OS X El Capitan (beta 5) does not support mismatch between GPT and MBR

I tried to install the latest El Capitan beta, but once I start the installation process, it will go forward for about a minute until it says it failed, due to the fact that it apparently doesn't care for the Boot Camp partition. It says "Installer (or OS X, I forget which one) doesn't support a mismatch of the GPT and MBR file systems" (or something of that nature). Why wouldn't it support being installed alongside Boot Camp. I had an earlier beta that installed just fine, but then I reverted back to Mavericks from my Time Machine backup. Now I would like to upgrade again, but this issue is not allowing me to do that. How can I get it to install, preferrably without removing my Windows partition or erasing my OS X partition?

Replies

If you're still having this issue, these steps should fix it.


Boot into Recovery Mode (cmd+R).

  1. Utilities menu > Terminal > Type:

    csrutil disable

  2. Reboot normally


First, download gdisk (sourceforge.net/projects/gptfdisk/files/gptfdisk/1.0.0/gdisk-binaries/gdisk-1.0.0.pkg/download) and run the installer package.

Then run gdisk from a terminal window and run the v (verify command).

  • sudo gdisk /dev/disk0
  • Command (? for help): v


Given what you've said, it'll probably say:


Warning! Mismatched GPT and MBR partition! MBR partition 4, of type 0x07, has no corresponding GPT partition! You may continue, but this condition might cause data loss in the future!

Identified 1 problems!


Next, display the MBR partition table and make note of the start and end sectors for your BOOTCAMP partition.


  • Command (? for help): r
  • Recovery/transformation command (? for help): o

This should be partition 4 unless you've added additional partition(s), which is not officially supported by Boot Camp. It should show something like this:


Disk size is 1953525168 sectors (931.5 GiB)

MBR disk identifier: 0x7C170CB2

MBR partitions:


Number Boot Start Sector End Sector Status Code

1 1 409639 primary 0xEE

2 409640 975693095 primary 0xAF

3 975693096 976962631 primary 0xAB

4 * 976963584 1952806911 primary 0x07


Next, display the GPT partition table information:


  • Recovery/transformation command (? for help): m
  • Command (? for help): p


Number Start (sector) End (sector) Size Code Name

1 40 409639 200.0 MiB EF00 EFI System Partition

2 409640 975693095 465.1 GiB AF00 Customer

3 975693096 976962631 619.9 MiB AB00 Recovery HD

4 976963584 1953523711 465.7 GiB 0700 BOOTCAMP


Compare the start and end sectors for partition 4 to the MBR partition 4 start and end sectors. Most likely the start sectors will match, but the end sectors will be different.


Next, delete the GPT partition 4. (Note: this does not delete the actual partition from disk. It only deletes gdisk's in-memory representation of the GPT).


  • Command (? for help): d
  • Partition number (1-4): 4


Now, create a new partition 4 using the start and end sector values from the MBR partition 4:


  • Command (? for help): n
  • Partition number (4-128, default 4): 4
  • First sector (34-1953525134, default = 976962632) or {+-}size{KMGTP}: 976963584
  • Last sector (976963584-1953525134, default = 1953525134) or {+-}size{KMGTP}: 1952806911
  • Current type is 'Apple HFS/HFS+'
  • Hex code or GUID (L to show codes, Enter = AF00): 0700
  • Changed type of partition to 'Microsoft basic data'


Now, change the name of the new partition 4 to BOOTCAMP:


  • Command (? for help): c
  • Partition number (1-4): 4
  • Enter name: BOOTCAMP


Run the verify command. It should report no problems. If it still reports a problem, quit (q command) and start over.


Command (? for help): v


If everything checks out, write new partition table to disk and exit.


Command (? for help): w


Reboot and test your dual boot setup to verify all is working correctly.


Boot back into Recovery Mode (cmd+R).

  1. Utilities menu > Terminal > Type:

    csrutil enable

  2. Reboot normally


-Max.