Stupid Mac technician screwed up my computer. Backup Bootcamp for reformat?

I'll tell my story...then I'll ask the question...

I took my machine in on Tuesday to have a battery issue addressed. On occasion when it was plugged in, it wouldn't charge.

He calls me this morning to say that he was unable to reproduce the problem and that he charged, discharged and recharged the battery with no issues. Ok. I go pick it up shortly after and I just noticed a few things a minute ago.

I was typing and I hit the eject key when I reached for the backspace and the machine reacted immediately, which was changed in 10.4.9. I check for updates and 8 of them show up on the list, including 10.4.9 and the latest Java update. 10.4.9 is pretty freakin important and I use features in the latest Java update with my computer science stuff. X11 and Xcode are also gone which is a freaking HASSLE. It also broke my installation of Parallels. XP still works in bootcamp.

So I'm pissed. I check the logs and it appears that he ran an install. What in the heck possessed him to do a restore on this machine? Did he not consider the ramifications of reinstalling the operating system?

I'm so freaking pissed. He didn't even tell me! On top of all that, I still have the problem. (Told you so).


So anyway...back to my question.. I figure I'll do a clean format to get everything perfect again...

Can I just back up the files from the bootcamp partition and restore them once I create the partition again? I have this funny feeling that there is some sort of boot record that needs to be present and it won't work.

Any ideas?

 

Was this done at an Apple reseller or at an Apple store? Either way, you should complain to the manager of the place.

As for the bootcamp, if you can still boot up in XP, I would use the XP backup software to do a full backup of my XP install. Then proceed with the re-install. Then you can do a restore once your boot camp is cleanly reinstalled.Of course, you will need to re-install XP before being able to restore...

 

Just because he reinstalled OS X, doesn't mean he touched the bootcamp partition. I doubt you need to do anything.

 

If he did a reinstall, it may have messed with the MBR.. I have absolutely NO idea how the intel macs handle booting like this (I've been a pc tech forever, but not hard core mac coder) but I would imagine they still have one.. if it doesn't know bootcamp's there, it could be trouble.

 

XP fires up just fine in bootcamp but Parallels is broken. I would just reinstall parallels, but it's a list of things that are either broken or missing.

I don't have much time this weekend to mess with it. I sent an email to the service manager explaining my problem - I hope to hear back on Monday.

I plan on going up to the store when he's back and asking the tech what exactly he did. When he lies to me, I'm going to call him out on it.


Is there some sort of restore feature in Tiger he might of used that I can undo? I'm not an idiot - I study computer science, but I just don't know the ins and outs of OS X.

I'm definitely not doing anything until they see it.

 

Hmm... I think I can get Norton Ghost for free from school. That would be the way to back it up. My registration and everything would still be intact.

It's so frustrating because it takes forEVER to get XP back up and running like normal. Visual Studio 05 by itself takes about an hour to install.

 

Macs don't use a master boot record. Your drive has one, but it's only there so disk utilities don't see the drive as free space.

It simply sounds like he did an archive and install and forgot to update to 10.4.9. That would break Parallels, but reinstalling Parallels will fix it. It will also get rid of the Developer tools, but a reinstall will get those back. X11 should have survived.

Don't even consider reformatting or repartitioning. I don't think you have a problem with that. And there shouldn't be any reason to backup or mess with your bootcamp files either. You said in the first post that XP runs fine under bootcamp.

Overall, you may have to reinstall a few things, but it doesn't sound very bad to me.

 

bootcamp is not supported by apple

one reason i chose not to use it (an eternal beta)

unless you have a disk image of your own system
don't ever reformat and start over

those days are long gone for WinXp and Mac OS if you use good hosukeeping

disk utilities provided by the OS makers . . . should be good enough

Hugh W

 

So...heres a question..

Do I reinstall parallels with 10.4.8 and then upgrade to 9?

Or...do I just upgrade to 9, and maybe that will fix my problems...


This is what the error says immediately after launching the app.

Parallels Desktop is unable to operate properly since it cannot communicate with one of its drivers. Try to restart the application to overcome this issue. If that doesn't help, re-install PD. Note that Parallels drivers require a short time to be properly started and initialized. So you may need to wait a minute before trying to launch the application.

 

Upgrade to 10.4.9 then reinstall Parallels.

Parallels desktop uses kernel extensions which are usually wiped out in a version upgrade. To make sure you keep the kernel extensions do the upgrade first, then reinstall Parallels.

 

Battery problem related

Somehow, this is a known problem with the batteries. I simply called the Apple support line, since I'm still in warranty with my MBP. Told the guy what was going on. Ran through some tests (like they always do), and came to the conclusion that it wasn't charging.

Anyway, he took my info, and said a new battery would be here within 5 working days. It was here the next day (and I called Apple after 1700 central time). Sent new battery in.

SO.....accelerate the problem. You need a new battery.

The Parallels side....see above.