Ticket Options
Question Profile
| DATE | Oct 26, 2006 |
| TICKET | #330007 |
| STATUS | Closed |
| SUBJECT | Boot Camp Has Hijacked my Mac |
| CAT | Computers, Operating Systems, Applications or Connected Devices |
| TYPE | Operating System Features, Bugs and Problems |
| DESC | Apple |
| DESC | 10.4.X (Tiger) |
| PLATFORM | Apple Macintosh (Intel) |
| MODEL | Apple iMac |
| PROC | 2GHz |
| RAM | 512MB |
| DRIVE | 160GB |
| NAME | Dave |
| USERNAME | fisherman55 |
| TECHNICAL | Lots of Experience |
| ISSUE | Stumped |
Question Details
TICKET ARCHIVE -> Boot Camp Has Hijacked my Mac
fisherman55 - Oct 26, 2006 - 5:39 pm
Hi. I'll start with a sequence of events leading up to my problem:
1)I downloaded & installed Boot Camp after making sure that I had all necessary updates.
2)I used the Boot Camp Assistant to create a 10GB partition for Windows XP. I then created the Mac Drivers CD, inserted my Windows XP Pro CD and rebooted as per the instructions.
3)After restarting into the Windows XP installer and loading the necessary files, I was presented with the option of installing Windows on one of two "disks", D (3.89GB) or C (131.something GB). I attempted to choose D, and it would not let me do anything with it; I now realise that so-called drive "D" was actually just my iPod. I didn't touch drive C, and I decided to quit before I screwed anything up.
4)I rebooted my Mac and it went directly to a DOS "Press any key to boot from CD. I rebooted again and ejected the CD, and held down the Option key. Apparently my only option was a drive called "windows"; Mac OS was nowhere to be seen.
5)I inserted my OS X CD and booted from it, and it brought me to the OS X installer. I went into Disk Utility, and while it saw my HD, it didn't see any sub-volumes or partitions or anything - just the physical drive. It does not recognize my HD as a valid startup disk or install disk.
Because I didn't actually end up reformatting anything, and because I didn't even touch the "C Drive", I feel strongly that my files / Mac OS partiton are hidden somewhere on my disk.
Your help is greatly appreciated!
1)I downloaded & installed Boot Camp after making sure that I had all necessary updates.
2)I used the Boot Camp Assistant to create a 10GB partition for Windows XP. I then created the Mac Drivers CD, inserted my Windows XP Pro CD and rebooted as per the instructions.
3)After restarting into the Windows XP installer and loading the necessary files, I was presented with the option of installing Windows on one of two "disks", D (3.89GB) or C (131.something GB). I attempted to choose D, and it would not let me do anything with it; I now realise that so-called drive "D" was actually just my iPod. I didn't touch drive C, and I decided to quit before I screwed anything up.
4)I rebooted my Mac and it went directly to a DOS "Press any key to boot from CD. I rebooted again and ejected the CD, and held down the Option key. Apparently my only option was a drive called "windows"; Mac OS was nowhere to be seen.
5)I inserted my OS X CD and booted from it, and it brought me to the OS X installer. I went into Disk Utility, and while it saw my HD, it didn't see any sub-volumes or partitions or anything - just the physical drive. It does not recognize my HD as a valid startup disk or install disk.
Because I didn't actually end up reformatting anything, and because I didn't even touch the "C Drive", I feel strongly that my files / Mac OS partiton are hidden somewhere on my disk.
Your help is greatly appreciated!
fisherman55 - Oct 26, 2006 - 6:02 pm
One more piece of important info: I made the mistake of using a non-SP2 install CD.
kellhound1 - Oct 27, 2006 - 12:20 pm
Hello,
The Boot Camp instruction manual that should have been downloaded with the utility is a little jerky about explaining install procedures.
After partitioning your hard drive and rebooting your computer with the Windows XP install CD, you will need to install on the C drive, not D. Boot Camp purposefully sets aside the partitioned Windows hard drive to a default "C" because that's what PC users are always given. Recall that whenever you open My Computer the initial OS hard drive is Drive C.
It appears you might have installed Windows partially over Mac OSX, or just messed up the boot procedure. There are a few things you can do to correct this:
1. Reboot your computer, making sure the Windows install CD is NOT in the drive bay. Do not press the Option key, rather allow the system to boot completely by itself.
2. If this does not return you to OSX, reboot your computer with the OSX install CD in the drive bay. You might be able to access the Repair option during installation. Leave everything default and allow the install to finish.
3. If push comes to shove, completely reinstall OSX. This is going to be a pain and you'll lose all your information.
You have to be very careful when partitioning your hard drive and installing another OS. For Windows installation ALWAYS install on Drive C. Everything else is off limits. Furthermore, SP2 is the required version to run on Intel Macs. You MIGHT be able to run SP1, but the drivers Apple gives you to install probably won't work on that version.
Sincerely,
Vishad
macosx.com
The Boot Camp instruction manual that should have been downloaded with the utility is a little jerky about explaining install procedures.
After partitioning your hard drive and rebooting your computer with the Windows XP install CD, you will need to install on the C drive, not D. Boot Camp purposefully sets aside the partitioned Windows hard drive to a default "C" because that's what PC users are always given. Recall that whenever you open My Computer the initial OS hard drive is Drive C.
It appears you might have installed Windows partially over Mac OSX, or just messed up the boot procedure. There are a few things you can do to correct this:
1. Reboot your computer, making sure the Windows install CD is NOT in the drive bay. Do not press the Option key, rather allow the system to boot completely by itself.
2. If this does not return you to OSX, reboot your computer with the OSX install CD in the drive bay. You might be able to access the Repair option during installation. Leave everything default and allow the install to finish.
3. If push comes to shove, completely reinstall OSX. This is going to be a pain and you'll lose all your information.
You have to be very careful when partitioning your hard drive and installing another OS. For Windows installation ALWAYS install on Drive C. Everything else is off limits. Furthermore, SP2 is the required version to run on Intel Macs. You MIGHT be able to run SP1, but the drivers Apple gives you to install probably won't work on that version.
Sincerely,
Vishad
macosx.com
fisherman55 - Oct 27, 2006 - 5:49 pm
Hi Vishad, thanks for your response.
I've made a bit of progress since yesterday. I now see that the problem is that my Mac simply can't see my Macintosh HD volume, because it was corrupted by the Windows installer. I connected my Mac to another machine via firewire and I ran the damaged Mac in Target Disk Mode. Of course, the host machine said it was unreadable and gave me the options to initialize, ignore, or eject; I chose to ignore. I then ran a demo version of Data Rescue II, and had some interesting results. Data Rescue II saw my damaged hard drive, as well as the "Macintosh HD" volume on that drive. A search of the Macintosh HD volume found nothing, BUT a basic search of the entire drive found absolutely all of my files! The demo software allowed me to retrieve one file, and it was perfectly intact.
So, my files are still intact on the drive, but it doesn't know that they're supposed to be in the Macintosh HD volume. The Data Rescue software will allow me to copy any necessary files to my other machine, but it's not exactly cheap. My question for you is, is there a way for me to fix the drive so that it knows that my files belong in the Macintosh HD volume? (Disk Utility, when run off of my Mac OS X DVD, doesn't even see the volume, so it's no help). Even if I do end up purchasing the software for safety's sake, it would be great if I could simply repair the disk rather than have to re-install and manually move my files, settings, etc.
Thanks in advance,
-Dave
I've made a bit of progress since yesterday. I now see that the problem is that my Mac simply can't see my Macintosh HD volume, because it was corrupted by the Windows installer. I connected my Mac to another machine via firewire and I ran the damaged Mac in Target Disk Mode. Of course, the host machine said it was unreadable and gave me the options to initialize, ignore, or eject; I chose to ignore. I then ran a demo version of Data Rescue II, and had some interesting results. Data Rescue II saw my damaged hard drive, as well as the "Macintosh HD" volume on that drive. A search of the Macintosh HD volume found nothing, BUT a basic search of the entire drive found absolutely all of my files! The demo software allowed me to retrieve one file, and it was perfectly intact.
So, my files are still intact on the drive, but it doesn't know that they're supposed to be in the Macintosh HD volume. The Data Rescue software will allow me to copy any necessary files to my other machine, but it's not exactly cheap. My question for you is, is there a way for me to fix the drive so that it knows that my files belong in the Macintosh HD volume? (Disk Utility, when run off of my Mac OS X DVD, doesn't even see the volume, so it's no help). Even if I do end up purchasing the software for safety's sake, it would be great if I could simply repair the disk rather than have to re-install and manually move my files, settings, etc.
Thanks in advance,
-Dave
IF THIS IS YOUR QUESTION AND YOU WISH TO RESPOND, LOGIN HERE FIRST.
