Parallels 6 broke my Windows 7 bootcamp partition

So last Friday, I decided to try out parallels, as I got tired of having to reboot my macbook every time I needed to use a windows program.

After installing parallels 6.0.11994, the program did not find my bootcamp partition. I checked disk utility and my bootcamp partition was not mounted anymore. I tried mounting it and nothing happened.

Then I tried rebooting into windows, and I got a an error: A disk read error has occurred.

So now I can't load my windows partition anymore, and it's not recognized in OSX. I never imagined that installing a program could so easily damage a hard drive partition, without so much as a warning.

My hardware is:

macbook pro 15" mid 2010 (i7)
windows 7x64 professional

At this point I would be very happy to just recover my windows partition. Any ideas?

Thanks,
psymn

 

Did you ever find a solution to this problem? I have had exactly the same experience using the same Build 6.0.11994. After 3+ hours of online chat 'service' all they could tell me is that it was more than likely due to me forgetting to properly shut down windows last time I was in it and instead hibernated it. Like you, I can no longer mount my bootcamp partition and get the same disk read error when trying to boot into windows.

 

the best bet would be trying to reboot from your Win 7 Pro Instal disc and fix your bootcamp Win7 pro!
I also had the black screen, but fortunately i've previously cooked a fresh image with a rescue disk and it was a snap to ressurect the wounded bootcamp...
In the meantime i stay with my working bootcamp and avoid to relaunch //desktop6 mostly because i'm asked for a secund Win7 pro License!

 

I have the SAME problem. I installed a Trial Version of Parallels 6 and it completely WRECKED my bootcamp partition. I can't boot it natively, I can't boot it within Parallels, VMWare Fusion no longer recognizes it. I can't mount it to pull files off of it. Ugh. I am so upset with this.

Windows 7 Recovery Console is worthless (natively) ... doesn't even detect the OS. I am going to take to Twitter, Facebook, My Blog, Your Mom's Blog, Your Mom's Mom's Blog and get the word out about how bad this software can be

 

hello,

Before trying //desktop6 virtualizing your Bootcamp you should have make an image to be able to restore your Bootcamp in case of having a fatal issue!
I bet the culprit is Win7 because it needs 2 license keys one for Bootcamp and another for //desktop6!
The same mess will occur with VMWare Fusion!
I have now 2 license keys, one with the Bootcamp partition and another for //desktop6 that works terrific with Lion!
Mostly all my usual work is done thru //desktop6 and I didn't use Bootcamp since a full month!
I used Bootcamp to play with Formula 1 2010, but I no longer will play this game because of the Microsoft shit that take more than an average 10' before starting the race. Holy sh...
So don't blame //desktop6: they are clearly not involved in your issue! what you've done was possible previously with XP needing only a single license, but Win7 is no way: you have to shell out more bucks for a second license key!
have fun

 

Parallels 6 broke my Windows 7 bootcamp partition: MFT corrupted

Like to share my experiences with Parallels 6:

- when trying to select the Bootcamp partition (which is on a seperate disk; EFI and Bootcamp partition) both disks are mounting/unmounting multiple times for a while.
- when booting for the first time, Parallels used wrong disk so tried starting from the EFI partition.
- after correcting (disable EFI partition at disk-options) Windows 7 started booting
- got a BSOD because of Video drivers.
- tried some more, and some more
- until the drive got corrupted: both MFT and backup MFT of NTFS drive are now corrupted due to Parallels.
Drive is not mounting anymore, Bootcamp not working, all data lost.

Now trying to fix things from within old XP drive with Testdisk, which is my last hope, but it's reporting both MFT's as corrupted so only data-recovery as an end-solution.

I wonder what Parallels is doing to my drive when I select it: it's doing something on the partition-level. It's unmounting and preparing my drive... for what? Why?
It sure isn't fail-save with my particular setup, which is non-standard I admit: my drive is setup from within Windows to be used as Bootcamp drive, so my EFT partition is in NTFS format, which is not normal. But Parallels shouldn't be altering anything at that level, should it?

If anyone knows a fix for my MFT issue: please let me know!
If anyone knows how to go about this the next time: please let me know! Don't want to loose another Windows installation all over again.

 

Hey SmokinX, I too noticed that both the MFT /AND/ the backup MFT were completely and utterly wrecked. During my recovery attempts, I replaced the MFT with the MFTMirr and it did not resolve my issue. I too went the TestDisk Route as well as NTFS GetDataBack via a BartPE recovery boot disc. It was futile.

I used the DD command to take an image of my hosed partition, so I can attempt recovery from another machine while I rebuild what has been lost in the meantime.

 

You see, VMWare Fusion no longer recognizes it anymore.

 

Since I have the same problem, and it's November 2011, I assume Parallels doesn't care about fixing the issue?