Cant remove Free Space partition in Disk Utility

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Level 1

5 points

Cant remove Free Space partition in Disk Utility

Hello, I am currently on Monterey and I had a partition in place for Windows. I decided to delete it so I used boot camp assistant. It failed in the end. But after checking in disk utility I can see that it did delete everything except for the ‘free space’ I then attempted to remove the free space and rejoin it with the rest of my drives space so I can reclaim my whole hard drive space. This process also failed….I followed along with this thread Can't Remove Free Space partition in Disk… - Apple Community and I seem to have the same issue in the I have APFS Corruption. The solution in that thread was this… by @Loner T

Boot into Local Recovery and temporarily disable SIP (complete)
Boot into Internet Recovery. (Complete)
Run diskutil list internal and find the APFS container. The disk should be named diskN with the number N
Run
- diskutil unmountDisk diskN (complete)
- fsck_apfs -s -o -y /dev/rdiskN
- Check that the corruption has been corrected
Boot normally and run
- diskutil apfs resizeContainer disk1 0g

I am up to the 4th step where I ran.. fsck_apfs -s -o -y /dev/rdisk2

I got an error: failed to enable crypto I/O mode for container dev/rdisk2 : Invalid argument.

Have I typed something wrong? Any ideas on where I go from here? Just to clarify I have 600gb that I currently have access to on my mac and I am trying to reclaim the 400gb of ‘free space’.

MacBook Pro 16″, macOS 12.6

Posted on Nov 29, 2022 07:35 AM

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Answer 1

Owl-53

Level 10

100,225 points

Nov 29, 2022 07:47 AM in response to korrin-F

There might be ways which More Learned Contributor know, but AFAIK when a Bootcamp Partition is removed via Bootcamp and fails - that is bad news.

It may require the Scorched Earth Method below to put the Drive back as a Single Partition

This method will WIPE ALL Data and there is No Recovery - Period.

>> Only works on Intel Based Apple Computer <<

To perform this action will require booting from a Bootable Installer.

The Bootable Installer can Only be performed on an Apple Computer

This will have to be performed from a Qualifying Computer to run the version of macOS to be made on the Bootable Installer. Example : Bootable Installer of Big Sur would have to be done on a computer that Qualifies to run Big Sur.

Notation: If the computer being used to perform this action is Too New or Too Old to qualify to run the version of macOS - this computer can not be used.

Alternative is, to gain access to a Qualifying Apple Computer from a family member, friend or associate.

Extra Special Notation regarding the Touch ID equipped Apple Computer.

About Startup Security Utility and Must Enable from Recovery Mode the ability to boot from External Drive Before Attempting

1 - Shutdown computer and disconnect all external drive Except the newly created Bootable Installer.

2- Restart and immediately hold the OPTION key until the Startup Manager appears and choose the USB Drive.

3 - It will present options >> Disk Utilities >> View >> View ALL attached Drives.

4 - Choose the Upper Most Drive ( not the volumes indented and list below ).

5 - The drive normally is called Apple Media or Apple SSD - that is the drive to Erase and format as APFS with the GUID Partition Map. This applies to macOS 10.14 Mojave and above.

5A - Formatting for macOS 10.13 High Sierra and below requires HFS Journaled with the GUID Partition Map

6 - Once that is done >> backup out of Disk Utilities and choose install macOS.

7 - Follow the prompts and it may automatically reboot several time.

8 - Upon a final reboot - Setup Assist will present with the newer version of macOS.

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Answer 2

korrin-F Author

Level 1

5 points

Nov 29, 2022 08:17 AM in response to korrin-F

This is the result of attempting to partition the drive to regain the space. I will attempt to repair disk1 from recovery.

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Answer 3

korrin-F Author

Level 1

5 points

Nov 29, 2022 07:52 AM in response to Owl-53

Thanks I think I will save this as a last resort then as I do not want to risk loosing everything just yet.

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Cant remove Free Space partition in Disk Utility

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