GUID or APM Partitions and Diskutil resizeVolume

As I am sitting waiting for my RAID to initialize I thought I would play around with formatting and test a few things that will be more difficult to try when the RAID is actually in use.
So here is the first peculiarity
GUI disk utility formats HFS Partitions using AMP
Command line Diskutil formats HFS Partitions using GUID
Why are they different?
The server is intel so why is the GUI tool formatting using the PowerPC partition schema? Admittedly I won’t be booting from it so it doesn’t have to be a GUID schema but it still seems a little strange.
I presume that I am better off using GUID so that I can enlarge my partition without reformating when I add another disk to the RAID. So that’s the next thing to test.
The RAID size is 1.4TB, so I format it as such and resize the volume to something smaller and that works just fine, however, when I try to enlarge the partition it says….
Started resizing on disk disk1s2 disk1
Verifying
Resizing Volume
Resizing encountered error No Space left on device (28) on disk disk1s2 disk1
Fine, perhaps since it is only 50% initialised not all disk space is available even though the
Diskutil resizeVolume limits
Command does not indicate that I am space limited
so I try with a much smaller partition, say 99gb to 100gb but still it wont enlarge.
Has anyone sucsessfully enlarged a GUID HFS volume on an xserver RAID, useing diskutil resizeVolume?

It is possible to grow the volume on the RAID itself. That has worked since the feature was introduced a couple years ago.
The hangup has been the fact that Mac OS X didn't support growing volumes. On Intel machines, this is possible, but I haven't tried it. IMO if you really want to grow the volume it's best from a safety and performance perspective to just copy off the data, reformat, and copy it back.
Frankly I recommend that people not plan on using this functionality. IMO you should use the RAID with 7 or 14 drives. Never with 4 with future plans to grow the LUN to 7. You use storage a lot faster than you think you will

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    ~~~~
       I was about to say, "Avoid fame like the plague," but you
       know, they can cure the plague with penicillin these days.
          -- Larry Wall in <[email protected]>

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    NOTE: Please read the entire post before actually performing the steps.
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    (This step also applied to me.) Boot into the repaired Linux Distribution.
    And open a Terminal.
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    Password:
    Command (m for help):
    To change the partition type give the appropriate command, i.e.,
    Command (m for help): t
    Specify the partition, i.e.,
    Partition number (1-10): 1
    Type L to see available codes:
    Hex code (type L to list codes):L
    0 Empty 24 NEC DOS 81 Minix / old Lin bf Solaris
    1 FAT12 27 Hidden NTFS Win 82 Linux swap / So c1 DRDOS/sec (FAT-
    2 XENIX root 39 Plan 9 83 Linux c4 DRDOS/sec (FAT-
    3 XENIX usr 3c PartitionMagic 84 OS/2 hidden C: c6 DRDOS/sec (FAT-
    4 FAT16 <32M 40 Venix 80286 85 Linux extended c7 Syrinx
    5 Extended 41 PPC PReP Boot 86 NTFS volume set da Non-FS data
    6 FAT16 42 SFS 87 NTFS volume set db CP/M / CTOS / .
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    8 AIX 4e QNX4.x 2nd part 8e Linux LVM df BootIt
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    b W95 FAT32 51 OnTrack DM6 Aux 9f BSD/OS e4 SpeedStor
    c W95 FAT32 (LBA) 52 CP/M a0 IBM Thinkpad hi eb BeOS fs
    e W95 FAT16 (LBA) 53 OnTrack DM6 Aux a5 FreeBSD ee GPT
    f W95 Ext'd (LBA) 54 OnTrackDM6 a6 OpenBSD ef EFI (FAT-12/16/
    10 OPUS 55 EZ-Drive a7 NeXTSTEP f0 Linux/PA-RISC b
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    12 Compaq diagnost 5c Priam Edisk a9 NetBSD f4 SpeedStor
    14 Hidden FAT16 <3 61 SpeedStor ab Darwin boot f2 DOS secondary
    16 Hidden FAT16 63 GNU HURD or Sys af HFS / HFS+ fb VMware VMFS
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    18 AST SmartSleep 65 Novell Netware b8 BSDI swap fd Linux raid auto
    1b Hidden W95 FAT3 70 DiskSecure Mult bb Boot Wizard hid fe LANstep
    1c Hidden W95 FAT3 75 PC/IX be Solaris boot ff BBT
    1e Hidden W95 FAT1 80 Old Minix
    Type the desired code, i.e.,
    Hex code (type L to list codes): de
    Write the partition table with:
    Command (m for help): w
    The partition table has been altered!
    Calling ioctl() to re-read partition table.
    WARNING: Re-reading the partition table failed with error 16: Device or resource busy.
    The kernel still uses the old table. The new table will be used at
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    Syncing disks.
    [abhishek@Nitaichand ~]$
    Download the required Diagnostics Update Package from the Drivers Download page for your model. Got mine from here.
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    title Dell Utility
    rootnoverify (hd0,0)
    chainloader +1
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    Backup your partition table using the sfdisk command (not fdisk).
    Follow the instructions in the link I gave above (i.e., http://community.spiceworks.com/how_to/show/1123) and build your Utility Partition from scratch.
    Now after that when you try to boot into the OS you'll be presented with an blue bar on top. This is because the mkup batch file from the Dell Diagnostic/Drivers CD/DVD wiped your partition table and rewrote it with only one partition on it- the Dell utility partition.
    Boot into a Live environment and restore your partition table from the backup created earlier using sfdisk.
    Now boot with a Windows disc to repair your Windows boot problem. This applied to me but may not apply to you.
    Again boot into a live environment and restore GRUB to MBR.
    After a reboot press F-12 to get to the BIOS boot menu and select Diagnostics.
    Let the Pre-boot Assessment run and after its complete it will ask you to press any key to boot the Dell Utility partition. Do that.
    You'll notice your still dropped into GRUB instead of getting the Diagnostics GUI.
    Now when on GRUB prompt don't boot any other OS.
    Press any key (other than <Enter>, that is ) to stop the timer if you have one set.
    Now look carefully at the boot menu.
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    After this initial run I was unable to run the Diagnostics GUI from the GRUB menu entry again. I haven't tried to re-run the Pre-boot Assessment and wait to see, if I'm able to boot it from there. But now, I'm satisfied that at-least the file there are in a running condition.
    Also, the update package can be used to create boot-able USB drives or boot-able CD/DVDs which can run the Diagnostics just fine. They are almost as fast as the partition (especially the USB which seems even faster). They are recommend, instead of going into this trouble to recreate the partition. That is unless you are a purist/perfectionist .
    Notes:
    At first, I panicked and tried a lot of steps that are not exactly documented above for the sake of convenience to others who might refer.
    I have thus rewritten the post in a manner to make it very general in nature as it did not become very fruitful for myself.  If you attempt to use this guide, use common sense where necessary .
    Of course, if you are trying to build a Utility partition on a bare hard drive or you're feeling adventurous, you can always follow this link .
    Last edited by bhadotia (2012-10-08 19:03:18)

    bhadotia wrote:Anyway's the file downloaded from dell to update the partition for Studio 1555 is corrupted (checksums don't match). My partition still doesn't boot. I'm working to fix this and will update my post when I'm done.
    The file seems to create the CD/DVD/Image and USB just fine. So I used this only to create a CD image which I then wrote on a blank CD which seems to work fine. Also, I played around a bit and had some partial success in booting the partition. I've updated my original opening post with the new findings.
    Whew!! what a waste of time! Never want to do all of this again .
    Last edited by bhadotia (2012-03-03 00:05:22)

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     I do not have or want to purchase as yet VMware Workstation as have W8.1 Pro that can use Hyper-V to run my XP SP3.
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    SYSPprep should I do anyway regardless of what target VM will be when configuring later, even if on same hardware machine? OR can I just boot Vm and see if boots ok first?
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    AU

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    Hi,
    I've just taken the plunge and dumped my PC in favour of a Mac Pro(details below).
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    Thanks in advance.
    D

    Hi Grant,
    Thanks for assisting me with this.
    My Mac has Two 2.4GHz Quad-Core Intel Xeon “Westmere” (8 cores)
    This link takes you to the full spec/ configuration:
    http://store.apple.com/us_smb_78313/configure/MC561LL/A?mco=MTg2OTUwMTk
    The retail version of Leopard that I'm attempting to install is: 10.5.6 so, I'm assuming, the install should work??
    Is there anything I should check/ do prior to installing? (as every time I try the DVD spins and then halts - it's like it's trying to do something but can't).
    Any pointers would be very much appreciated.
    Thanks again,
    D.

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