Bootcamp assistant won't partition my HD for use with Bootcamp

Question

A while ago I tried to install bootcamp but could never find the proper drivers for my computer. I decided to use parallels instead which worked ok for a while. Recently I believe I found the correct way to install the drivers but upon me booting up Windows XP it prompted me to verify my copy of windows. Problem was, no drivers were installed so I couldn't connect to the internet to verify it. I decided to delete the partition and re-install Windows XP with my SP3 disc. After I deleted the original partition I tried making a new one but my Mac gave me this message: "The disk cannot be partitioned because some files cannot be moved. Back up the disk and use Disk Utility to format it as a single Mac OS Extended (Journaled) volume. Restore your information to the disk and try using Boot Camp Assistant again." I'm pretty sure I completely understand what it wants me to do, but I really hope I'm wrong. Is there anyway around this? I really, REALLY, don't want to reformat the hardrive, I can't make room for all the important files I have on my External Hardrive. So, is there any way around this? Thanks for any help you can give, It's greatly appreciated.

Answer 1

The issue you are dealing with is a major pain for anyone using BootCamp - it really shouldn't be happening. Data gets "sprayed" (like paint) across the entire hard drive, and when you want to section the space in two the software sometimes cannot because the last half of the hard drive got covered.
This can be avoided in 2 ways:
1.) when you first install OSX.
You can install the very minimal amount of OSX then STOP (before updates or anything else) and use BootCamp (in Applications / Utilities) to JUST partition your drive then STOP and continue with OSX updates, 2nd DVD, whatever.... Then whenever you are ready, finish installing your BootCamp stuff. The software is totally designed to do this without any tricks or special knowledge.
What you have done - essentially - is to occupy the smallest amount of hard drive space when starting your OSX install - and then partition - only to stop and finish the OSX install + update. This works very well, actually.
2.) If you already have done a full install and BootCamp cannot continue, you have to move the data to one side of the hard drive by one of two methods:
2a.) Clone your hard drive (to an external hard drive) using (free trial) Carbon Copy Cloner or Super Duper or Time Machine and then re-install it all. For some reason this process (while mildly risky - it may fail) lays all the data in a tidy "stack" and one side of the hard drive, allowing BootCamp to continue,
2b.) purchase iDefrag (no Free Trial available) and defragment your whole OSX install using their special Boot Disk in the PREBOOT environment. Defragging an Apple has to be done as a Boot Disk operation - otherwise it's useless.
iDefrag costs money and is more work than anything other method (I've done it) but at least you own it and can use it to speed up your install down the road (results for speed are mild but actually noticeable). The iDefrag procedure is NOTHING like Windows Defrag (which is free of cost and almost effortless) but the results are very similar.
Cheers - NAS
PS - actually I wonder if MAYBE a re-installation of the OS (archive & install NOT erase & install) would have a tidy enough result that the data would all be shoved to the correct end of the hard drive. Might work! Would be an experiment though...
Message was edited by: NA Smith