[Guy Kuo]

Drives are cheap and the MacBook design makes it very easy. I've upgraded more than once, but that also means migrating my OSX and bootcamp volumes. Most recently, it was a move from a triple boot (Tiger, Leopard, Windows XP) 250 GB to a dual boot (Leopard, Windows XP) 320 GB configuration.

Migrating an OSX partition is simple. Just clone using SuperDuper or Carbon Copy Cloner.

Migrating a bootcamp bootcamp Windows XP partition isn't as easy, but it's far faster to migrate a Windows XP install than to reinstall from scratch. Here is how I do it.

1. Backup your OSX partitions using SuperDuper and an external drive. I like to keep external backup drives partitioned the same way my internal drive is done. That means simple cloning from one partition to another. One partition is also used to back up Windows XP bootcamp partition, but you can't do that using SuperDuper.

2. Create a backup .dmg of your original bootcamp volume using the OSX Disk Utility. This should be to an external drive. The dmg can be compressed image to save space. Also, note how large the bootcamp partition is. You'll need the new one to be same size or bigger.

3. Prep the new drive by partitioning it using DIsk Utility. (or Bootcamp Utility if you are only dual booting) For triple booting, create three partitions. The LAST must be the one for your bootcamp Windows partition. BTW you must select GUID format in the partitioning options!

4. The partition command won't let you choose MS-DOS format so that needs to be done next. Erase the future bootcamp partition to MS-DOS format using Disk Utility. NOTE this does not fully prep the partition to accept your restored windows image!

5. Clone your saved OSX volumes back into the new drive's OSX partitions.

6. Boot your Windows installation CD and begin a Windows install. You'll be shown a list of partitions. Ignore the small sized ones and the unknown ones. The unknown ones are your OSX partitions. Leave those alone. Work on the FAT32 partition and let the Windows Install CD quick erase it to FAT32. (I use FAT32 to allow OSX to also write to the windows partition). Some magic seems to be done during this step, for the process won't work if you skip steps 6 & 7 and attempt to just restore to a Disk Utility created MS-DOS volume.

7. Let the Windows install copy files. Eventually, the Mac will reboot. Let it boot into OSX instead of continuing the next Windows install phase.

8. IF AND ONLY IF, you have CHANGED the number of partitions on your new drive so it differs from your old drive, copy the fresh boot.ini file from your windows partition and save it on the OSX side. You'll need the newly created boot.ini to replace the one in your backup image because the one in the image has the wrong partition numbers.

9. Use Bombich NetRestore to restore your windows backup image to the your new Windows volume. This does it file by file (instead of by sector as Disk Utility) so it won't destroy the arrangement of volume information created by the combination of bootcamp and Windows setup.

10. IF AND ONLY IF you had to save boot.ini due to a change in number of partitions, replace the boot.ini on the restored windows volume with the fresh boot.ini saved in step 8

Your Windows XP bootcamp partition should now have been migrated to your new drive with far less effort than reinstalling Windows on the drive.

I have used this method with success through two drive upgrades. I hope this helps someone else facing the same situation.

[ghporter]

Interesting. Thanks for the guidance. It looks like you're pretty comprehensive and detailed here.

Thanks!

[mduell]

Seems like a long and slow way to do it.

1) Boot off the Leopard install disk.
2) dd source drive to destination drive.
3) Obliterate the Tiger partition and grow the Leopard partition with Disk Utility.
4) Delete the Tiger line from your boot.ini.
5) Swap internal and external drives.

Avoids the need for using another external backup disk, but it does require a $10 USB2<->SATA enclosure.

[Guy Kuo]

Originally Posted by mduell 

Seems like a long and slow way to do it.

1) Boot off the Leopard install disk.
2) dd source drive to destination drive.
3) Obliterate the Tiger partition and grow the Leopard partition with Disk Utility.
4) Delete the Tiger line from your boot.ini.

That does seem simpler, but the instructions won't be of much help to non-masters. Could you give some more details on how to do your process? Namely...

How do you dd a drive? Is that a unix terminal command? If so, could you lay out for the less unix literate how to get the right parameters?

Will this work if the tiger partition if it is the 1st on the drive? More specifically, can Disk Utility MOVE up and grow a second partition to use the space of a partition that was originally before it?

Lastly, what are the contents of the boot.ini and what should the lines be edited to read as? It looked like at least two lines needed to be edited.

Those details would clarify things immensely so people would not have to guess.

[mduell]

dd is a unix terminal command. Read the man page for specifics, but the basic command is dd if=/path/to/source of=/path/to/destination

As far as I know Disk Utility can grow in either direction.

boot.ini will probably only have one line for Tiger, and it's labeled as whatever you're picking to boot into Tiger.

[seanc]

Good instructions Guy.

I did this when I upgraded to a 250GB drive, but re-installed Leopard and cloned Windows.

I put my old drive into a USB 2 > SATA enclosure and booted the OS X partition. I launched Disk Utility and prepared the disk with the partitions I wanted. I used the restore tab to clone my old Windows partition to the new one.

I re-installed Leopard and used migration assistant to copy all of my data back.

[Waragainstsleep]

When using netrestore to clone the boot camp image to the new boot camp partition, do you erase the destination or leave it?

[blackbook204]

This is my 3rd attempt to clone a new MAC OSX/Windows HD using different instruction from the 'Net

this time I came close as I am now able to boot from both OSX and XP but I could not clone my original XP partition (all my windows docs/applications could not be copied)

the step with NetRestore gave me an error and would not complete
there are options in NetRestore that were not explained in the instructions ( erase target disk, etc)

also at what step do you physicaly put in your new HD into your macbook?

any help appreciated as I dont want to have to pay the local MAC place $70 to do this for me

[sehnix]

Thank you Guy, so far.

Your Instruction helped me very well for the first part.

I've been wondering how you were able to restore the clone-Windows back the from the Image to the FAT32 partition.
My NetRestore doesn't recognise the FAT32 partition.
So I now have a Clone of my Windows but I can't restore it.

Is there a way around that. Maybe some other tool or command line.
I would really like to keep the FAT32 instead of a NTFS formatted drive.
I understand that the image needs to be restored file-by-file?

[Guy Kuo]

It's been a while.... but if I recall correctly, NetRestore will refuse to recognize the volume if it thinks it is too small. I ran into this when I created a FAT32 partition that was just a little too small. Fixed by redoing the partition and other steps making the new FAT32 partition a bit larger than the original. PITB to do over, but once the partition is big enough, NetRestore should accept the partition.

[hokie17]

I've had success using WinClone to backup AND restore a 32GB FAT32 BootCamp partition.

[ekdor]

Hi, Not sure if my situation is unique but here goes.

I have been trying to expand my XP partition used by Boot Camp and this procedure seems to offer the solution.

I've tried a few things I've read around the place. This came the closest to solving it. At the very least it allowed me to mess with the XP partition and know that I can set it right again if all fails. I must thank you for that! It also allows me to backup the XP drive to my TM HD, It is a bit manual but at least I don't have to start from scratch should my HD... stop.

I've failed to actually expand the partition using any app including NetRestore. What I've read seems to suggest the partition should fill out but it doesn't. I ponder a reason I'll elaborate on bellow at a less confusing spot.

Thus I should start at the beginning in attempt to reduce confusion, I hope.

I started out with a 7GB XP Boot Camp NTFS partition created using Boot Camp Assistant some time back. Have now run out of space and wish to use some of OSX's excess HD Space (common story). In hind-sight I think I would be better off had I used FAT32 originally, again I'll elaborate later.

I tried to use the Terminal's diskutil with no success, partly my ignorance to it and errors saying it ran out of space, which as far as I could work out wasn't a problem. Sizes were correct etc. I tried a few other less reputable methods with worse results. Fortunately I had imaged the XP partition even though at the time I didn't know how to restore it properly.

Notably I was not able to start fresh with Boot Camp. All seemed ok until the first restart as part of the XP install process. I have to add that I'm very familiar with this process as part of my former work. I would receive one of several errors resulting in Windows installer failing to start-up from HD. Unable to resolve this issue as yet.

The result of following these instruction turned up a couple things of interest. One worth mentioning for others using it. Perhaps this is unique to me, but here it is anyway. After the NetRestore procedure was complete the XP would fail to boot. The restore gave no errors etc. The partition number was correct etc. I realised that it only works if I choose the leave partition structure as is... option (I forget exact wording).

The other issue that arose was that after the NetRestore the partition had been reverted to the old size and the file structure was reverted to NTFS presumably because NetRestore has to? I could live with this if it didn't resize the partition to it's original size. To add to this the 8GB excess it cut off has remained unallocated and I've not found a way to reassign it to either OSX or XP partitions. This is possibly due to my understanding. I wasn't able to use diskutil to expand the XP NTFS partition because it's locked to OSX.

Disk Utility app shows no sign of the unallocated spaces that I see in the XP installer or what's cut off after NetRestore is finished. I wonder if this has anything to do with the failures I get as I've read the XP partition has to be on the end of the partition. When following this procedure: 1. remove unwanted partition (resulting in OSX's default scheme). 2. Use Disk Utility to create a 15GB FAT32 partition to become the new XP Partition, as described above. 3. Restart with XP installer CD and follow instruction, as described above (making sure not to modify the any of the partitions). 4. Upon restart, boot OSX and perform the NetRestore. This works but with the above symptoms. At the XP installer partition stage I see a weird partition list, which consists of OSX's 2 partition scheme followed by the new 15 gig XP partition, followed by a 128 mb unallocated space. Might this be part of my trouble. I get similar lists when just doing a fresh XP install which fails every time. I understand OSX has it's own extra partition but this other one has no information other than it appears unallocated and I can't do anything with it.

I understand that the NetRestore should restore then refit the partition to take up excess space, which in this case about 8 gig? Might the reason it's not doing this be that it restores from a 7GB NTFS image to a 15GB FAT32 partition? i.e incompatible so it changes the file structure and for some reason fails to utilise the 15GB allocated to it?

Is there a way to expand the partition using XP without damaging OSX?

ADDED>>> Specifically the the partition map as seen by XP is 200MB GPT Protected, 133.61GB OSX, 128MB unallocated,6.86GB NTFS XP, 8.27GB unallocated...

If I turn the 8.27GB space into a partition XP inevitably stops working and OSX refuses to see it also.

I'm now wondering if there might be a way to get around this by turning the 8.27GB space into a FAT32 partition, cloning XP into it, restarting from the new partition, remove the NTFS partition from the XP side. After that I should be able to get OSX to expand the FAT32 partition because it will no long be locked. So I think, I'm not too confidant in that line of reasoning But I feel I must try.

Apart from not having the tools at hand I wonder just how the windows install will handle being moved from NTFS to FAT32. I suppose it wont. Any thoughts?