Inability to boot after iATKOS installation on Dell E1705

[Paul Dullford]

I have installed iATKOS for OS X 10.5.2 on my Dell Inspiron E1705 (w/ 945GM). The installation went fine -- I used the approx. 17GB partition after formatting it -- and then I converted it into a primary partition as it was a logical partition before.

When it was a logical partition, I could see an extended partition above the logical partition in my GParted LiveCD; that has disappeared since.

After installation, all efforts to boot OS X have frustratingly failed. I don't want it to be "If at first you don't succeed, you fail." I have tried the following:

• Acronis OS Selector. However, it fails to detect the fact that my 0xAF partition actually has OS X on it.
   
  
• Chain0 chainloading method. This results in a "Chain booting error." Therefore I tried:
  
• Moving partitions around. Not only did this result in a temporary inability to boot WinXP -- which I managed to fix -- but also this did not alleviate OS X booting.
   
  
• Booting with the install DVD in the drive. Maybe this is an old 10.4 thing, but I tried it. And failed.
  
• Fixing the MBR. Nope. One attempt almost completely wrecked the MBR such that I had to use Super Grub Disk to restore the MBR.
  

Now what? I welcome any suggestions. So long as they do NOT involve moving around my WinXP partition. I want to keep every single darned bit of that partition intact, and I want a WinXP/Leopard dual boot solution, preferably with chain0.

 

Thanks in advance.

[MacNutty]

Leopard booting fails on a extended partition, your partition should be primary active. Partition your hdd with GUID and set it to active (commands given below). After installing if not booting then install the Darwin bootloader from iATKOS install disk.

 

Boot from install disk at boot prompt type sudo -s

At command prompt use following commands

fdisk -e /dev/rdisk0 (0 is the disk number use appropriate disk number)

flag 1 (1 is the partition where leopard is installed. Use your partition number)

update

write

quit

reboot

 

This might solve your problem.

[Paul Dullford]

Leopard booting fails on a extended partition, your partition should be primary active. Partition your hdd with GUID and set it to active (commands given below). After installing if not booting then install the Darwin bootloader from iATKOS install disk.

 

1. My Leopard partition is in fact primary, although not active. So you're saying that the Leopard partition should be active? When I set it to active, I get this: "[XLDR] ATA error."

2. If I convert my HDD partition table type from MBR to GPT, does this erase all HD data?

3. Is installing the Darwin bootloader achieved by merely choosing that option before installation?

 

EDIT: 2, no, 3 additional points/questions.

1. I searched the Internet, and found out that GPT is incompatible with 32-bit XP, and also that I would have to use a completely empty hard disk. This is a bit of a problem. I need an XP-Leopard dual boot, without touching my current XP partition.

2. Is it possible to use the Darwin bootloader with an MBR-partitioned hard disk, as I presume mine is as of the moment?

3. Under GParted LiveCD, the Leopard partition supposedly cannot be read. I cannot see the used and free disk space statistics. However, under the Disk Utility in the install disk, the partition looks perfectly fine.

[reecepeart]

Having the problem too I have a Dell Inspiron 1520

[Paul Dullford]

I'll try reformatting the Leopard partition and reinstalling iATKOS within the week, actually. Let's see how that turns out.

[conroy101]

I'm also having the same problem, just with an inspiron 6000.

[Paul Dullford]

I just reinstalled OS X after erasing the partition -- no luck. Here is what I selected:

- Main System (a trivial matter)

- Darwin Bootloader

- Darwin X86 for MBR

- GMA950

- NTFS-3G

- Broadcom 440x

 

Since I repaired the MBR bootloader (not the Darwin bootloader, by the way) with Super Grub Disk, when I set my Leopard partition to active and restart, there is a black screen with a blinking cursor (no, not a graphical cursor). After about 15 seconds, if I press any key, there is a high-pitched beep noise, presumably generated by the motherboard speaker.

Here's my theory on what happened:

1) My old hard drive partitions were arranged like this:

DellUtility (diagnostics etc.; FAT32 primary)

Windows XP (NTFS primary)

Extended partition

- Extra partition (logical, either FAT32 or NTFS)

Unpartitioned space

2) I subsequently installed OS X on my extra logical partition, after formatting it to HFS+ (journalled).

3) I used Acronis Disk Director Suite to convert my extra partition to a primary partition. Checking under GParted, I noticed that the extended partition was gone, and the extra partition could not be read by GParted, although under the install disk it looked fine. Perhaps something happened here during conversion from logical to primary that caused problems.

My theory: an outdated partition table. Possibly the extended partition still shows up before the Leopard partition in the partition table.

 

I will try more fixes in the meantime.

 

QUICK PS: Could it be because of my long, multiple-word disk name? I'll rename it as a single-word disk name.

QUICK PPS: tried more fixes, now it shows b0 error, even though I set my OS X partition active in fdisk. GUID/MBR clash, maybe?

QUICK PPPS: How do I even boot from the DVD without going into the Installer? Also, I really do want OS X on an MBR hard drive, namely the current one.

[Paul Dullford]

Hey, I got it semi-decently working!

I just erased the partition, except with a single-word name, and reinstalled OS X! So, instead of a partition name like "The Incredible Machine Part 2" I used the name "TIM2" -- now it semi-decently boots.

That is to say, after the grey apple screen with the swirling wheel, I am met with a bluish screen for a short duration, but then this switches to black. I will post a separate topic on this issue.