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Can't boot into Windows after splitting Mac partition with Disk Utility

U

usuario

macrumors newbie
Original poster
Jan 27, 2010
28
0
Central VA
Hi everyone,

I installed Windows 8 with BOOTCAMP, creating a large 871 GB partition with a smaller 127 GB partition for Windows. After installing Windows, I then went back to Disk Utility to shrink the Mac partition and add two new partitions, one for storage and another blank, hoping to use it to install Linux into one day.

I did that, and now Windows doesn't boot. A Windows blue screen tells me I need to use the Windows DVD to repair it.

I tried to use Disk Utility to delete the two new partitions I made and grow the Mac partition back to the max size of 871 GB. But it doesn't let me do this. The Disk Utility log doesn't report an error and thinks it worked but the partition stays the same size. However if I make the partition a little smaller, like 870 GB then it works. I'm wondering if the Recovery partition is hiding there and preventing me from fully expanding the Mac partition.

What can I do?

Here's what I get if I type in sudo gpt -r -vv show disk0:
Code: 
gpt show: disk0: mediasize=1000204886016; sectorsize=512; blocks=1953525168
gpt show: disk0: Suspicious MBR at sector 0
gpt show: disk0: Pri GPT at sector 1
gpt show: disk0: Sec GPT at sector 1953525167
       start        size  index  contents
           0           1         MBR
           1           1         Pri GPT header
           2          32         Pri GPT table
          34           6         
          40      409600      1  GPT part - C12A7328-F81F-11D2-BA4B-00A0C93EC93B
      409640  1701278816      2  GPT part - 48465300-0000-11AA-AA11-00306543ECAC
  1701688456     1269536      3  GPT part - 426F6F74-0000-11AA-AA11-00306543ECAC
  1702957992     1846360         
  1704804352   248002560      4  GPT part - EBD0A0A2-B9E5-4433-87C0-68B6B72699C7
  1952806912      718223         
  1953525135          32         Sec GPT table
  1953525167           1         Sec GPT header

Here's what I get if I type sudo fdisk /dev/rdisk0:
Code: 
Disk: /dev/rdisk0	geometry: 121601/255/63 [1953525168 sectors]
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 - 1701278816] HFS+        
 3: AB 1023 254  63 - 1023 254  63 [1701688456 -    1269536] Darwin Boot 
*4: 07 1023 254  63 - 1023 254  63 [1704804352 -  248002560] HPFS/QNX/AUX

Here's what I get with gdisk:
Code: 
Disk /dev/rdisk0: 1953525168 sectors, 931.5 GiB
Logical sector size: 512 bytes
Disk identifier (GUID): 6075110F-7CEF-4604-85EE-6231B850E2AE
Partition table holds up to 128 entries
First usable sector is 34, last usable sector is 1953525134
Partitions will be aligned on 8-sector boundaries
Total free space is 2564589 sectors (1.2 GiB)

Number  Start (sector)    End (sector)  Size       Code  Name
   1              40          409639   200.0 MiB   EF00  EFI System Partition
   2          409640      1701688455   811.2 GiB   AF00  1 TB APPLE HDD HTS54101
   3      1701688456      1702957991   619.9 MiB   AB00  Recovery HD
   4      1704804352      1952806911   118.3 GiB   0700  BOOTCAMP
 
Sorry about the above post. My information was not correct.

Sadly, once Bootcamp is used any further partitioning of the hard drive is unsupported as it can lead to mismatched mbr and gpt partition tables, though I'm not certain this is what happened to your system.

Firstly, have you tried running the Windows automatic repair function (which can require up to 3 runs)?

If that fails to repair Windows boot will Bootcamp allow you to remove the Windows installation? If it will then you should be able to restore the Mac partition to its full size and start again.

If Bootcamp won't allow this you may be able to delete the new partitions via a third party partitioning tool and then try to resize the Mac partition.

It may be the case that it is easier for you to backup and re-install everything.
 
Quackers said:
Sorry about the above post. My information was not correct.

Sadly, once Bootcamp is used any further partitioning of the hard drive is unsupported as it can lead to mismatched mbr and gpt partition tables, though I'm not certain this is what happened to your system.

Firstly, have you tried running the Windows automatic repair function (which can require up to 3 runs)?

If that fails to repair Windows boot will Bootcamp allow you to remove the Windows installation? If it will then you should be able to restore the Mac partition to its full size and start again.

If Bootcamp won't allow this you may be able to delete the new partitions via a third party partitioning tool and then try to resize the Mac partition.

It may be the case that it is easier for you to backup and re-install everything.
Click to expand...

I can't seem to run Automatic Repair. The blue screen I get when I try to load Windows doesn't have that option. When I put in the Windows DVD and boot from it, it doesn't recognize that Windows is already installed and therefore doesn't give me the option of troubleshooting it with automatic repair or a command prompt for example.
 
When booting from the Windows dvd and you get to the language screen select your language and near the bottom left of the next screen there is an option to repair the system. The next screen offers the Advanced options and one of those is to repair the system.
This repair function may need to be run up to 3 times with reboots in between each one. It is entirely possible that the first run will not recognise that Windows is installed (or at least say so).

It's worth trying this first.

If that does not work there is another thread just below this which is dealing with somewhat similar problems. It may be worth looking at that one, if you haven't already.
 
Quackers said:
When booting from the Windows dvd and you get to the language screen select your language and near the bottom left of the next screen there is an option to repair the system. The next screen offers the Advanced options and one of those is to repair the system.
This repair function may need to be run up to 3 times with reboots in between each one. It is entirely possible that the first run will not recognise that Windows is installed (or at least say so).

It's worth trying this first.

If that does not work there is another thread just below this which is dealing with somewhat similar problems. It may be worth looking at that one, if you haven't already.
Click to expand...

The option to repair the system doesn't even appear so I think the Windows DVD doesn't even recognize the existence of Windows on my HD.

I think I'll reformat the hard disk and reinstall OS X, then figure out how to do the actual disk partitioning before I install any other operating systems :)
 
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