Compressed C Drive

OK I should have researched a bit before doing something like this :l

I compressed the C Drive on my Windows partition hoping to save up some space, that was the only drive in the Windows partition. When I switch my Mac off and boot back into Windows, it says the "C Drive is compressed" and to press Ctrl+Alt+Del to restart. The keyboard doesn't seem to work or respond in this mode (this shows up in some commandline-input mode. P.S not familiar with this stuff)

I tried an external Logitech keyboard (connected by wire), the keyboard still doesn't respond, though this external keyboard works fine in the Mac partition.

The Windows partition is Windows 7 and the OS X is Mountain Lion 10.8.5

What are my options? :S

What are my options? :S

Click to expand...

As you found out, compressed drives are not supported when dual booting from a Boot Camp installation. Go back to OS X, start the Boot Camp Assistant, and tell it to remove the Boot Camp partition. That will restore your hard drive space to OS X once more. Then you can use Boot Camp again to create another partition and reinstall Windows 7.

I can't even advise you to make a copy of your Windows 7 installation because you have no access to it. Sorry I don't know of another solution. Perhaps someone else may have a better suggestion.

I didn't realize that about the compressed partition. Not much chance of me doing that though. I've been nervous about this type of compression since my early days on a Mac. There was a program at the time that compressed things at the driver level to create more room. When a reviewer pointed out that this had to be done at the driver level I realized the fubar potential.

remove the whole partition and reinstall Windows?? 0_0

isn't there anyway to format that partition, similar to a hard drive format on a Windows PC? Or does it not work that way on dual booted Mac? :S

I don't mind losing data, but I don't want to go through the hassle of reinstalling Windows all over again. :l

Not sure what the solution is to your problem but I don't know a way to format the Windows drive and preserve Windows. When a drive or partition is formatted everything (OS and personal data) is removed.

At the risk of disclosing how really stupid I can be, and with full disclosure that I know absolutely nothing about BootCamp, is it possible to boot from an external drive that has Windows installed and somehow uncompress the compressed partition? Just clutching at straws here, but hey, the OP has nothing to lose but time, right?

I really don't know if that will work since without a hack Windows will not install to an external hard drive. (Built in piracy protection by MS.) It would be a good experiment to try out though.

Well, if he decides to try, here is a link to a Windows site that shows how to do it.

sorry about the late reply

I just erased the Windows partition and reinstalled it, not without a few bumps though :l but all good now

Thanks for all the replies )

That was the right way ksabee.

chscag would not put you on the wrong track. All you can do with the Windows partition is change the size if need be using CampTune from Paragon.


http://www.paragon-software.com/home/camptune/