[Macpartners] OS X 10.11.4 diskutil bug: Partition Drive will kill Recovery Partition

[Duncan S Kincaid]

Ciao teddy

Yes, that is what I mean by partitioning.

Whenever I change the partition map using diskutil or Disk Utility in OS X 10.11.4 build 15E65, the Mac can no longer boot into recovery mode. 

I suspect there is a bug in diskutil which fails properly to move the recovery partition when normal partitions are added or deleted.

I have verified this on macs with a clean install of 15E65.

Apple did reply to my bug report asking for more info before and after partition using gpt. That was supplied and have not heard back.

Best
dk

> On Apr 5, 2016, at 10:22 PM, Teddy Thomas <tthoma24 at mit.edu> wrote:
> 
> Hi Duncan-
> 
> I’m a bit late to the party. By “partitioning,” do you mean adding an additional partition after installing OS X?
> 
> I’ve been erasing machines with the diskutil command line, and reinstalling OS X on them, and that seems to be fine both with and without FileVault. Haven’t tried adding any additional partitions, but I’d be happy to test if it is helpful.
> 
> -Teddy
> 
>> On Mar 28, 2016, at 10:23 AM, Duncan S Kincaid <dsk at MIT.EDU> wrote:
>> 
>> ciao thomas
>> 
>> i have tested the following scenarios:
>> 1. same as below with FV enabled BEFORE partitioning 
>> 2. same as below, but enabling FV AFTER partitioning
>> 
>> in both cases
>> 1. the Mac boots normally.
>> 2. the recovery portion is hosed
>> 
>> i should have added in my initial report that attempts to boot into Recovery Mode post-partitioning results in any of the following (partially depending on whether selecting COMMAND-R or selecting 'Recovery-10.11.4’ after booting with option)
>> 1. hang
>> 2. kernel panic
>> 3. 'apple.com/support -30001F’ error message
>> 5. attempt to boot ‘Internet Recovery'
>> 
>> 
>> |||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
>> duncan kincaid
>> cron | mit school of architecture and planning
>> 
>> 
>> 
>> 
>>> On Mar 28, 2016, at 9:51 AM, Thomas Brand <tbrand at mit.edu> wrote:
>>> 
>>> Good morning Duncan,
>>> 
>>> Does partitioning a disk in 10.11.4 and damaging the Recovery Partition prevent a machine from booting
>>> after FileVault is enabled?
>>> 
>>> Thomas Brand
>>> 
>>> 
>>>> On Mon, 28 Mar 2016, Duncan S Kincaid wrote:
>>>> 
>>>> I have noticed the following with OS X 10.11.4 (15E65):
>>>> Partitioning the internal drive using diskutil (command line) or the much loathed 'Disk Utility v. 15.0’ will damage the hidden recovery partition named ‘Recovery HD’ such that one can no longer boot into recovery mode.
>>>> This is true whether one is performing the partitioning from Recovery Mode or from normally booted Macintosh.
>>>> The Macintosh hangs or presents apple.com/support <http://apple.com/support> -30001F when attempting to boot into Recovery Mode after partitioning disk0.
>>>> 
>>>> 1. This appears to be the case whether disk0 is formatted CS or not
>>>> 2. This has been confirmed only on disk0 (built-in internal drive). Have not experimented with others.
>>>> 3. This has been confirmed on computers with fresh install of OS X 10.11.4 (both with previous 'Recovery HD' present and with it removed (and re-created by OS X 10.11.4 installer)).
>>>> Recovery Mode works fine until one changes the partition map of disk0.
>>>> 4. Following partition of disk0,  diskutil will still list ‘Recovery HD’ normally, but it no longer works
>>>> 5. restoring the partition scheme to single partition does NOT undo ‘Recovery HD’ damage. it is still hosed.
>>>> 
>>>> will file bug with Apple.
>>>> 
>>>> dk
>>>> 
>>>> |||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
>>>> duncan kincaid
>>>> cron | mit school of architecture and planning
>> 
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