Deleted windows partition still in MBR

Hi, I searched google all day long and found out some clues about what could be the problem (even found someone having the same problem as I have) but no solution to repair beside formatting and reinstalling from scratch.
What happened is that I had a Vista partition on my primary HD on my Mac Pro. I bought a new HD to move windows to this new HD so Mac OS can regain some space on its HD. I tried to use Winclone as mentioned on some forum but was not able to boot on the new partition after the restore process. So I did go ahead on deleting the Boot Camp partition on the first HD and reinstall from scratch on the new one. But now, when I use option at boot time to choose my start up device, I see 2 windows disk. One which is the new install, but one that lead to a missing operating system error. I did tried to remove my new HD to see if there would still be a windows option and yes, there is one and it is the missing operating system one.
So for what I understand from reading around the web is that probably, my protected MBR in the EFI partition still has the information about the Boot Camp partition that was once there. So I tried to rewrite this by creating a new Boot Camp partition on the first disk and then deleting it again in case the Boot Camp Utility had not made fully its job the first time, but with no luck. I then tried using rEFIt to sync the GPT and MBR but again, with no luck.
Also, now that I have rEFIt installed, I see 4 windows option at boot time. One legacy OS, 2 windows and one that offer me to boot windows with EFI.
So if someone as any idea, is in front of a similar problem or do know how to update/restore the EFI partition please let me know.
Best,

Hi,
Another little update after a couple of unsuccessful tentative to fix the situation.
I tried to use rEFIt to sync back the MBR from the GPT, but I got this error:
Status: Analysis inconclusive, will not touch this disk.
Error: Not Found returned from gptsync.efi
So, I tried to use Time Machine to restore my main HD after a complete repartitioning/reformat, but even after that I still got the same issue: 2 Windows partition from the start up preference pane in Vista and at boot time after holding the option key and although I only see one Windows partition under the start up preference pane in Mac OS, it tries to boot Windows from an non existing partition and display the missing operating system error.
I am now out of idea and since I don't have time for a clean install, I think I will try to live with it for now. Thanks for all suggestions.

Similar Messages

How to delete Windows partition

I am running Snow Leopard and currently have two partitions in my hard drive-OS X and Windows Vista(I know - bad idea). How do I delete the windows partition?

this should be done using Bootcamp Assistant. start Bootcamp assistant and it will give you an option to remove the windows partition.

How do i recover disk space after deleting windows partition?

I have a macbook pro running on maverick. I removed the windows partition using bootcamp assistant, but I did not gain the disk space back. The disk space is 500gb but it's still showing 250gb?

Yes, that matters. So your partition map looks something like this:
You see one single space surrounded in blue with the disk name in the center, sort of like the above. But, you say that this space is only 250 GBs of your 500 GB drive. In other words the space in the Size field reads 250 GBs, mol? Am I correct in my understanding?
I suggest you might give this a try: repair the hard drive using Disk Utility. Then restart the computer. See if that recovers the space. It would also help if you could send me a screen image like mine but of your Disk Utility display on the same settings.

Mac dies on boot, every time - but bootcamp Windows partition still runs

Hi there,
I hope someone can give a bit of advice.
I have a 17" Intel iMac, Core 2 Duo, the old white style, running OSX 10.4 Tiger.
When I got it I set up a smallish partition (80GB, the hard drive is 500GB) using the Bootcamp beta and installed Vista Home Premium on the partition. I went along for a while happily switching between the two. However, I am now completely incapable of booting into OSX.
When the computer is turned on, the Mac chime sounds, then it thinks for a second or two, and goes straight into Vista. If I hold down Option to go into Bootcamp and choose which OS to run, it will let me. However if I choose the Mac partition, the computer thinks for a sec, then switches itself off.
I've tried launching in safe mode. This doesn't work, the computer just boots into Vista.
I've tried inserting the Tiger install disk to run Disk Utility (holding C when you turn on), but the same thing happens - it boots in Vista.
I've tried launching in single user mode, but the same thing happens.
I've tried running Disk Warrior, but can't.
I've tried Cmd/Opt/Shift/Del to force it to run from the CD, but it just turns off.
Basically, I have the install disks for OSX and Vista, and I have everything backed up on an external HD, so I want to do a complete fresh install of OSX and start again - I might purchase Leopard and use its version of Bootcamp (because it's not beta, and would hopefully be more secure from this kind of thing).
Is there anything else I can do to make this thing run Disk Utility? I don't want to pay repair costs if I can somehow avoid it.
Thank you very much.

But there can't be much wrong with the HD if the Windows partition runs fine.
Sort of, sort of not, depending how you look at things... one bit going astray in the wrong place can cause anything to happen.
Does it boot into Open Firmware with CMDOption+of ?
http://docs.info.apple.com/article.html?artnum=42642
reset-nvram (press Enter)
set-defaults (press Enter)
reset-all (press Enter)
Have you done a PRAM reset...
http://docs.info.apple.com/article.html?artnum=2238
Intel-based iMac, Intel-based Mac mini: How to reset the System Management Controller ...
http://support.apple.com/kb/HT1543
Startup key combinations for Intel-based Macs...
http://support.apple.com/kb/HT1533

[Solved] KDE 4.4: Dolphin no longer sees Windows partition

This is a bit tricky, but I figure someone may have just have come across this bit of oddity... or hopefully, might have an idea of how to fix it.
A week ago, I did a clean install of Arch and KDE. When I would start Dolphin it would start up and show my Windows partition (labeled like '34 MB Disk' or something like that) in the sidebar. It was real handy: I could click on it and it would mount my Windows partition - easy to get to files on it. A week after this, I decided I needed a swap partition so I used gparted to resize my / partition from something close to:
Number Start End Size Type File system Flags
1 32.3kB 23.1GB 23.1GB primary ntfs boot
3 24.3GB 60.0GB 36.7GB primary ext4
to:
Number Start End Size Type File system Flags
1 32.3kB 23.1GB 23.1GB primary ntfs boot
2 23.1GB 24.3GB 1258MB primary linux-swap(v1)
3 24.3GB 60.0GB 35.7GB primary ext4
I also labeled the Windows partition to 'Windows'.
When I rebooted, I remember opening up Dolphin and there was a partition named 'Windows' on the Panel sidebar. However, when I went to set up the swap, I noticed that 'fdisk -l' showed the partitions in the wrong order. At the end of the output was the message, "Partition table entries are not in disk order". A bit unsure about this, I learned that I can fix this with fdisk (fdisk in the extended menu has a 'fix partition order' option). After doing this and rebooting, I can no longer seen my Windows partition in Dolphin.
I've tried a couple things, like restarting again, and erasing the dolphin configs (~/.kde4/share/apps/dolphin) with no luck. I'm not sure if this is a HAL problem, or if the partition table entry is a bit corrupt, or what. Was hoping someone had an idea.
Last edited by Gen2ly (2010-03-01 07:53:36)

Um, no. Good question toad. This is what I'm getting:
# mount -t ntfs-3g /dev/sda1 /mnt/win
Unexpected clusters per mft record (-1).
Failed to startup volume: Invalid argument
Failed to mount '/dev/sda1': Invalid argument
The device '/dev/sda1' doesn't have a valid NTFS.
Ok, I've tried a couple things now and got it fixed to a degree. When I installed a swap partition in the middle of the partitions, this altered GRUB's knowledge of the partition tables, and I had to reinstall it. During this I accidentally installed GRUB 'setup (hd0,0)' to the Windows partition. But I don't think this caused the problem. I say this because when I did [wiki]MBR#Restoring_a_Windows_Boot_Record[/wiki] the Windows partition still didn't show in Dolphin. Instead, I had to repair the Boot Sector as described by a friendly guy in the Ubuntu forums. Because this was a Boot Sector issue, it looks like the fdisk command did this. Anyways, I'll describe it quickly here in case anyone else comes across it. What you need to do is boot from a LiveCD and either install TestDisk or use a Rescue CD like Parted Magic that does, then start 'testdisk' and do these steps:
No log
Choose Disk > Proceed
Intel
Advanced
Select partition > Boot
Rebuild BS > Write
And voila, next reboot, I'm able to see and mount my Windows partition again. Phew. So it looked like the problem is fixed, but not quite. When I rebooted and tried to load Windows GRUB hung, it showed one line, something like 'GRUB loading stage2' and it wouldn't go any further. Has anyone run across this before? I use Windows from time to time so, hoping to find a way to get this fixed.
Edit:
Found out more, take a look at this post:
http://bbs.archlinux.org/viewtopic.php?id=92233
Last edited by Gen2ly (2010-03-01 07:54:23)

I cannot access windows partition after an unexpected stutdown

Hello everyone,
while I was working on my windows partition(windows 7 ultimate) in my imac 27' i5, a strong and continuous error sound and black screen appeared without shut down the machine,so I pressed the button( in the back of my monitor which is used to start up my machine).
After that windows partition only starts with safe mode (where so no much I can do),(in normal mode a blue window appears which says something about remove hardware, error and some things which I can not read cause it disappears too quickly (1sec).
So,after several efforts in save mode I understand that there was a problem with an installation of an antivirus program,which had not been installed correctly,and in save mode I got a message of catastrophic failure,and also I can not uninstall or remove this program under safe mode.
Till now I have been advised to delete bootcamp partition,and create it again and run windows again,so do you think this is the only solution?
Is there any way to access bootcamp files and modify under macintosh?
I need to mention that I have imac about two months, and usually I use windows partition (because I work with a program which is not supported by macintosh).
Also, do you think that deleting windows partition and creating again is there any case to harm my mac?
Which edition of windows is better compatible? (If there is one)
iMac, Mac OS X (10.6.4), 27''

Personally I have had no experience with this problem but maybe these urls will have some useful info.
http://reviews.cnet.com/8301-13727_7-20061565-263.html
http://reviews.cnet.com/8301-13727_7-10329899-263.html
http://www.articledashboard.com/Article/Boot-Options-Change-To--EFI-Boot--in-Mac /615006

I can not access windows partition after an unexpected shutdown

Hello everyone,
while I was working on my windows partition(windows 7 ultimate) in my imac 27' i5, a strong and continuous error sound and black screen appeared without shut down the machine,so I pressed the button( in the back of my monitor which is used to start up my machine).
After that windows partition only starts with safe mode (where so no much I can do),(in normal mode a blue window appears which says something about remove hardware, error and some things which I can not read cause it disappears too quickly (1sec).
So,after several efforts in save mode I understand that there was a problem with an installation of an antivirus program,which had not been installed correctly,and in save mode I got a message of catastrophic failure,and also I can not uninstall or remove this program under safe mode.
Till now I have been advised to delete bootcamp partition,and create it again and run windows again,so do you think this is the only solution?
Is there any way to access bootcamp files and modify under macintosh?
I need to mention that I have imac about two months, and usually I use windows partition (because I work with a program which is not supported by macintosh).
Also, do you think that deleting windows partition and creating again is there any case to harm my mac?
Which edition of windows is better compatible? (If there is one)

There is a Boot Camp forum that can probably do a better job at answering your question. It's possible because your system is messed up in Windows that all you need to do is hold down the Option key when starting your computer and then choose the partition to start from. There isn't a problem with OS X or Windows 7 I suspect it's what you have done by not following instructions on installing and removing software. If you do choose to remove the Windows partition then use Boot Camp Assistant to properly uninstall. You can fin the Boot Camp forum at:
https://discussions.apple.com/community/windows_software/boot_camp
Roger

I recently deleted a partition on my mac that was intended to install windows. Now it is just blank space. I attempt to resize my Macintosh HD partition to cover entire hard drive space and hit apply but nothing happens (disk utility). Any ideas?

I have a few problems...
I wanted to make a partition to install windows, I tried to use bootcamp 5 where it wanted to partition and install windows at the same time. I do not have a cd of windows but instead had it on a flash drive. Bootcamp couldn't find it. Instead I was reading forums and found that there was another way to install windows by partioning your harddrive using the disk utility, downloading the bootcamp drivers, and installing rEFIt (an app that when starting the compouter a menu would come up to boot windows from the flashdrive). I try that and the windows install screen gets me to the point where I pick a partition. I attempt to pick the partitioned drive but a message comes up telling me that "this is of the GPT partition style" and windows cannot be installed on the drive.
So now I went back to disk utility and deleted the partition but there is still blank space. I wanted to retry and install windows through bootcamp (somehow) but a message comes up that there cannot be any partitions or that a partition must be created using bootcamp. SO i keep trying to drag the partition over the blank space and hit apply but nothing happens.
By the way I was trying to install windows 8 pro, some forums would say that you cant install win8 however I found others that said you could. How do I fix my partition and how do I use bootcamp to install windows (preferrably 8)?

Csound1 What Ive been trying to explain is that I have been running bootcamp, I open the app where the first screen is the introduction, i hit continue, the first time I select "download the latest windows support software fromm Apple" then I return and instead select "Install Windows 7." Then hit continue. The third screen is where I "Create a Partition for Windows" I set Windows to 80 gigs then hit INSTALL. As stated before Bootcamp cannot find the install drivers saying "The installer disc could not be found." My windows software is on a USB drive not a disc, I tried using a virtual disc reader to make it appear that the windows software was running on a disc, still no luck. What I would like to know is how to install windows on bootcamp.

Can't boot anything after deleting C partition in order to install Windows 8.1

I have a ASUS X55VD notebook, wich had a Windows 7 64-bit (and a dual booted Ubuntu, but with Windows bootloader). Yesterday I tried to install a Windows 8.1, so I inserted a disc and restarted.
The window to manually select the partition, on wich it will be installed, came up so I formated C partition where Windows 7 was installed. It did not allow me to install to that partition because, a new format (GPT) had to be used. So i chose to delete the
partition. Deleting was quite long, after wich the computer restated, and after that it only showed black screen.
The Windows DVD is still spinning, but nothing shows. Can't acces the BIOS (none of the keys work).
Tried:
- Hardware reset (battery out>hold power button fro 10-20 sec>put battery inside>start) - No change
- Put a Live Linux DVD to boot from it - No change
- Put a hirens boot cd - No change
- USB boot - No change
- Connect a external keyboard and tried accessing BIOS - Nothing happened
I would suffice with just gettng some of my data from him, and sending him to repair Can't tinker with harware, or it will void my varrancy
Please help. The problem is really urgent.

Hi,
It seems a hardware issue, you can first try to reset the CMOS - remove the cell battery from the motherboard for at least half hour, re-insert it, boot up. The BIOS settings should be reset to defaults. But for better solution, I
suggest you contact the manufacture.
Regards,
Yolanda
Yolanda
TechNet Community Support

I deleted my partition but can't install Windows 8.1 any more.

I've deleted my Windows partition in disk utility, but now every time restart my MacBook Pro (2012, 13 Inch) without holding down the option key and it says your PC needs to be repaired and the wininstall file is missing even though ive deleted my whole partition. When I do hold down the option key I can't go into windows because I've deleted it but I still see the EFI Boot partition. Now I want to install a better Windows version but I can't because when I enter the serial it says it can't verify it.
I have an older backup of my disk from before all this happened, so I've tried to erase my disk but every time I rebooted holding command and R, but every time I tried my mac shut down while loading the Apple sign.
Please help!
Raoul

There are several possibilities.
1. You do not have contiguous free disk space.
2. BCA has failed, or you may have a Fusion drive which is causing problems.
3. You have incorrect permissions on the disk.
4. Can you boot in OS X Safe Mode - OS X: What is Safe Boot, Safe Mode? - Apple Support?

Hi, I have macbook Pro, running Leopard OS X. I partitioned my hard drive a while ago to install windows and only allowed myself 10 Gig of data. Anyway, i deleted windows and want another OSX on there instead. How do i make this partition bigger please??

Hi, I have macbook Pro, running Leopard OS X. I partitioned my hard drive a while ago to install windows and only allowed myself 10 Gig of data. I deleted windows after i realised i wasnt enjoying using it at all and wasted my hard drive. I now decided that i want another OSX on there instead yet i have only allowed myself 10 gb on the partition. I have ben thru some programms but am struggling on making this partition bigger.
I only want it at 20gb but cant seem to make the partition bigger, only smaller or split it into further partition.
Is there a way to do this, i have all installation discs from original OSX so think this could help.
Any help please would be fantastic.
Thanks Chris

Hi, dragging the partition will only make smaller, not larger. In disk utility you can only split or make smaller the partitions. Yes i booted from installation disks also but still no help.
And Brody, I am willing to erase the disc completely, infact jus started doing a backup in order to do so but that failed also. And the information you gave on partition a hard drive, Although very simple and i already know how to do this, but it wont let me make the partition bigger, and i dont want to make a new partition, just enlarge the one i already have, which i dont see possible from disk utility.
Getting really frustrated now, even backing up is saying no to me. **** external being a douche.
I dont mind erasing the hard drive but surely this must be doable without deleting the secondary partition back t a single volume, and re partitioning into 2 volumes again.
Thanks again

Deleted Windows via bootcamp, but Launchpad still shows the windows apps. Why?

I had Windows 7 installed on my 2008 Macbook Pro, but after deleting the partition via Bootcamp some time ago, the Windows apps still appear in Launchpad. I'm wondering whether this indicates that there is something of Windows still present on my hard drive? Because I'd rather it not be there, at least for the reason that it absolutely clutters up my Launchpad app selection.
Something to mention is that I used to have a trial copy of Parallels installed on this computer, but I deleted it before I deleted my Windows partition. Hence, the apps are visible within the Mac OS.
This link shows a screenshot image of Launchpad, which shows what I see in Launchpad. I daresay that this is related to something Parallels left on my computer, but if anyone can give any idea as to what I should do, I'd greatly appreciate it!
http://i.imgur.com/C2LTT.jpg

Okay...had a breakthrough! I went to my Applications folder, but not the regular one, the one found in HD/Users/Me/Applications. There was a folder called "My Boot Camp Applications". I was like whaaaat? So I looked inside, and all the applications I was concerned about were there. I deleted them...and all's good. I'm confused, but relieved. I'm guessing that they were just isolated apps that weren't connected with anything, as I had deleted the Bootcamp partition. So, it looks like things are resolved for the time being...let's hope things don't explode!
I thought I'd put message out there before I rebooted, in case I couldn't after for whatever reason...
Thanks heaps for your help everyone, I really appreciate the helpfulness and willingness of the community. Bravo to you all.
All the best,
Mike

I need to delete my old windows partition but it doesn't appear in disk utility

I can't find my windows partition it just shows as Macintosh HD. Although when I go into bootcamp it shows there is still 20gb assigned to windows but I screwed it up as I tried to extend the amount of GB I allowed to windows without reinstalling it. However I don't know what to do in Disk Utility now?
Please can someone help. thanks
Model Name:          MacBook Pro
Model Identifier:          MacBookPro7,1
Processor Name:          Intel Core 2 Duo
Processor Speed:          2.4 GHz
Number Of Processors:          1
Total Number Of Cores:          2
L2 Cache:          3 MB
Memory:          4 GB
Bus Speed:          1.07 GHz
Boot ROM Version:          MBP71.0039.B0B
SMC Version (system):          1.62f6

leroygh wrote:
Version 10.6.8
Just realised I didn't mention...
I have had windows XP fully working on here before. However, I tried to extend the amount of GB I gave the windwos partition obviously there corrupting the partition so now I can no longer loads windows up. So I want to delete the partition and reinstall.
Yeah you messed up your system. You can't expand, shrink or in any other way do anything to the Windows partition as that will cause it to become non usable and then can't be removed and put back into the Mac partition.
Your only option now is to save all your files, with Time Machine or just copying them to an external drive, and Wipe/Erase/Re-Partition the complete drive and reinstall OS X Snow Leopard.

Deleting Multiple Windows Partitions

So i put two partitions of windows on my mac, one using boot camp and one using vmware fusion. Once i connected to the internet on both of them, i was hit by some MAJOR viruses. I am done with windows and want to delete all partitions and be clean. I cant seem to figure out how to delete them though. When i open the bootcamp assistant, it doesnt give me the option to restore or remove partitions, only installation. I saw that you might have to use disk utility to delete them, but i the partitions dont show up on the hard drive, only the "mac" partition. i know that the partitions are still there because i can still use them. How do i get these darn things off my computer without reformatting it? Is that what it comes down to? Also, i heard something about first and second disk partition and that can make a difference, but i have no idea what they are talking about. A little insight would help a poor fellow out. Thanks!

You cannot use Boot Camp once you change the number of partitions on the drive. Boot Camp only works on a drive that has one partition prior to creating the Boot Camp partition. Now that you created a third partition you removed the ability of Boot Camp to delete its partition. You did read the Boot Camp documentation?
You need to backup your OS X partition by creating a bootable backup to an external Firewire drive. Then repartition your hard drive and clone your system back from the external drive. You can create the clones using the Restore option of Disk Utility. Be sure you use DU to repair the hard drive and permissions before cloning. Your external drive should be erased prior to cloning.

My MacBook Pro encounters an error when partitioning for loading windows using Bootcamp Assistant. I deleted the partition that was there in order to upgrade to Bootcamp 5 but now I am struggling to get Bootcamp 5 to complete the job. Help please.

I am struggling to Partition my MacBook Pro using Bootcamp 5, can someone help, please. I previously had successfully loaded Windows 7 running Bootcamp 4 on the same machine. When I upgraded to Windows 8 I started encountering problems. My trackpad would not work and it required me to load Bootcamp 5" as I was running 32 bit this is not supported by Bootcamp 5 I had to completely delete the previous partition, but now I can't repartition as it goes halfway and says an error has been encountered and Bootcamp cannot partition this drive.
I do not know how to defragment the drive in Apple as I can in windows nor can I clean it up to maybe get everything in neat clusters, maybe somebody can help me solve this problem.

Sorry Bobthefisherman, this was not helpful. I had already gone through these pages before coming to you. What I have discovered however is that when Bootcamp Assistant deleted the partition, it did not create a single volume but created three partitions instead which maybe the reason why it cannot create the new part ion parameters I am asking it crate. So I took it to the geniuses at Apple who suggested that I reformat the drive and reload everything again! and this might solve the problem. We'll all know whether this is helpful once it finishes the formatting of the hard drive. This process is taking a very long time to complete so I am leaving it overnight for it to complete. I will keep you updated on progress. I am also told that Apple is struggling with Windows 8 drivers and I may not be able to use that, so I am going back to Windows 7 even though I was beginning to like windows 8 very much.

Deleted windows partition still in MBR

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