Here at work we're experimenting with a different method to deploy Windows to our mac workstations. Part of this is to try and boot the macs into the windows pre boot environment (winpe). So far, we can boot the few models that we have from a CD that we burned through SCCM (from an iso), and also from a USB key that has been formatted from windows (has an MBR-only partition table).
Since srs5694 and murphychris seem to be active in this forum and very knowledgable in hybrid MBRs, I'm hoping they can chime in.
So far this is the progress I've made:
"No bootable device -- insert boot disk and press any key" with the following output from gdisk:
And fdisk:
So, I thought that maybe my MBR was wrong and I tried it a different way (more along the lines of rob's article found here):
and an now getting just a blinking cursor. That's better, I think. Maybe now it just needs the bootloader code. I dd'd the first 440 bytes from my USB flash drive that does boot, but stopped at that. I don't know where to restore that MBR code section for a hybrid MBR.
So, I went on trying some microsoft tools to fix the MBR. From a windows 7 DVD, `bootrec /FixBoot` didn't fix the problem. However, `bootrec /FixMbr` made the windows partition show up in the Mac's EFI (I had to use bless before), but resulted in "Disk Error Press any key to restart". Trying `bootrec /fixboot` again still did not do anything.
So, back into fdisk and gdisk to see what fixmbr did: no difference.
Finally, as a last ditch effort I tried a modified version of gptsync (found here), and it recommended adding another 0xEE in the 4th MBR slot (which I thought would break OS X from booting).
Now, I'm back at "No bootable device -- insert boot disk and press any key".
Interestingly, if I have the WinPE CD or USB flash drive inserted, it automatically fails over to one of those.
What piece to this puzzle am I missing to make this work?
Since srs5694 and murphychris seem to be active in this forum and very knowledgable in hybrid MBRs, I'm hoping they can chime in.
So far this is the progress I've made:
"No bootable device -- insert boot disk and press any key" with the following output from gdisk:
Code:
GPT fdisk (gdisk) version 0.8.4
Partition table scan:
MBR: hybrid
BSD: not present
APM: not present
GPT: present
Found valid GPT with hybrid MBR; using GPT.
Command (? for help): r
Recovery/transformation command (? for help): p
Disk /dev/disk0: 976773168 sectors, 465.8 GiB
Logical sector size: 512 bytes
Disk identifier (GUID): 4AE2EB88-3C2F-4BA9-B6B0-F76C96CD9380
Partition table holds up to 128 entries
First usable sector is 34, last usable sector is 976773134
Partitions will be aligned on 8-sector boundaries
Total free space is 263637 sectors (128.7 MiB)
Number Start (sector) End (sector) Size Code Name
1 40 409639 200.0 MiB EF00 EFI System Partition
2 409640 842441279 401.5 GiB AF00 Macintosh HD
3 842704896 976773119 63.9 GiB 0700 Untitled
Recovery/transformation command (? for help): o
Disk size is 976773168 sectors (465.8 GiB)
MBR disk identifier: 0x2912C428
MBR partitions:
Number Boot Start Sector End Sector Status Code
1 1 409639 primary 0xEE
2 409640 842441279 primary 0xAF
3 842704896 976773119 primary 0x0BAnd fdisk:
Code:
fdisk: 1> p
Disk: /dev/disk0 geometry: 60801/255/63 [976773168 sectors]
Offset: 0 Signature: 0xAA55
Starting Ending
#: id cyl hd sec - cyl hd sec [ start - size]
------------------------------------------------------------------------
1: EE 1023 254 63 - 1023 254 63 [ 1 - 409639] <Unknown ID>
2: AF 1023 254 63 - 1023 254 63 [ 409640 - 842031640] HFS+
3: 0B 1023 254 63 - 1023 254 63 [ 842704896 - 134068224] Win95 FAT-32
4: 00 0 0 0 - 0 0 0 [ 0 - 0] unusedSo, I thought that maybe my MBR was wrong and I tried it a different way (more along the lines of rob's article found here):
Code:
GPT fdisk (gdisk) version 0.8.4
Partition table scan:
MBR: hybrid
BSD: not present
APM: not present
GPT: present
Found valid GPT with hybrid MBR; using GPT.
Command (? for help): r
Recovery/transformation command (? for help): o
Disk size is 976773168 sectors (465.8 GiB)
MBR disk identifier: 0x2912C428
MBR partitions:
Number Boot Start Sector End Sector Status Code
1 1 842704895 primary 0xEE
2 * 842704896 976773119 primary 0x0B
4 976773120 976773167 primary 0x0A
fdisk: 1> p
Disk: /dev/disk0 geometry: 60801/255/63 [976773168 sectors]
Offset: 0 Signature: 0xAA55
Starting Ending
#: id cyl hd sec - cyl hd sec [ start - size]
------------------------------------------------------------------------
1: EE 0 0 2 - 1023 254 63 [ 1 - 842704895] <Unknown ID>
*2: 0B 1023 254 63 - 1023 254 63 [ 842704896 - 134068224] Win95 FAT-32
3: 00 0 0 0 - 0 0 0 [ 0 - 0] unused
4: 0A 1023 254 63 - 1023 254 63 [ 976773120 - 48] OS/2 Bootmgrand an now getting just a blinking cursor. That's better, I think. Maybe now it just needs the bootloader code. I dd'd the first 440 bytes from my USB flash drive that does boot, but stopped at that. I don't know where to restore that MBR code section for a hybrid MBR.
So, I went on trying some microsoft tools to fix the MBR. From a windows 7 DVD, `bootrec /FixBoot` didn't fix the problem. However, `bootrec /FixMbr` made the windows partition show up in the Mac's EFI (I had to use bless before), but resulted in "Disk Error Press any key to restart". Trying `bootrec /fixboot` again still did not do anything.
So, back into fdisk and gdisk to see what fixmbr did: no difference.
Finally, as a last ditch effort I tried a modified version of gptsync (found here), and it recommended adding another 0xEE in the 4th MBR slot (which I thought would break OS X from booting).
Now, I'm back at "No bootable device -- insert boot disk and press any key".
Interestingly, if I have the WinPE CD or USB flash drive inserted, it automatically fails over to one of those.
What piece to this puzzle am I missing to make this work?
