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I am trying to create a new partition so I can install Windows through Boot Camp. I boot into recovery mode using my Recovery Assistant USB and no matter what I do, when I try to resize my drive and create a new partition, I get this error. What am I doing wrong?

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Try using Disk Utility to verify the disk. Based on a bit of Googling, it sounds like this error can be caused by a some corruption in the boot record. – robmathers Jul 10 '12 at 1:24
Can you add the output from the following terminal commands to your question? diskutil list disk0 (prints the partition table as OSX sees it) sudo gpt -r show disk0 (prints the actual GUID partition table) sudo fdisk /dev/disk0 (prints the MBR partition table, used by Boot Camp) - when Disk Utility can't partition, it's often because the GPT and MBR don't agree for whatever reason, and you have to manually fix it. – pmjordan Jul 11 '12 at 9:50

3 Answers

up vote 1 down vote

Have you tried repartitioning with Boot Camp (just go through the Boot Camp process normally)? You shouldn't have to repartition manually in the first place.

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When I go into Bootcamp I get this error: "The startup disk cannot be partitioned or restored to a single partition. The startup disk must be formatted as a single Mac OS Extended (Journaled) volume or already partitioned by Boot Camp Assistant for installing Windows." – Zachary Jul 10 '12 at 1:42
up vote -1 down vote

Use Boot commands for mac os x

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Answers on Ask Different need to be more than just a sentence. It's okay to mention an idea, but please excerpt it in the answer. Thank you! – gentmatt Oct 10 '12 at 17:24
Could you provide more details on the specific command you have in mind? – user8472 Oct 16 '12 at 7:25
up vote -2 down vote

You should install OS X on an external hard drive and wipe your internal hard drive. Hopefully, if there's nothing on the internal drive, the OS won't bother mounting it.

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I've had cases where I get this error even when I run the system from an external drive. Recent versions of OS X seem to mount the internal drive at boot whether it needs it or not. – bmike♦ Oct 10 '12 at 15:04
I would not listen to advice to wipe my disk that has the word "hopefully" in it. – myhd Oct 13 '12 at 14:40

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