Install Windows from USB Flash

It worked perfectly for me. I have an old black MacBook (feb 2007)

Here is how I made it.

1°) Make a bootable NTFS USB key with the installation of Windows 7 on it using the official tool by Microsoft (http://store.microsoft.com/Help/ISO-Tool); you must have a working Windows copy for this
2°) Make another USB key (HFS+) with rEFIt on it (I think that installing rEFIt on your hd should be ok too but I personally preferred to avoid it); look a the doc here : http://refit.sourceforge.net/doc/c1s1_install.html
3°) Reboot your computer with both keys plugged in; select rEFIt and then in its menu, simply launch Windows

Hope it helps someone.

Thanks everyone for the help.

Install windows 7 on mac with out superdrive/usb

This guide helped me come to this this http://insidethebrackets.blogspot.com/2009/04/install-windows-on-macbook-air-with-no.html . I don't know if it's to late for that but here is what i did. I have pre unibody macbook pro early 2008 version with out superdrive. For this guide you do not need a usb! What you need: rEFIt (to be installed and working every time you boot), a Windows 7 iso and Parallels Desktop 5 (this is what i used).
1)So star by making a bootcamp partition (if you haven't already).
2)When bootcamp askes you to start instaling windows quit it.
3)Go to Disk Utility and unmount the bootcamp partition! If you don't parallels may start bitching.
4)Start Parallels 5 and create a new virtual machine
5)In first window push "Skip Detection"
6)Select witch windows you wont to install
7)Virtual machine type: Custom
8)CPU and RAM default
9)Hard Disk Option: No hard disk
10)And start, a window should appear prompting you to push start to install windows. Don't do that yet!
11)In the lower right corner of the windows installation window there is a button "virtual machine configuration", push it.
12)There you will have 3 options. Go to "Hardware" option.
13)Select "CD/DVD-ROM" and from a drop down menu select the windows 7 iso
14)Then push "+" and add Hard Disk. From the drop down menu select bootcamp
15)Go to Boot Order and be sure that the order is like this "1)CD/DVD-ROM,2)Hard-Disk,3)Floppy,4)Network Adapter"
16)Push ok and start installing windows 7
17) Watch closely when the installation prompts you to restart the first time STOP! the virtual machine and quit parallels.
18) Now comes rEFIt in.
19)Restart your Mac. And when it boots to rEFIt you will see that the windows partition is there. Enter it. The windows 7 will start re configuring stuff. And will continue to install windows normal. After it's done.
20) After you installed the bootcamp 3 drivers got to nvidia page and download the latest video card drivers for your mac. Coz bootcamp has old ones. Well that's all. Hope this guide will help some.

Utamaru said:

This guide helped me come to this this http://insidethebrackets.blogspot.com/2009/04/install-windows-on-macbook-air-with-no.html . I don't know if it's to late for that but here is what i did. I have pre unibody macbook pro early 2008 version with out superdrive. For this guide you do not need a usb! What you need: rEFIt (to be installed and working every time you boot), a Windows 7 iso and Parallels Desktop 5 (this is what i used).

Click to expand...

*ahem* Same link I posted one page ago
Worked for me too

Regading the posts of Utamaru and ken694

I have tried both ways in MBA 2,1. and none of them work form me.

-Using parallels 5 (latest build) I don't get the same options during VM setup. After selecting "No hard disk" I have to configure networking and the optimization options, but the problem comes when I have to select the Name and Location of the VM. I have tried everything and nothing seems to work. Has anyone tried this?

-Regarding the use of aUSB flash, rEFIt gives me error "not found while loading legacy loader"

Any ideas

Regards

dextro said:

I have tried both ways in MBA 2,1. and none of them work form me.

-Using parallels 5 (latest build) I don't get the same options during VM setup. After selecting "No hard disk" I have to configure networking and the optimization options, but the problem comes when I have to select the Name and Location of the VM. I have tried everything and nothing seems to work. Has anyone tried this?

-Regarding the use of aUSB flash, rEFIt gives me error "not found while loading legacy loader"

Any ideas

Regards

Click to expand...

Some news here: actually I installed completely Windows 7 under Parallels in the bootcamp partition. When trying to boot I get the known error (in Vista) stating that winload.exe is missing or corrupt. Can someone that has managed to install win7 the output of the bcdedit (I want to know the booting partition).

Regards

David

Instead of doing USB booting or trying to break EFI by booting a Legacy OS, couldn't you just make a bootable USB version of Win, and then just run the installer off of there. I mean, once the installer starts running, it just copies the install data to the appropriate drive, then reboots to that drive and runs the installer from there. At this very moment I'm doing this on my Mac Pro 1,1 and it seems to be going without a hitch. I'm installing x64 too, which seems to be the biggest pain in the ass ever, but no problems here.

Edit:
Yep it works. I just installed Windows 7 x64 from a "bootable" USB drive with no hitches whatsoever. And there was much rejoicing!

cowboyjebus said:

Instead of doing USB booting or trying to break EFI by booting a Legacy OS, couldn't you just make a bootable USB version of Win, and then just run the installer off of there. I mean, once the installer starts running, it just copies the install data to the appropriate drive, then reboots to that drive and runs the installer from there. At this very moment I'm doing this on my Mac Pro 1,1 and it seems to be going without a hitch. I'm installing x64 too, which seems to be the biggest pain in the ass ever, but no problems here.

Edit:
Yep it works. I just installed Windows 7 x64 from a "bootable" USB drive with no hitches whatsoever. And there was much rejoicing!

Click to expand...

Could you please explain how you create a "bootable" USB drive?

cowboyjebus said:

Instead of doing USB booting or trying to break EFI by booting a Legacy OS, couldn't you just make a bootable USB version of Win, and then just run the installer off of there. I mean, once the installer starts running, it just copies the install data to the appropriate drive, then reboots to that drive and runs the installer from there. At this very moment I'm doing this on my Mac Pro 1,1 and it seems to be going without a hitch. I'm installing x64 too, which seems to be the biggest pain in the ass ever, but no problems here.

Edit:
Yep it works. I just installed Windows 7 x64 from a "bootable" USB drive with no hitches whatsoever. And there was much rejoicing!

Click to expand...

This might have worked for you in a Mac Pro but it does not work with a Macbook Air, not even with rEFIt.

Regards

I'm trying the method posted by utamaru, but when it comes to restart the iMac 27" and boot the windows partition, i get an error:

WINDOWS BOOT MANAGER

Windows failed to start

File: \boot\BCD
Status: 0xc0000034
Info: "The Windows Boot Configuration Data file is missing required information".

maybe i've found the problem... while installing Windows 7 in parallels, i get an alert message:

Mac OS X has prevented the guest operating system from changing the boot loader on your physical hard disk.

Could this be the problem? how can i solve this?

my case.

macbook. Totally hostile to install windows 7. Tried 3 dvds, all where "empty" to finder.
Did the refit to pendrive, booted with it (holding option upon startup) and booted the win7 pendrive. (used Windows7-USB-DVD-Download-Tool to make it bootable).
Windows 7 setup, choose the bootcamp partition, formated, and error. It couldnt install on that partition. Deleted it, formated, restarted. Made the partition again. Nothing. Always the same error.

Took the hdd of the macbook, installed it on my pc, booted with the win7 pendrive, choose the bootcamp partition and setup went, thankfully, smooth.
On first restart I shutdown the pc. Took the hdd off it and installed back to the macbook. Setup continued then 'till it finished.

laughinghan said:

@ MattZani, kinkster:

I'm trying to boot Tiny XP on a Late 2008 Aluminum "Unibody" 2.4 GHz MacBook5,1.

Many thanks,

Han

Click to expand...

I had a copy of Tiny XP, I was never able to boot from it on my mac mini using boot camp to install it, though it worked on an actual PC to work from booting off the cd and it also worked in paralells desktop.
Another version of XP installed fined though leading me to think Tiny XP is missing something macs need.

Exactly the same. Mine also Macbook 2,1 (Boot Rom - MB21.00A5.B07). My superdrive is broken so got no other option.

1. I tried the usb drive approach. I used the same usb drive to install win7 on another pc - worked like a charm. But on my machine it would never boot gives -

Error: Not Found returned from legacy loader
Error: Not Found returned from LocateDevicePath
........
........
The firmware refused to boot from the selected volume. Note that external
hard drives are not well-supported by Apple's firmware for legacy OS booting.

2. I tried the virtual machine approach mentioned here. Didn't work. Blank screen with error saying \boot\winload.exe.... error. I tried copying the files from the disk to "\boot" folder in bootcamp drive - didn't work.

3. Again cleared the drive. Reformatted again. Created bootcamp partition. Tried the approach as mentioned by Utamaru in one of the posts above - same post, page 4, reply #77. Didn't work. Gives an error:-

0xc999999e
\windows\system32\winload.exe
......the application is missing or corrupt.

So finally - 2 days, 1 night of frustration, my opinion is - Macbook is made for Mac OS, even the firmware is like that only. Win 7 - just by chance.

I just bought a usb dvd-drive for me for this sole purpose. I'll try to burn it to disk and try. But I don't know - coz mac wouldn't allow booting from usb disk either I think. I'll try rEFit. Thanks all for the posts.

dextro said:

I have tried both ways in MBA 2,1. and none of them work form me.

-Using parallels 5 (latest build) I don't get the same options during VM setup. After selecting "No hard disk" I have to configure networking and the optimization options, but the problem comes when I have to select the Name and Location of the VM. I have tried everything and nothing seems to work. Has anyone tried this?

-Regarding the use of aUSB flash, rEFIt gives me error "not found while loading legacy loader"

Any ideas

Regards

Click to expand...

Macbook 2,1 not firmware not capable of windows 7

OK. I give up. I used Aopen usb-rw to boot windows 7 using Boot Camp. Then I tried another Benq Dvd-rom, it booted with none of them.

The first attempt it restarted and hanged at the startup with first a crossed circle and then a folder with question mark blinking. I searched the answer and was able to boot my macbook with big difficulty.

Below are the steps which finally helped me install windows 7 to my macbook 2,1. I just wonder why I didn't reach this thread early. Thanks a lot to everyone for the informative posts:-

https://forums.macrumors.com/showthread.php?p=10601274#post10601274

dextro said:

This does not work with Parallels 5. The problem is that when windows tries to restart for the first time and you stop the VM, then the bootcamp volume is not properly mounted.

The solution I found after spending the whole weekend is:

-proceed to the installation as mentioned in the article you mention until the first reboot is necessary. This is actually only to make the partition bootable. Probably it is already when you create it in bootcamp, but as the system works now I don't want to try.
-Stop the VM
-properly unmount the drive with disk utility, remount it
-delete all the contents of the bootcamp partition
-copy the contents of the Windows installation CD (only tried with Windows7).
-reboot the mac and keep the option key pressed.
-select the windows volume to boot.
-proceed with windows installation normally selecting the same drive that contains the installation files (the bootcamp partition).
-when windows boots for the first time you can delete the files and folders of the installation
-install the windows bootcamp drivers
-install the nvidia driver.

DONE

Cheers.

David

Click to expand...

Now I'm using windows 7 on my machine.... its running super hot. Touchpad - cranky, no-right click either. Once it went to sleep - backlight didn't turn on automatically. Got to fix this but even the bootcamp drivers downloaded from apple site aren't working fine either.

Hello,
I created a USB from my original Win7 using Flash2drive. I installed rEFIt. When I boot my mac with the USB inserted, I do see a "Boot Windows" option but when I selected I then get "No bootable device found".

Any ideas ?

I also tried using the Microsoft tool to create the USB stick and it also won't boot. It boots fine on a PC. I just found on a rEFIt site that it's not well supported

Same case

Mafetapaz said:

maybe i've found the problem... while installing Windows 7 in parallels, i get an alert message:

Mac OS X has prevented the guest operating system from changing the boot loader on your physical hard disk.

Could this be the problem? how can i solve this?

Click to expand...

Hi Mafetapaz, I have the same problem, have you found a workaround ?
Regards,
Pietro

registred said:

Hi Mafetapaz, I have the same problem, have you found a workaround ?
Regards,
Pietro

Click to expand...

I am having the same issue. I get this message a few times while installing windows through parallels onto the bootcamp partition. When I restart after everything is done, the windows partition is visible but when I boot to it a boot manager comes up midway and says windows encountered an error.

This is a bit out of my league now because I think the format is not changing correctly. It seems that snow leopard is stopping parallels from altering the drive. Any suggestions?

It's finished!

If you follow okdone's instructions it works (even when you get the warning that I was getting). His speculation of this process working without doing the Parallels part was wrong though.

You need to run the installation through parallels at first because it allows you to reformat the bootcamp partition to NTFS otherwise it's just in FAT32. So just ignore the warnings as you go through Parallels installation and be sure to stop the virtual drive as soon as it tries to reboot the first time.

Then erase everything on that partition (this took quite some time and you may need to have NTFS-3G installed to read the now NTFS bootcamp partition, I'm not sure). Then copy all the files from your windows 7 iso to the hard drive and reboot! Hold option to get to the windows partition and you're golden!!!

Thank you so much okdone! Your good deed of following up with your posts has made my day a success.

rangerrick337 said:

If you follow okdone's instructions it works (even when you get the warning that I was getting). His speculation of this process working without doing the Parallels part was wrong though.

You need to run the installation through parallels at first because it allows you to reformat the bootcamp partition to NTFS otherwise it's just in FAT32. So just ignore the warnings as you go through Parallels installation and be sure to stop the virtual drive as soon as it tries to reboot the first time.

Then erase everything on that partition (this took quite some time and you may need to have NTFS-3G installed to read the now NTFS bootcamp partition, I'm not sure). Then copy all the files from your windows 7 iso to the hard drive and reboot! Hold option to get to the windows partition and you're golden!!!

Thank you so much okdone! Your good deed of following up with your posts has made my day a success.

Click to expand...

I confirm that this method is working!
I just installed it in a late 2006 macbook pro.

Thanks everybody for your efforts!

Using Diskutil (Mac OS X only)


Download the desired .img file
Open a Terminal (under Utilities)
Run diskutil list to get the current list of devices

Insert your flash media
Run diskutil list again and determine the device node assigned to your flash media (e.g. /dev/disk2)

Run diskutil unmountDisk /dev/diskN

Execute sudo dd if=/path/to/downloaded.img of=/dev/diskN bs=1m

Run diskutil eject /dev/diskN and remove your flash media when the command completes

mthq said:

Using Diskutil (Mac OS X only)


Download the desired .img file
Open a Terminal (under Utilities)
Run diskutil list to get the current list of devices

Insert your flash media
Run diskutil list again and determine the device node assigned to your flash media (e.g. /dev/disk2)

Run diskutil unmountDisk /dev/diskN

Execute sudo dd if=/path/to/downloaded.img of=/dev/diskN bs=1m

Run diskutil eject /dev/diskN and remove your flash media when the command completes

Click to expand...

Can you then boot from the usb ??

thefunkymunky said:

Thats the theory yes. Some people are having problems though. It worked for me first time but I'm on an old(ish) Mac. Think it might have something to do with the unibody notebooks.

Click to expand...

Well, mine is an old MacBook Pro as well, MacBook Pro3,1 which I bought in 2007, I still have the same firmware not supported stuff going on when using 32bit Windows 7 USB drive made from an ISO

I've installed the rEFIt tool

I'm trying to install W7 on a 1st gen MBA but I get the "The firmware refused to boot from the selected volume" error when trying to boot from the USB with rEFIt.