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I am trying to install windows as a boot camp partition on my main hard drive ssd (after spending countless hours trying to get it installed on the optical bay hard drive).

I assumed this would be simple since o am no longer trying to install to an "external" hard drive. But it has turned out to be just as difficult.

The biggest problem I am encountering is that i have a 2010 15" macbook pro which originally came with an optical drive which i have replaced with a Hard disk and the main drive is now an ssd also I am trying to install windows 7. I tried modifying my info.plist so i could create a USB install of my windows iso but when I create a boot camp partition and hit install it restarts into a gray screen and nothing happens. If I attempt to force restart from this It boots into an apple logo that hangs until it goes to a black screen that says "No bootable device found - please insert a bootable device and hit any key." I then force restarted and held down option and when it loaded it didn't show my USB as a device (only my main ssd drive and my optical bay hard disk).

I found a YouTube video of a Czech guy who used virtual box to start the install and then move it to the desired disk and used refit to access it, but when I installed refit it didn't even show up in my boot devices when I held down option...

My question is how I can go about installing windows 7 on my 2010 macbook pro that has an ssd in the main hard drive and a hard disk on the optical bay drive. It can be installed to either disk but I suppose the ssd would be better since its faster to boot. I have a working ISO (showed working from virtual box installs) and a USB drive.

user8363
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  • Are you using rEFIt or the newer replacement rEFInd? You should be able to get rEFInd to work from a flash drive. This is pretty simple to do. See here. This will allow you to test out rEFInd. If you like, I can help move rEFInd to one of your internal disks. Also, this rEFInd install is 100% reversible. Also, please give the link to the YouTube video (if in english). – David Anderson Apr 04 '15 at 21:03
  • Here's link to the video: youtube.com/watch?v=cG1gdImjy8k. I had no idea refit was replaced with a new thing called refind. – user8363 Apr 04 '15 at 21:19
  • Shouldn't refit still work for this method since it doesn't use a USB at all? – user8363 Apr 04 '15 at 21:37
  • Not a dup, I made the other thread to address installing on an external disk. Which your advice never worked. Now I'm trying to just get it on my main sdd and its still not workjng – user8363 Apr 04 '15 at 22:03
  • I am not sure I understand your question. What does "this method" mean? – David Anderson Apr 04 '15 at 22:04
  • The method in the video – user8363 Apr 04 '15 at 22:05
  • @user8363 - your previous question doesn't mention installing to an external disk hence the possible duplicate note. I've had good results with Rufus but clearly it didn't work for you - you still have the option of burning your .ISO file to DVD though, all you would need is an external enclosure (SATA to USB type) to house your old optical drive. These are very cheap online and it'll give your old optical drive a new lease of life. – ScunnerDarkly Apr 05 '15 at 04:06
  • My post does mention an external drive, the second internal one that's located in the optical drive is technically external. Also I have an external disk drive that connects via USB, it doesn't work for installing windows as I have tried this already with a DVD that I know works. – user8363 Apr 05 '15 at 06:00
  • I watched the video vary carefully many times. I lost count of all the flaws. I am not going to say the video is a fake. I will say that perhaps several attempts were made to install windows. What you see is the badly edited results. – David Anderson Apr 05 '15 at 08:52
  • So what's the best way to actually install windows without my optical drive? – user8363 Apr 05 '15 at 16:20
  • I have the same setup (2011 13" MBP, SSD for main drive, HDD in the optical bay, original optical drive in a USB enclosure), and I'm pretty sure I was able to install Windows from a Win7 DVD in the USB optical drive… On another note: if you have a working Windows install in a virtual machine, you can move it over to a Boot Camp partition using WinClone. You'll have to get the Standard version (not Basic) to migrate an external Windows version, but I can attest that it works wonderfully. – Dustin Wheeler Apr 06 '15 at 15:15
  • Thanks for the advice. It almost works with the optical drive, but when I hold down option and choose the external optical drive it goes to a Frey screen with the apple logo and hangs there. It doesn't seem to want to boot from the optical drive at all. – user8363 Apr 06 '15 at 15:18
  • Also I don't have the super drive as my external optical drive, its an external optical drive from HP. I hope that doesn't matter but if may be why its hanging when I choose to boot from it – user8363 Apr 06 '15 at 15:26
  • I don't think the issue is the identity of the external drive. Seems to be something coded into the EFI of the MBP. you might check out this page, it has a workaround involving rEFIt: http://www.andrewsavory.com/blog/2011/2156 – Dustin Wheeler Apr 06 '15 at 15:32
  • Thanks for the link. I tried installing refit and it didn't even show up when I held option on boot up. But I'll try again! – user8363 Apr 06 '15 at 15:33
  • Don't give up yet. I believe it should be possible to install windows without a physical optical drive. You don't need refit or refind. What you need is the command sysprep which comes with windows 7 and 8. The idea is to install windows directly into a partition of one of your physical drives using Virtual Box. Next run sysprep (stored in folder C:\Windows\system32\sysprep) to prepare windows for a hardware change. Exit Virtual Box and boot to Windows. Windows will reinstall using your Mac's physical hardware. Next, install bootcamp drivers. I am still testing. Will post when finished. – David Anderson Apr 07 '15 at 17:36
  • Did not know you are here. Have questions. What version of windows? Is it 32 or 64. Will windows be on the same drive as OS X. Have you already successfully installed windows in Virtual box using all the default settings? – David Anderson Apr 07 '15 at 17:42
  • I am usually around since my phone notifies me when someone replies

    Windows 7 Ultimate 64 bit edition. I want windows to be on my SSD that OSX is also on in the main hard drive bay (at first i wanted it on my optical bay HDD but that turned out to be more of a headache and also i want the SSD speed). I have successfully installed the iso (and CD on a separate occasion) using Parallels.

    My mac model is Macbook Pro6,1 2.66GHz, 8GB 1067 RAM (from OWC) ,NVIDIA GeForce GT 330M 512 MB, OSX 10.2.2

     – user8363 Apr 07 '15 at 17:49

2 Answers2

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Since this question has been marked as a duplicate, I have moved my answer to the other question. Please see my answer posted at Boot camp install of Windows 7 issue, no bootable devices.

Community
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David Anderson
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  • Your dedication to this question is very admirable. I will continue checking this for the full instructions. Thanks so much for all the help, i truly appreciated it. If you are ever in the Sacramento area and want a free case of beer or burger make sure to message me. – user8363 Apr 08 '15 at 21:52
  • FYI: I did succeed in installing Windows 7 Pro 64 bit on my 2007 iMac using virtual box and the windows install iso. I was lucky enough to have bootstrap code in my physical disk's MBR. This was because of a previous install of windows 8 from a DVD. I problem is others who try my solution may not be as lucky. Finding a solution has held me up a bit. I found one and I am currently updating the solution document. By the way, you will not have this problem, because your windows install will be on a different drive than OS X resides. I assume your install will update the MBR bootstrap code. – David Anderson Apr 08 '15 at 23:44
  • If its easier I aan have osx on the same main drive, I may even prefer that since its an ssd unlike my HDD which is what I gave in the optical bay. But whatever method works! – user8363 Apr 08 '15 at 23:47
  • i noticed your last step is just "hi there", i assume its a place holder for more to come later but wanted to check in and see if you needed any information from me. Again i want to thank you for your hard work on finding a solution for this problem. Cant wait to try this all out! – user8363 Apr 09 '15 at 14:29
  • I am basically done documenting the physical changes that need to be made. I am currently reinstalling Windows 7 to the physical partition disk0s4 using VirtualBox. The next updates should contain the virtual steps from within VirtualBox. From this point the rest of the steps are trivial. – David Anderson Apr 09 '15 at 15:02
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Machines that shipped with a DVD drive can't install Windows using a usb device in my experience. It seems that as soon as the thumb drive is selected for booting it looses power for a second and then can no longer be found.

One option would be to use your secondary drive as a bootable installer for Windows.

Kevin Grabher
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