Disk Utility no longer restores to smaller partitions

Up until today, I've been using Disk Utility to clone my Macbook Pro HD to an external HD. The MBP drive is 750GB, with about 300GB in use. The external 1TB drive has two equally sized partitions of ~500GB. I alternate between the two partitions each time I make a back up. I've been doing this regularly for many years now, and it's saved me on a couple of occasions. My last clone was made on June 2nd. However, today I got this message when trying to make a clone:
Restore Failure
Not enough space on /dev/disk1s4 to restore
This is the first time I've ever had this message pop up. I even tried repartitioning and reformatting the external drive, but it didn't help. The only way I can successfully clone my drive now is by making the external drive one large partition, which results in "Copying blocks. Estimated time: 8 hours". Previously, it took slightly less than 3 hours to clone my drive.
Was there a recent update that changed something with Disk Utility? Is anyone else having this problem?

I seem to remember reading somewhere that Disk Utility will only restore to a smaller partition if you un-select the "Erase destination" check-box. This option does not seem to exist any more in the latest version of Disk Utility (13 (450)). Have you updated to Mountain Lion recently?
A better approach may be to use Time Machine with your external HD. This works nicely with USB disks. You don't need to buy the TimeCapsule hardware. I assume the reason you alternate backups between two partitions is in case it fails during one of the backups. That is less of an issue with Time Machine as it does incremental backups. However, if you want multiple backup disks, Time Machine will automatically alternate backups between them. You can even do the same thing with two partitions on the same disk, but it is safer to use two separate disks in case of a complete disk failure.

Similar Messages

Disk utility fails to resize portable drive partitions with error message "requested change in size is too small".

I am using a 1TB WD studio passport portable drive with my 2011 MacBook Pro. I have the portable drive partitioned into 4 volumes: 355 GB, 320 GB, 320 GB, & 4 GB. But Disk Utility won't allow me to split the third of those into 160 GB /160 GB. All volumes verify as seeming "to be okay". Seems if Disk Utility could create me a 4GB partition that 160 GB is plenty big enough, right? Something's not right; Can you help me with this please?

What is on those partitions and or the partition you want to split in two?
If you don't have any data on partitions or if you can save it someplace else for the time being then why not just Re-Partition the whole drive into the sizes you now want.

Disk Utility - Solution for a Weird MediaKit Partition "too small" Error

I found a very suggestive article, could be a silver bullet for this kind of problem.
*http://ubuntuforums.org/showthread.php?t=760190*
+*quote from SWedd*+
+In my case, it was caused by the Apple_Bootstrap partition (created during Ubuntu install), of format unknown to OSX. This partition was positioned right after my Macintosh_HD partition. To enlarge my Macintosh_HD I needed to use diskutil to erase the Apple_Bootstrap partition to a blank "MS-DOS" partition. Then I could use Disk Utility to Delete the MS-DOS partition. After that I could resize my Macintosh_HD freely.+
In my understanding, if you failed to increase the size of a certain partition, it might mean a partition just after that partition is corrupted or broken (whether or not it is corrupted, you can know it by using command "diskutil info ...").
With command "diskutil eraseVolume ..." you can erase the partition in question, then with "diskutil mergePartitions ..." merge the partition you want to increase in size and the partition you just erased. Now you can increase the size without any error.
Anyway, diskutil can do several things which Disk Utility can't do.
To resort to diskutil is sure worthwhile.
Message was edited by: Shigerello

Welcome to the Apple forums and thanks for the information.
Warning:
The terminal command
diskutil
should be used with care, as with most terminal commands.
A good rule to remember is "If you do not know what something will do, do not do it."
For information on diskutil, in a terminal enter
man diskutil

Disk utility won't restore to external hard drive.

I recently installed Leopard on my Imac G5. I tried to "restore" the HD to a USB external hard drive. It said it would take 15 hours and when I came back - the time machine window was up and had a failure message as did the disk utility for the restore. Does the time machine need to be turned off to successfully restore the HD to an external hard drive?

Also worth noting that, if your drive has a FireWire interface, use that instead of USB. While the theoretical max speed of USB2 is faster than FireWire 400, in real-world conditions FW will blow the socks off USB. And if you're purchasing an external drive, it repays on the long run to pay a little more to purchase one with FW. And, of course, if FW400 is faster, FW800 is out of sight.

HT1331 "AirPort Disk Utility" no longer exists in 10.7 Lion (and possibly hasn't existed since 10.5).

I think this article is misleading, it seems that "AirPort Disk Utility" no longer exists in 10.7 Lion (and possibly hasn't existed since 10.5).

Good luck, I've treid with this one:
http://support.apple.com/kb/HT4635
Notice how outdated it still is. Not only that, but how it's got wrong info, like 1st Gen Express Model #.
Maybe you got more weight than I do...

Disk Utility says of USB Drive - "This partition can't be modified" "This disk is not writeable and cannot be partitioned"

Several months ago I bought a 64GB PNY USB memory stick to transpord data quickly.
It seemed to work fine. I could format it as a Mac partition and use it. I hardly ever need
it so I just put it away.
Today I wanted to use it to put a file on and take it to the Kinko's/FedEx to print, and I
find I cannot mount it on any of my computers, iMac, MacMini or MacBookPro.
In Disk Utility virtually everything is greyed out.
Disk Utility says: "This partition can't be modified" "This disk is not writeable and cannot be partitioned"
If I try to mount it, it says "This disk cannot be mounted"
There is no physical read-only switch or setting on the disk that I can see and it is very small.
I has a Mac OS installed on it, so I wonder if that is a problem? I should be able to write over that
or reformat it I would think.

Thanks for these replies.
I've got regular time machine backups and just backed up some of my data by copying some key folders to an external drive. I'm bit paranoid about backup integrity and would ideally like to do another full backup to a different drive using a system other than time machine, in the event that something goes wrong with the time machine backup. Any recommendations on good and affordable backup software to do a backup of my TM backup?
One other question: I seem to encounter problems like this pretty frequently. I'd say once a year or so, my drive fails completely or gets near enough to failing that I have to wipe and restore. (I've never had a TM backup fail to work, though the last go around there were some hiccups which has led to my backup paranoia.) I've had this happen on multiple computers, so I'm becoming pretty convinced that the problem lies somewhere in my data. Is it possible (even likely) that there's something in my data causing this recurring problem? If so, is there anything I might be able to do to try and pinpoint and address this problem? I'd love to go one year without having to wipe/restore my machine!
For a while I thought I just had bad luck. But I think this is like the 4th or 5th time this has happened in the past 4 years and every time, I'm restoring from a backup, so I come back with the same data. It's the one constant since I've had 3 different machines over this same time period.

Disk Utility no longer working correctly

I did a search and couldn't find a similar problem, so here goes.
I'm running OS 10.4.11 on a G4 PPC Dual 1.25 GHz.
I've done the regular updates the last several weeks:
QuickTime-7.5.5
iTunes- 8.0
Xserve RAID Driver Update- 1.0
Java for Mac OS X 10.4, Release 7- 1.0
Digital Camera Raw Compatibility Update- 2.2
Security Update 2008-006 (PowerPC)- 1.0
Security Update 2008-007 (PowerPC)- 1.0
Migration and DVD/CD Sharing Update- 1.1
iTunes- 8.0.1
iPhoto Update- 7.1.5
Digital Camera Raw Compatibility Update- 2.3
Safari- 3.2
iLife Support- 8.3.1
iTunes- 8.0.2
Safari- 3.2.1
Since the updating of the above, when launching Disk Utility, I get the spinning beachball as it tries to find my hard drives. It spins and spins and spins, but my drives don't show up.
Sometimes logging out and back in and then restarting will make DU work ok, but that can't be normal. It should work on each launch.
Is anyone having similar problems? Anyone know what the cause and solution may be?
Thanks in advance for any help, and Happy Thanksgiving!

Hi,
Could be many things, we should start with this...
"Try Disk Utility
1. Insert the Mac OS X Install disc that came with your computer, then restart the computer while holding the C key.
2. When your computer finishes starting up from the disc, choose Disk Utility from the Installer menu. (In Mac OS X 10.4 or later, you must select your language first.)
Important: Do not click Continue in the first screen of the Installer. If you do, you must restart from the disc again to access Disk Utility.
3. Click the First Aid tab.
4. Click the disclosure triangle to the left of the hard drive icon to display the names of your hard disk volumes and partitions.
5. Select your Mac OS X volume.
6. Click Repair. Disk Utility checks and repairs the disk."
http://docs.info.apple.com/article.html?artnum=106214
Then Safe Boot , (holding Shift key down at bootup), run Disk Utility in Applications>Utilities, then highlight your drive, click on Repair Permissions, reboot when it finishes.
The usual reason why updates fail or mess things up, or things don't load/run, is if Permissions are not fixed before & after every update, with a reboot... you may get a partial update when the installer finds it doesn't have Permissions to change one obscure little part of the OS, leaving you with a mix of OS versions.
Some people get away without Repairing Permissions for years, some for only days.
If Permissions are wrong before applying an update, you could get mixed OS versions, if Directory is the slightest messed up, who knows!
If many Permission are repaired, or any Directory errors are found, you may need to re-apply some the latest/biggest updates again, or even do an A&I if you have enough free disk space.
The combo update for PowerPC-based Macs...
http://www.apple.com/support/downloads/macosx10411comboupdateppc.html
The combo update for Intel-based Macs...
http://www.apple.com/support/downloads/macosx10411comboupdateintel.html
Repair Permissions before & after re-install, then reboot again each time.
If all the above do not resolve the problem, then it's time for an Archive & Install, which gives you a new OS, but can preserve all your files, pics, music, settings, etc., as long as you have plenty of free disk space...
http://docs.info.apple.com/article.html?artnum=107120
Or, Might give a try with Applejack...
http://www.versiontracker.com/dyn/moreinfo/macosx/19596
After installing, reboot holding down CMD+s, (+s), then when the DOS like prompt shows, type in...
applejack AUTO
Then let it do all 5 of it's things.
At least it'll eliminate some questions if it doesn't fix it.
The 5 things it does are...
Correct any Disk problems.
Repair Permissions.
Clear out Cache Files.
Repair/check several plist files.
Dump the VM files for a fresh start.

Disk utility wont resize/add/delete a partition (HD is part of a raid)

I have two SSD set in a raid 0 in my MBP 15" late 2011 (Mountain Lion 10.8.2)
256gb Samsung
120gb Vertex 3
My Vertex 3 is partitioned into 2 parts
1. 70gb set in raid 0 with another 70gb partition in the Samsung
2. 50gb dedicated to Windows 7
My Samsung is partitioned in to 2 parts
1. 70gb set in raid 0 with the other 70gb partition in the Vertex 3
2. The rest of the space in this SSD is just for data storage.
The reason why I did it this way is a long story since it deals with issues in the optical bay SATA speed limitations so that's a different topic.
So here is my problem:
I have two 70gb partitions set in raid 0 between the two SSD's, the 50gb partition that was in the Vertex 3 dedicated to Windows. After a while I realized I dont use windows that much and wanted to erase that partition. Erasing it was easy, but now with the 50gb space left over I try to use disk utiility to divide the 50gb partition into 2 parts and it wont let me. The satus bar says "preparing to partition disk" for 30 minutes and it doesnt budge.
To make matters worse, I deleted that partition by clicking the minus sign on the lower right corner, and now that partition is completely greyed out. When I try to press the plus sign to add in the remaining free space in my Vertex 3, it wont let me. The satus bar says "preparing to partition disk" for 30 minutes again and it doesnt budge.
Does the 70gb raid partition in the Vertex 3 prevent disk utility from making further changes to the Vertex SSD? I am pretty familiar with disk utility and know my way around it but I have my hands tied in this situation. Please help!

Things I've tried:
1. Booting from an extenral HD with Moutain Lion and trying to use DIsk Utility to make changes to the Vertex 3 partition, same thing occurs (it hangs for 30 minutes with no progress).
2. After I deleted the 50gb partition from the Vertex 3, it is now greyed out. Now when I try to press the add sign in disk utility to add back that 50gb empty greyed out space to make it for free storage (choosing Mac OS Extended, journaled), SAME THING HAPPENS.
It seems as though once I deleted that partition from the Vertex 3, that 50gb space is now totally unuseable!
By the way, I dont have filevault activated if that info helps at all to diagnose it.

My partition menu in Disk Utility is greyed out in recovery partition

So upgraded to yosemite and after a while decided that i would do a clean install of it because it didn't update the recover partition and i could no longer boot into Ubuntu partition. So i made my bootable drive and booted into it. I was met with:
When i clicked on the hard drive in the sidebar that it was only 300gbs, which is the size of my os x partition.
I then went to the partition menu and i could not change anything there. I can't resize anything or repartition anything.
I've tried to do multiple things in terminal from recovery and bootable disk but to no avail. It still won't work. The thing is that when i type diskutil list into terminal i get
/dev/disk0
   #:                       TYPE NAME                    SIZE       IDENTIFIER
   0:      GUID_partition_scheme                        *500.1 GB   disk0
   1:                        EFI EFI                     209.7 MB   disk0s1
   2:          Apple_CoreStorage                         300.0 GB   disk0s2
   3:                 Apple_Boot Recovery HD             650.0 MB   disk0s3
   4:       Microsoft Basic Data                         1.0 MB     disk0s4
   5: 0FC63DAF-8483-4772-8E79-3D69D8477DE4               195.0 GB   disk0s5
   6:                 Linux Swap                         4.2 GB     disk0s6
/dev/disk1
   #:                       TYPE NAME                    SIZE       IDENTIFIER
   0:                  Apple_HFS Macintosh HD           *299.6 GB   disk1
/dev/disk2
   #:                       TYPE NAME                    SIZE       IDENTIFIER
   0:      GUID_partition_scheme                        *500.1 GB   disk2
   1:                        EFI EFI                     209.7 MB   disk2s1
   2:                  Apple_HFS MacBook Pro Back Up     398.2 GB   disk2s2
   3:                 Apple_Boot Recovery HD             650.0 MB   disk2s3
   4:                  Apple_HFS Back up of files        100.9 GB   disk2s4
/dev/disk0 is the internal hard drive that i want to reformat, /dev/disk1 i don't know what that is. It could be an internal thing in the drive? And /dev/disk2 is my external hard drive that is running mavericks that i writing this on.
I've tried resetting PRAM and SMC but that didn't help.
Didn't know if reinstalling the OS would help?
What i want to get is to reformat /dev/disk0 so that i have a 500gb hard drive that i can then do a clean install of yosemite on and then possibly make an ubuntu partition later. PLEASE HELP!!!

And, this was from the Internet Recovery utilities window, right? OK, this next suggestion depends on which MBA model you have. Check the link below. If your model came with Lion pre-installed then it is capable of using Internet Recovery. If it came with a late version of Snow Leopard it can be upgraded via a firmware update. You will find this in the link below.
Computers that can be upgraded to use OS X Internet Recovery
Be sure you backup your files to an external drive or second internal drive because the following procedure will remove everything from the hard drive.
Boot to the Internet Recovery HD:
Restart the computer and after the chime press and hold down the COMMAND-OPTION- R keys until a globe appears on the screen. Wait patiently - 15-20 minutes - until the Recovery main menu appears.
Note: You will need an active Internet connection. I suggest using Ethernet
            if possible because it is three times faster than wireless.
Once the Utility Menu appears select Disk Utility and click on the Continue button. Now try removing the partition again. If you have the same error, then do the following:
From the screen's menubar select Terminal from the Utilities menu. Enter the following at the prompt:
     diskutil list
Press RETURN. You should see a display of your devices. Next enter:
     diskutil unmountDisk force /dev/disk0
Press RETURN. Now, if this works your internal drive should be unmounted. Return to Disk Utility and try the process of removing the partition.

Disk Utility resize results in corrupt BootCamp partition

Hello,
Yesterday I decided that I wanted to put Linux on my system: taking what was already a fully working boot camp partitioned drive, resizing the main mac partition to free up some space, and then install debian on that. I went into Disk Utility and resized the drive and that worked just fine, except that when the process was complete my boot camp partition was no longer bootable. It is also no longer labeled BOOTCAMP in the diskutility (though it is when I use diskutil list on the command line), but instead named after its block device (disk0s4 in this case).
I've tried everything I can think of. Disk Utility quickly became useless (repair disk? can't repair disk!), and any sort of attempt to mount the disk on the command line just gives me an "Input/output error," so no dice there. I really need the data off this partition and from what I can tell it seems that the partition is intact, its just the partition map that has been corrupted. I also tried rEFIt's gptsync utility which also did not work. Any suggestions would be very welcome, it's very important that I get the data off this partition.

Honestly, had this process even gotten to a point at which I was on my way to a triple boot I would be much more inclined to agree with you. Yes, I did make a mistake of not backing up before the resize, totally willing to admit that. Of course, that course of discussion leads nowhere in terms of solving this problem. We all know to back things up, most of us do, some don't, nothing new here..
Having said that, this problem has nothing to do with a triple booting. This problem stemmed completely from a simple resize of a HFS+ partition in Disk Utility (a partition, I might add, that was extremely large and mostly free, so overwriting data in the shrink was also not a concern). As far as I'm concerned, if Disk Utility can't resize the partition without destroying/corrupting data, then they shouldn't offer it as a feature. At very least display some sort of message. Maybe: "Hey there! This process USUALLY works, caveat emptor!" I might have been inclined to use _any_ other product.
I'm in the process of using Data Rescue 3 to analyze the drive, and hopefully retreive most of the files. As I previously stated, the actual problem here appears to be completely with a corrupt partition map (Data Recue is having no problem accessing the files so far), but I just don't have the time to dig too deeply into how that all works to solve the problem.

Disk Utility stuck on "updating boot support partitions for the volume as required"

Tonight when I mounted my Time Machine drive (a WD My Passport drive), it failed to mount properly, and I received a warning from Drive Genius that it needed repair. But when I launched Drive Genius, the disk would not show up.
Through a series of mounts, unmounts, and sleeping the computer, I managed to get it to show up in Disk Utility, so I seleted "Time Machine Backups" under the main listing for the drive ("319.37GB WD My Passort..."), and clicked Repair.
The detail window showed "Volume repair complete" almost immediately. But for almost four hours now, it's been stuck on "Updating boot support partitions for the volume as required."
Meanwhile, Activity Monitor has been showing fsku_hfs taking 30%-85% of the CPU the whole time.
Anyone have advice?

Apparently not:
Error: Disk Utility can’t repair this disk. Back up as many of your files as possible, reformat the disk, and restore your backed-up files.
But when I ran Disk Utility again this morning, not on the Time Machine Backup, but up the hierarcy on the level labeled "319.37GB WD My Passort...," I got...
The volume Time Machine Backups appears to be OK.
And now the drive seem to be OK.
I think I'll still offload everything and reformat it.

Disk Utility error when restoring a drive to another drive: Error 6

"Device not configured."
I have a 24" iMac with a 250gig hard drive, and a firewire enclosure with a 160 gig hard drive. The iMac has a windows partition that I am trying to back up on the firewire drive, so that I can repartition and make the windows section bigger, but I keep getting errors when trying to restore.
If I uncheck erase destination, and then click restore, it starts to copy for a few minutes, but after 2-3 gigs of copying I get another error:
"Restore Failure An error (2) occurred while copying. No such file or directory"
This happens again and again and again and again. Any ideas?

Thanks for the different responses. Just a few more details. My internal hd is only using 63 of 100g.
So I don't think the disk space issue for disk utility would be the answer to my particular problem. I have also tried using superduper to back up this same drive; however, it would not complete the task either. Would it be better to just back up the user folders separately and maybe the applications folder and then just use the mac os dvd's to install on my new drive? ( I don't guess backing up the applications folder would do any good; they would have to all be reinstalled. ) Just trying to find a way to get this done without having to do to much reinstall work. Any other ideas?

Help ,Disk utility does not allow me to partition my internal HD

hello , i want to partition my internal hard drive but for some reason disk utility does not allow me to , when i click on the partition window everything is greyed out, i read on other thread that file vault might be the problem but is already off , i can t figure out what the issue is any ideas ??? here is a screenshot.

Not if you want to be able to restore the Boot Camp partition using Boot Camp Assistant. There are alternative boot loaders you can use to add Windows and Linux to an OS X drive. You would first need to restore your drive by deleting the Boot Camp partition you now have. Then take a look at The rEFInd Boot Manager: Getting rEFInd - Roderick W. Smith.

Disk Utility taking long time to open directory with disk images

Hi and thanks in advance.
I have a couple of CD and DVD disk images stored in a folder (and organized into several sub-folders) on a FAT32 volume.
The problem is that recently, Disk Utility takes forever to display the content of any of these folders when I select Open Disk Image from the File menu. The Select an Image to Attach dialog remains empty and the beach ball spins. After a very long time (10-15minutes? I've never had the patience to time it.), the contents will display, if at all. During this period of virtual inactivity, the program is unresponsive.
Since the FAT32 volume is also accessible from my Bootcamped Windows XP OS, I tried doing a disk check and a defragment but it hasn't improved my problem.
Any ideas?

HI,
Make sure your MacBookPro has sufficient free disk space to read the disk images.
Right or control click the MacintoshHD icon. Click Get Info. In the Get Info window you will see Capacity and Available. Make sure you always have a minimum of 10% to 15% free disk space at all times.
Carolyn
Message was edited by: Carolyn Samit

Disk Utility can't repair and refuse Partition to work

Hi,
Is there any ways to solve this message appearing in the Disk Utility?
When i click repair disk on Disk Utility, message shown;
Repairing permissions for “Macintosh HD”
Permissions differ on "System/Library/Frameworks/JavaVM.framework/Versions/A/Resources/Deploy.bundle/ Contents/Resources/JavaPluginCocoa.bundle/Contents/Resources/Java/deploy.jar", should be lrwxr-xr-x , they are lrw-r--r-- .
Repaired "System/Library/Frameworks/JavaVM.framework/Versions/A/Resources/Deploy.bundle/ Contents/Resources/JavaPluginCocoa.bundle/Contents/Resources/Java/deploy.jar".
Warning: SUID file "System/Library/PrivateFrameworks/Admin.framework/Versions/A/Resources/readconf ig" has been modified and will not be repaired.
Warning: SUID file "System/Library/PrivateFrameworks/Admin.framework/Versions/A/Resources/writecon fig" has been modified and will not be repaired.
Permissions differ on "System/Library/Frameworks/JavaVM.framework/Versions/1.6.0/Resources/JavaPlugin Cocoa.bundle/Contents/Resources/Java/deploy.jar", should be -rw-r--r-- , they are lrwxr-xr-x .
Repaired "System/Library/Frameworks/JavaVM.framework/Versions/1.6.0/Resources/JavaPlugin Cocoa.bundle/Contents/Resources/Java/deploy.jar".
Permissions differ on "System/Library/Frameworks/JavaVM.framework/Versions/1.6.0/Resources/JavaPlugin Cocoa.bundle/Contents/Resources/Java/libdeploy.jnilib", should be -rwxr-xr-x , they are lrwxr-xr-x .
Repaired "System/Library/Frameworks/JavaVM.framework/Versions/1.6.0/Resources/JavaPlugin Cocoa.bundle/Contents/Resources/Java/libdeploy.jnilib".
Warning: SUID file "System/Library/CoreServices/RemoteManagement/ARDAgent.app/Contents/MacOS/ARDAg ent" has been modified and will not be repaired.
Permissions repair complete
Then i thought its might not be repair just by one repair.
After that i try repair again however this message still appear.
I ever try restarting and shutting down my MacBook but the message still appear.
I do some research and find that one of the message in the list can be safety ignore
http://support.apple.com/kb/ts1448
Hence i just ignore the message.
Meanwhile i try to partition my hard disk and message shown;
Partition failed
Partition failed with the error:
Could not modify partition map because filesystem verification failed
I getting too frustrated about this problem.... ARRRGGGGHHHH!!!!
Any solutions are welcome. Thanks

You can find an extensive discussion of the permissions repair messages you can ignore at Topic: Permissions Snow Leopard 10.6.4. Nothing on your list of permissions messages is unusual or indicates an issue that needs correction.
However, the partition failed message indicates that you need to run Disk Utility's Repair Disk function on the disk volume. Note that if this is your normal startup volume, you will have to start up from some other disk, such as your installer disc, & run the Repair Disk step from it.
If Disk Utility is unable to repair the HD, you can try more powerful (& costly) utilities like Disk Warrior, but there are no guarantees that any of them will be able to fix all possible problems the HD may have.

Disk Utility no longer restores to smaller partitions

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