After my vmware image with Windows 7 RC crashed completely with errors like:

• NOT_IMPLEMENTED
• Pipe read failed
• and many more…

i decided to give bootcamp a chance.

But even after freeing up more than 100 gigs, the bootcamp assistant was not able to partition the harddisk because it couldn’t figure out how to move some data.

The error message was

• "Ihre Festplatte kann nicht partitioniert werden, weil einige Dateien nicht bewegt werden können."
• “Your Disk Cannot Be Prtitioned Because Some Files Cannot Be Moved”

The suggestion for fixing the issue was: Back up the disk and use Disk Utility to format the disk as a single Mac OS Extended (Journaled) volume. Restore your information to the disk and try using Boot Camp Assistant again.

Well this is indeed a bad option – especially when you are on vacation and the installation disks are quite unreachable.

But what finally worked:

• Clean up you disk (Gran Perspective helps finding the big files)
• Buy iPartition or iDefrag from Coriolis Systems (actually I called them and they promised to refund, if it won’t work)
• Create a bootable DVD using Coriolis Disk Creator
• Boot and run iDefrag using the “Compress” algorithm (iDefrag Lite ships with iPartition)
• Reboot into MacOS and run the Bootcamp Assistant

After installing Vista (32bit) Bootcamp Drivers (from my personal torrent disks) + the 2.1 update everything worked quite well.

VM Ware Fusion detected the partition right away and lets me boot a virtual machine from it.

I use BootChamp from Kain Jow to restart into windows without changing the default boot partition.

The main drawback of booting windows natively is that you have no access to your MacOS HD. But that gap can be bridged by using the free read-only Paragon HFS for Windows or a fully-fledged MediaFour MacDrive (50 bucks), which I’ll give a try.

When you need write access to your NTFS-partition Paragon NTFS for Mac would be the choice. Read access to my NTFS was already enabled – might be it is done by MacFUSE.

Issues (updated)

• Audio did not work. Fix: How to get sound working in Windows 7 running via Boot Camp – Simple Help

I also found a really good workthrough with a lot of troubleshooting info here: Using Boot Camp to install Windows 7 on your Mac: The Complete Walkthrough – Simple Help

Aquí tenéis 2 aplicaciones que administrarán y cuidarán de vuestros discos duros como si de un bebé se tratase.

La primera es iPartition 3.0.1, capaz de hacer cosas que Disk Utility no puede, como por ejemplo reparticionar tu disco duro sin perder nada de información que tengas en él y tanto en particiones HFS+, FAT y NTFS, para que si tienes Windows instalado en tu Mac tampoco tengas que reinstalarlo o formatear esa partición para su posterior instalación, muy cómodo. Cuesta 41.06 € (IVA incluido), podéis ver más información y comprarla aquí.

La segunda es iDefrag 1.6.5, que a los usuarios de Windows les será muy conocida, ya que hace lo mismo que el desfragmentador de disco que Windows trae por defecto. Útil para personas como yo que testeamos muchas aplicaciones en el Mac y que de vez en cuando ejecutamos para optimizar el rendimiento del disco duro. Cuesta 29.37 € (IVA incluido), podéis ver más información y comprarla aquí.

Todas las compras son muy cómodas ya que se pueden hacer con Visa, MasterCard, Maestro y PayPal.