c i cant find the disk in the startup panel :|

MacFUSE/NTFS-3G are programs that allow Mac OS to write to your Boot Camp partition and would not be needed during the Windows install. Can you double check that the Boot Camp partition you see on your desktop is read only as it should be by default? Something else you installed might have made it read/write and thus invisible to the Startup Disk System Preference.

I have a Boot Camp issue with my original 17" iMac and the current Apple wired keyboard. It doesn't recognize the Alt key from it at boot, so I need to use the remote or mouse to bring up the boot menu.

So when you hold down Alt, do you actually get the boot selector with Mac OS as the only choice? Your OP seems to imply it went straight to OS X without the menu.

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[scmaster53]

MacFUSE/NTFS-3G are programs that allow Mac OS to write to your Boot Camp partition and would not be needed during the Windows install. Can you double check that the Boot Camp partition you see on your desktop is read only as it should be by default? Something else you installed might have made it read/write and thus invisible to the Startup Disk System Preference.

I have a Boot Camp issue with my original 17" iMac and the current Apple wired keyboard. It doesn't recognize the Alt key from it at boot, so I need to use the remote or mouse to bring up the boot menu.

So when you hold down Alt, do you actually get the boot selector with Mac OS as the only choice? Your OP seems to imply it went straight to OS X without the menu.

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OK the format is NTFS-3g (MacFUSE)

for permissons I have custom access

and no it wont bring it up at ALL. it just boots OS X

 

[scmaster53]

OK so i worked on it some more. And get this, if i restart using the OS X DVD and tell it to run the startup disk utility.. it detects windows! So the only way for me to boot into windows now is to first restart with my OS X DVD and then tell it to restart in windows 7.

I have no idea whats going on, but part of me thinks that something on OS X got messed up :|

 

[scmaster53]

Ok i got it fixed. Turns out it was simply a defective keyboard. Apparently it wasnt getting power until after the kernel was booted, and by then its too late to hit the alt key to select Windows or OS X. I called apple and got a replacement board. All set now.

Thanks so much for all your help

 

[balamw]

I hate that. My 17" iMac and Alu wired Apple keyboard don't get along this way either. I end up using the mouse or Apple remote to access the boot selector.

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[bcrguy]

I hate that. My 17" iMac and Alu wired Apple keyboard don't get along this way either. I end up using the mouse or Apple remote to access the boot selector.

B

thats wierd.. i have the aluminium keyboard (wired, with number pad) and the old G4 im playing with never has any issue sensing it... and neither does my Macbook Pro..

 

[balamw]

thats wierd.. i have the aluminium keyboard (wired, with number pad) and the old G4 im playing with never has any issue sensing it... and neither does my Macbook Pro..

Same one. It's a known problem for at least the Yonah based iMacs.

Works beautifully after boot, just not during the boot process.

http://discussions.info.apple.com/thread.jspa?threadID=1416944

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