"Use Boot Camp" option grayed out

R

rorschachm

Junior Member
I've seen this go by unanswered in the larger forum.

Whether I try to create a new virtual machine or add a hard drive to my old virtual machine, the "Use Boot Camp" option is greyed out and cannot be selected.

I've successfully installed the Parallels Tools for Boot Camp. I have an NTFS Boot Camp Partition, a FAT32 Partition, and my HFS Mac Partition, all on the same physical disk.

Any ideas for how to get the selection enabled?

Thanks, all.
 
What happens when you try to run Boot Camp Assistant? It is most likely because you have 3 partitions, Boot Camp does not recognize more than one partition and will not function properly.
 
Boot Camp Assistant doesn't care for the setup, no. It tells me that it can neither partition the drive nor restore it to a single partition.

Should that matter to Parallels if I have a working NTFS/Windows XP partition? Because having a shared FAT32 partition that both OSes can read has been really important.
 
Because BootCamp gives you that message means that Parallels can not use the BootCamp partition. Perhaps in a later release Parallels will have a different way to check if a the BootCamp partition is valid to be used.

Now that Parallels allows you to drag and drop files between your Mac and VM, perhaps you might not need the FAT32 partition? I'd just wait until the next release if you do not want to mess up your current partitionining scheme.
 
Thanks for the help.

I keep a large number of shared documents and settings on that FAT32 drive that I definitely want to use in full boot-ups of either OS. (I have MacDrive, but I'm not sure I feel comfortable using it for something so critical.) So if I had to choose, I'd keep the shared FAT32.

But, of course, if anyone knows a way to force/trick Parallels or Boot Camp to accept this arrangement, let me know.
 
My 'Use Boot Camp' is grayed out as well. Here's my setup:
MacBook Pro Core Duo 2.0 GHz, 2 GB RAM, 100 GB HD.
HD split in two via Boot Camp Setup Assistant: 6 GB NTFS, 87 GB HFS+ (yeah, it's not really 100 GB due to hard drive manufacturer claims. That is 100% of the usable space, though.)
XP Pro SP2 Full Retail installed in Boot Camp, all updates, latest Boot Camp drivers.

A few months AFTER installing Boot Camp and Windows, I reformatted my MacOS partition, and reinstalled the MacOS. I then ran all updates, including re-installing the Boot Camp Assistant.

Parallels was one of the first apps I reinstalled, being lucky enough that this new beta came out just as I was going to reinstall it. I installed Parallels, then booted into XP via Boot Camp, and installed the 'Parallels for Boot Camp' tools.

When I rebooted into the Mac OS, Parallels still has 'Use Boot Camp' grayed out.
 
Hi guys,

same problem here. Using Mac Pro, OSX 10.4.8, latest Updates, WinXP Pro Corp. SP2 without latest fixes on one NFTS partition on the same drive.

@ Parallels Team

Need some more info?
 
I am having the same problem. Im my case, I have partitioned my disk as MBR, with four partitions:

1. OS X
2. NTFS (XP)
3. NTFS (Vista)
4. FAT32 (swap files, shared data etc)

It seems that the beta would accept only "kosher" partitions, maybe to not confuse users? But could there be a way for advanced users to tell parallels what partion to use, even manually - editing configuration files etc?

Of course, being able to boot from any partition would allow multi-os support, instead of being limited ot XP only.

Thanks
Alessandro
 
I have the same problem too, on a Mac Pro with three hard drives (1 for OSX, 1 for Windows, and 1 for Storage).
 
I haven't tested this systematically but I think MacDrive may be the problem. When I first tried creating a Parallels VM booting from Bootcamp Windows I got past the set up OK (button not greyed out). Then I reset my Bootcamp partition, reinstalled and put on a load of software. Then I got the grey button problem. But one of the things I installed was MacDrive (which itself is disabled when you install Parallel Tools.)

Anyhow after I removed MacDrive from the Bootcamp Windows then the Bootcamp button is not greyed out when creating a new VM in Parallels.

Maybe someone else can confirm?
 
I do have MacDrive on the NTFS installation. I may try to remove later, but I look forward to hearing if other people have any success.

Thanks!
 
I also have macdrive...
I uninstalled it and reinstalled the BootCamp tools, but it didn't make a difference for me. Use Boot Camp is still greyed out.
 
What does it say when you run BootCamp Assistant?

bayz said:
I also have macdrive...
I uninstalled it and reinstalled the BootCamp tools, but it didn't make a difference for me. Use Boot Camp is still greyed out.
Click to expand...
 
dailo said:
What does it say when you run BootCamp Assistant?
Click to expand...
Same as rorschachm, I can erase disk, but I can't restore or create a second partition.
I don't have anything important on that HD, maybe if I erase it and start over it will work.
 
It will work if you start over, but if you don't want to start over just delete your second and third partition. Then format your new second partition to anything besides Mac OS Extended, I think I did MS-DOS or Unix by booting into the Tiger Instalation Disk and choosing Disk Utility. Once you have done this run boot camp it will allow you to go back to a single volume. Once you only have a single volume run BootCamp Assistant again and it will make you a new partition that you can install Windows on. Once you do this, Parallels will work fine. I'm sure eventually Parallels will figure out a way to read the partition map without relying on Bootcamp.

I had to use this technique to get it working and man it's working great for a beta. BootCamp + Coherence is awesome!
 
I too had this problem. At some point I had deleted one or more of the smaller partitions that Boot Camp creates. Although my Windows installation was working, this was obviously enough to mess up Parallels. My solution was to clone my hard drive to an external firewire drive using Carbon Copy Cloner. Next I booted with the OS X installation DVD and made my hard drive one large partition. After this, I simply restored the clone and re-ran the Boot Camp setup. Now all is well!
 
I formated the disk and it worked... kinda.
I can now select the "Use Boot Camp" option, but now parallels can't find the Hard Drive. (But thats a subject for a different topic)
 
rorschachm said:
I've seen this go by unanswered in the larger forum.

Whether I try to create a new virtual machine or add a hard drive to my old virtual machine, the "Use Boot Camp" option is greyed out and cannot be selected.

I've successfully installed the Parallels Tools for Boot Camp. I have an NTFS Boot Camp Partition, a FAT32 Partition, and my HFS Mac Partition, all on the same physical disk.

Any ideas for how to get the selection enabled?

Thanks, all.
Click to expand...

SOLUTION:

If you install the new version, then make changes to your drives, install the Tools for BC and the option is still greyed out. The fix is simple: you MUST use the uninstaller that comes with the new version to uninstall, then reinstall Parallels. The boot camp detection appears to occur when Parallels is installed, not when the app starts. I stumbled onto this by accident this morning, but very happy I can now run my boot camp partition from within Parallels on OS X.
 
Hello,

thank you for the suggests, but the option ist still greyed out. Does anybody have another possible solution? MacDrive has already been deleted. I have got a MB 1,83 and only one NTFS-partition.

Thank you and best regards

Victor
 
I'm having the same problem Boot Camp partition is greyed out. System is Mac Pro, standard bootcamp install on osx boot disk nothing fancy and no partition editing. I installed the parallels bootcamp tools and ended up with a trashed bootcamp xp. I had to copy the backup of boot.bak over boot.ini to get xp to boot in bootcamp.
 
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