Os X, Windows XP and seperate Data partition

I prefer to always keep all my data files on a seperate partition. This partition is then backed up more often than the OS partitions.

How can I do this on the Macbook Pro using bootcamp? I have tried a few option but they all ended up with me either reinstalling OS X or Windows or both.

The machine is still brand new, so I do not need to worry about loosing data. Just need to find a way to be able to dual boot Os X and Windows, with a common Data partition.

Any help would be greatly appreciated

Ivor

Have not done it, but my guess is that you'll need a 3rd party partitioning product to do it. I'd probably try iPartition after you've got your BootCamp partition up and running.

Use Disk Utility. The version that comes with Leopard can now resize partitions "non-destructively" and create new ones. The Boot Camp utility is strictly for setting up a partition to install Windows to it.

EDIT: to clarify... use Boot Camp to setup your Windows partition and install Windows. When all is said and done, use Disk Utility to create a 3rd partition. It won't be able to resize an NTFS volume, so be prepared to split the volume you use for OS X. Or have it split in advance.

The suggestion to use Disk Utility from lifeisabeach is the way to go but note that Disk Utility can not non-destructively resize a Boot Camp partition. For that you would need "Camp Tune" from Paragon software.

Regards.

Thanks for the replies. I have indeed tried the Disk utility route, in fact my current setup is like this. I used disk utility to setup 3 partitions, called , mac, windows and data. I then installed os-x onto the mac partition and booted it, planning on using boot camp assistant to then install windows on to the "windows" partition.

When I run Bootcamp assistant, it complains that the whole startup drive must be formatted as a single Mac OS Extended (Journaled) partition, or already partitioned by "Bootcamp assistant" for installing windows.

I do have iParition, and ParitionMagic and GParted.

My first attempt was to use BCAssistant to install windows and this worked fine. Then I booted into windows and tried to use PartitionMagic to split of a section of the Windows partition to become the data partition, but PartitionMagic was unhappy about obtaining some or other drive letter.

So i left that option there and got iPartition. I then booted back into Os-x and tried to use iPartition to resize the windows partition, but iPartiton does not want to run from the same DISK as the partitions are on. So I tried to make some Os-x boot disk but could not quite get that right.

So then I pulled out a Linux Live CD that i knew had Gparted on and tried to use it to partition the drive, Gparted unfortunately gave many errors while trying to work with the drive, complaining that windows was not shut down properly.

So, back I went to the os-c option and telling Disk Utility I wanted 3 partitions. Re-installed os-x ok, but now boot camp assitant is unhappy.

Any fresh advice after this long story?
Ivor

It looks like you have all the tools. I would try this:

Start over and restore the entire drive to OS X. In other words, get everything back to one partition formatted to HFS + with only OS X. Reinstall OS X and all your apps.

Run the Boot Camp assistant, create a BC partition, install Windows.

Now break out your iPartition boot disk, boot the machine with it and create the third partition from your existing OS X partition. Format it as FAT-32 for common use. You could of course use Disk Utility to do the same thing - but in order to use Disk Utility you must be booted from your original install media so that the drive is dismounted.

Do not attempt to use Partition Magic or Ghost as they both will "choke" when run from within Windows. It may be possible to use PM but you would have to boot the machine with the PM CD and then it would not recognize your OS X partition anyway. GParted may work OK from a Live CD as it will recognize an OS X partition.

Let us know.

Regards.

I agree with chsag's plan. Disk Utility might still work as I had described to use it, but since you already have iPartition I would certainly stick to using that since it is a more robust utility.

I don't normally recommend using FAT32 for ANY reason... with OS X in particular, failing to dismount ("eject") a FAT32 volume properly can and will lead to data corruption. This is more an issue with external drives to be honest (unplugging them before ejecting, for example). So long you are backing up that partition more frequently as you planned (and do so to an NTFS or HFS+ backup volume!), you should have little to worry about. Leopard's Time Machine might be a great choice to use for it.

As an FYI... there is an open-source driver called NTFS-3G that enables OS X to read and write to NTFS volumes. Also a commercial one from Paragon.