Win7 x64 booting natively via EFI (no BIOS emulation)

mac-hacks said:

If i create USB Installer for WIndows 7 or 8 & add the "bootmgfw.efi" to \EFI\Microsoft\Boot\

Could you post example for rEFInd.conf, for Winodws7 Here what i have now, I get black screen w/ Windows 7, but windows 8 will load.

Code:

timeout 5

scanfor internal,external,optical,cd  

default_selection 1
graphics off


menuentry "Windows 7" {
	loader \EFI\Microsoft\Boot\bootmgfw.efi
}

EOF

Click to expand...

This is mostly correct, but:

• The manual menu entry is useless, both because there's no "manual" option in your "scanfor" line and because the "external" option in the "scanfor" line means that the Windows 7 boot loader on your USB installer should be auto-detected. Thus, I'd just remove the Windows 7 menu entry definition.
• The "EOF" at the end of the example is useless. There's a "# EOF" line at the end of the sample file (a holdover from rEFIt). Note the comment character ("#"); it's there just to tell the user that it's the end of the file ("end of file" = "EOF"). In practice, rEFInd ignores configuration file keywords it doesn't understand, so this line has no practical effect, but it's best to remove it anyhow, since it's conceivable that I'll add new keywords in future versions of the program, and if you happen to have one that matches something I use in the future, it could have unintended consequences.

As to your overall question, I'm afraid I can't answer it, except to say that this thread has shown that Windows 8 seems to handle Mac hardware in EFI mode better than does Windows 7, so you're presumably seeing that effect. AFAIK, this has nothing to do with rEFInd.

Rod,

Thanks, i wasn't sure if graphics "off" was correct. Wold same settings for grub2.conf work with rEFInd?

I have no problems with installing Windows 8 UEFi. There way to many bugs that need to be work. 1st preview ran better on my Mac's than the latest release.

If by "same settings for grub2.conf" you're referring to options that are passed to the Windows boot loader, then yes, you can pass those via a manual configuration stanza's "options" line in refind.conf. OTOH, if you mean GRUB-specific options to set graphics modes or whatnot, then no. The only options that rEFInd supports are those described in its configuration file documentation.

Please keep in mind that I have no experience booting Windows on Macs. My one Intel-based Mac is a first-generation Mac Mini, so it's got a 32-bit CPU and a 32-bit EFI. As such, it's incapable of booting Windows in EFI mode. In fact, I've never installed Windows on it, period. My experience with booting Windows in EFI mode is based on a laptop I own and that I use with UEFI DUET. (FWIW, UEFI DUET might be worth trying to get Windows installed on Macs in UEFI mode, but it would be awkward as a long-term solution.)

I slipstreamed drivers from Boot Camp 4.0.1 and at least one driver is not signed. I had to disable automatic signed driver enforcement.
...
Finally... I got it working on my early 2011 15" MBP.
...
Time to resume drinking before work!

Seeing this boot was extremely satisfying. I'm going to create a short supplement to what cbruckne wrote. Reviewing the procedure it seems obvious.

srs5694,
yes, I was referring to options that are passed to the Windows boot loader. thank-you

duffman9000,
Good, basically that's my ultimate goal is getting it install on MBP 17" 2011. I replace optical-bay and SATA 3 6Gbps sucks in IDE mode. I hope u use USB to install? Assuming you use Rt7-Lite to slipstream? Can you tell me drivers so i can go ahead build .iso while i wait for your detail guide.

Thanks

mac-hacks said:

srs5694,
yes, I was referring to options that are passed to the Windows boot loader. thank-you

duffman9000,
Good, basically that's my ultimate goal is getting it install on MBP 17" 2011. I replace optical-bay and SATA 3 6Gbps sucks in IDE mode. I hope u use USB to install? Assuming you use Rt7-Lite to slipstream? Can you tell me drivers so i can go ahead build .iso while i wait for your detail guide.

Thanks

Click to expand...

I used a USB to install. I was already familiar with slipstreaming drivers using DISM. I've used WinPE many times before.

I'm not familiar with RT7. Use what ever method you're familiar with. I added all drivers that were included in Bootcamp 4.0.1. However, there is at least one unsigned driver in that package that will cause the installation to reboot automatically.

Device manager showed the trackpad, sound, and discrete adapters failed to start. Slipstreaming the trackpad driver probably isn't a good idea. I don't think anyone else reported that the trackpad doesn't work during installation.

srs5694 said:

If by "same settings for grub2.conf" you're referring to options that are passed to the Windows boot loader, then yes, you can pass those via a manual configuration stanza's "options" line in refind.conf. OTOH, if you mean GRUB-specific options to set graphics modes or whatnot, then no. The only options that rEFInd supports are those described in its configuration file documentation.

Please keep in mind that I have no experience booting Windows on Macs. My one Intel-based Mac is a first-generation Mac Mini, so it's got a 32-bit CPU and a 32-bit EFI. As such, it's incapable of booting Windows in EFI mode. In fact, I've never installed Windows on it, period. My experience with booting Windows in EFI mode is based on a laptop I own and that I use with UEFI DUET. (FWIW, UEFI DUET might be worth trying to get Windows installed on Macs in UEFI mode, but it would be awkward as a long-term solution.)

Click to expand...

Not sure if this is this is the right place but here goes -
Anyone know of a bootloader that will run on a Mac Pro 3.1 that has a NON efi graphics card installed? Will rEFInd do this, from what I have read so far I think it does not?
Why I ask is I want to boot Windows 7 64 bit (separate HDD) or OSX Lion 64bit at boot time.
Holding down the option key does not work with a non EFI graphics card
(blank screen until login) I use a graphics card GTX460 so that I do not have to pay exorbitant prices for a MAC graphics card with half the power and 8 times the cost aka Quadro 4000.
Anyone know of a solution besides a MAC helper card?

avkdm said:

Not sure if this is this is the right place but here goes -
Anyone know of a bootloader that will run on a Mac Pro 3.1 that has a NON efi graphics card installed? Will rEFind do this?
Why I ask is I want to boot Windows 7 64 bit (separate HDD) or OSX Lion 64bit at boot time.
Holding down the option key does not work with a non EFI graphics card
(blank screen until login) I use a graphics card GTX460 so that I do not have to pay exorbitant prices for a MAC graphics card with half the power and 8 times the cost aka Quadro 4000.
Anyone know of a solution besides a MAC helper card?

Click to expand...

This might work. You may need slipstream drivers,

http://eshop.macsales.com/item/Newer Technology/VIDU2DVIA/

----------

duffman9000 said:

Device manager showed the trackpad, sound, and discrete adapters failed to start. Slipstreaming the trackpad driver probably isn't a good idea. I don't think anyone else reported that the trackpad doesn't work during installation.

Click to expand...

Ok,

I've never used DSM. RT-7 Lite will allow you to force sign Drivers. I'll still skip those anyway. I've tried this before and I wasn't successful even loading DVD or USB to even try to install. Same old black screen i get every time i try using bootmgfw.efi.

Look forward to seeing methood to load Installer.

mac-hacks said:

This might work. You may need slipstream drivers,

http://eshop.macsales.com/item/Newer Technology/VIDU2DVIA/

----------



Ok,

I've never used DSM. RT-7 Lite will allow you to force sign Drivers. I'll still skip those anyway. I've tried this before and I wasn't successful even loading DVD or USB to even try to install. Same old black screen i get every time i try using bootmgfw.efi.

Look forward to seeing methood to load Installer.

Click to expand...

Thinking outside of the box - I just happen to have an USB/VGA adapter, I will give it a shot! Thanks!!!

avkdm said:

Thinking outside of the box - I just happen to have an USB/VGA adapter, I will give it a shot! Thanks!!!

Click to expand...

Not sure if these features MacPilot.app offers would help. 3rd screenshot probably the one u want to look at.

https://www.sugarsync.com/pf/D7631334_4994359_687554

https://www.sugarsync.com/pf/D7631334_4994359_687552

https://www.sugarsync.com/pf/D7631334_4994359_687592

FYI - I fix 3rd shot if u look at it in last 15 mins.

mac-hacks said:

Not sure if these features MacPilot.app offers would help. 3rd screenshot probably the one u want to look at.

https://www.sugarsync.com/pf/D7631334_4994359_687554

https://www.sugarsync.com/pf/D7631334_4994359_687552

https://www.sugarsync.com/pf/D7631334_4994359_687592

FYI - I fix 3rd shot if u look at it in last 15 mins.

Click to expand...

Thanks - my VGA adapter not supported in OSX so i will give this a shot.

# Create a Windows 8 USB stick.
# I've read posts that mentioned not to use the MS tool which will format the drive as NTFS and that this tool shouldn't be used.
# I used DISKPART and formatted the drive as fat32. Google for instructions.

# Slipstream drivers as needed.
# I slipstreamed all drivers from Bootcamp 4.0.1 and this was not a good idea.
# That package has at least one unsigned driver and it causes my x64 installation to reboot during installation.
# I'll examine my installation to find that unsigned driver later.

# If you're using bootcamp to boot Windows, use bootcamp to delete that installation.
# The bootcamp assistant deleted my Windows installation and expanded my OS X partition to use all available space.
# Shrink your OS X partition and leave some unpartitioned space.

# Boot your Mac and hold the option key to display the UEFI Windows stick. Select the drive to kick off the installation.
# Install Windows in the unpartitioned space.
# If you can't install in the unpartitioned space, bootcamp screwed you. Repartition your drive to fix this.

# The BCD error will occur near the end of the installation. Now the fun begins:
# Ignore the error window.
# Press Shift+F10 to open the shell
# I chose to mount ESP using disk part
> diskpart
> list disk
> select disk # (choose the correct number)
> list volume
> select volume # (choose the correct volume)
> assign letter=U (I chose U)

# Use cbruckne's BCD file
# I copied this on to another USB stick.
# Windows mounted this under D:
# Copy this to U:\EFI\Microsoft\Boot\BCD
> del U:\EFI\Microsoft\Boot\BCD
> copy D:\BCD U:\EFI\Microsoft\Boot\

# Update the Boot Manager portion of the BCD file
> bcdedit /store U:\EFI\Microsoft\Boot\BCD /set {bootmgr} device partition=U:

# Update the Boot Loader portion of the BCD file
> bcdedit /store U:\EFI\Microsoft\Boot\BCD /set {default} device partition=C:
> bcdedit /store U:\EFI\Microsoft\Boot\BCD /set {default} osdevice partition=C:

# Verify that the BCD was created correctly
bcdedit /store U:\EFI\Microsoft\Boot\BCD /enum all

# Exit the shell and shutdown the computer using the power button

# Hold option to display the EFI hard drive. This is the actual Windows installation.
# After you select the EFI hard drive the Windows boot loader should appear.
# If you see a Windows error message the BCD was not created correctly.

# Press F8 to get into safe mode.
# Setup will continue. Wait for the "Windows can't be setup in Safe Mode" error window. Ignore the error window.
# Press Shift+F10 to open the shell.
> compmgmt.mcs
# Disable the Intel graphics adapter. You will have to examine the hardware IDs.
# The Intel adapter has Vendor ID 8086.
# Modify the C:\Windows\System32\Sysprep\ActionFiles\Specialize.xml file
# The easiest way to do this is by copying that file unto another USB stick and editing it using another program. I used Notepad++.
# Remove any imaging XML tag that includes BCD. I'll post a better example of this later. I had 2 entries and
cbruckne reported the same.
# Press the error window's OK button to reboot the system.

# Hold option to display the EFI hard drive and select the drive.
# Windows should now continue with the installation.
# If you see a spontaneous reboot you have an unsigned driver. Press F8 during boot and choose to disable signed driver enforcement.
# A new error window should pop up complaining about the boot configuration.
# It took me a couple of tries to get this portion correct.
# In my initial attempt I did the following: (Insert pics here)
# I rebooted but I encountered a different message stating that an unexpected error occurred and I should restart the installation.
# I reverted the changes and rebooted.
# Same "unexpected error occurred message"
# I opened the command prompt again and ran C:\Windows\System32\oobe\msoobe.exe
# Ignore the error message. It will be there until you finish installing Windows.

# The OS will go through the new user experience and eventually you'll make it to the desktop.

Thanks to cbruckne for the BCD file and for bypassing the error messages.
Thanks to everyone else who I didn't mention by name.

I was tempted to try to enable the AMD discrete GPU. I disabled the sound devices, which don't work anyway, to free up resources. I attempted to enable the GPU, but a reboot was required. During the reboot the fans will kick in full blast and the system crashes. I had to reboot back into safe mode to re-disable the sound devices. I couldn't leave well enough alone.

I examined my system to verify that this is a GPT installation and that AHCI drivers are being used. I screwed up the BCD portion of this guide once and I couldn't get the USB installer to boot. I fixed the problem, but I can't post exact instructions on what I did to fix this. It's been way too long of a day.

# Disable automatic updates!
# Win8 Automatic updates will update and enable the AMD and Intel GPU drivers. If you allow this to happen and you are away from your MBP, you may return to a smoldering heap.
# I noticed that after the auto update, my MBP's fan kicked into high gear. I rebooted before it got too hot, but during the next boot the Intel GPU was enabled which causes a crash during boot. I had to boot into safe mode and re-disable the Intel GPU.

duffman9000,

Windows 7 or 8? I need to get Windows 7 install.

mac-hacks said:

duffman9000,

Windows 7 or 8? I need to get Windows 7 install.

Click to expand...

Windows 8 only. The Windows 8 Consumer Preview makes this much easier.

duffman9000 said:

Windows 8 only. The Windows 8 Consumer Preview makes this much easier.

Click to expand...

I know, it still has too many bugs. Ive had success installing it with UEFI on both my Mac's. Half apps i use crash and OS locks up and automatically reboots. Until dev. get apps updated, it's worthless for my needs. Your guide was informative and glad you got it work.

What apps are you using? I seen a few reports of drivers causing the crashes. I probably haven't seen any crashes yet because I installed almost all of the boot camp drivers.

There are some drivers that I do not want to install. I may leave off the keyboard drivers. I hate having to turn off the keyboard backlight and right now it's off.

duffman9000 said:

What apps are you using? I seen a few reports of drivers causing the crashes. I probably haven't seen any crashes yet because I installed almost all of the boot camp drivers.

There are some drivers that I do not want to install. I may leave off the keyboard drivers. I hate having to turn off the keyboard backlight and right now it's off.

Click to expand...

7zip stay away from, do not install AMD Catalyst 12+, Few of SSD tweeks for W7 cause few crashes on W8. It's been couple weeks i can't remember all issue i notice . After 20th Crash in 1st hour of setting up Preview 2, i said screw it & wipe HD clean.

windows 8 install process

duffman,

a few pointers you may want to try on your install procedure that went well when i did them:

the BCD error:

I used to get it, i don't have to go through that whole process anymore. at the beginning of the installation, before i entered serial, i hit shift+f10, selected the 200MB efi partition (select vol #) and formatted it to fat32, then assigned a letter. error at the end of the installation never haunted me again. I can't confirm that this was what fixed it, but i remember after i did that format i never got the error again. (i happened to damage the efi partition during one of the disk util resizing ordeals, it seems disk utility doesn't like to resize any partitions if that efi partition is mounted...)


the unsigned drivers:

The way i ran into this was a little different. I found that i was getting an error when trying to slipstream the nVidia drivers for my MBA. And if i slipstreamed ALL the drivers, my system would crash and go into a reboot loop. So what i did:

Regular Bootcamp Bios install onto bootcamp partition -> install a program called Drivermax, which can export all the drivers you select on your system to a windows friendly directory structure packed into a zip file -> exported windows drivers that my system uses into zip file -> unzipped,


For me this works, the only issue is that my nvidia drivers go BLACK. everything else works.

One thing i'm going to try is installing with bios emulation but using BOOT_DUET, seeing if everything runs right in the virtual bios/virtual efi clusterF***, and if it does, grab the way the registers are configured using
the following from the shellx64.efi before booting windows


and compare the results to the outputs for the above devices WITHOUT any kind of bios emulation. If there are any differences, then i'll change them so they match and take it from there...

rip1999eternal said:

duffman,

a few pointers you may want to try on your install procedure that went well when i did them:

the BCD error:

I used to get it, i don't have to go through that whole process anymore. at the beginning of the installation, before i entered serial, i hit shift+f10, selected the 200MB efi partition (select vol #) and formatted it to fat32, then assigned a letter. error at the end of the installation never haunted me again. I can't confirm that this was what fixed it, but i remember after i did that format i never got the error again. (i happened to damage the efi partition during one of the disk util resizing ordeals, it seems disk utility doesn't like to resize any partitions if that efi partition is mounted...)

Click to expand...

I'll try this when I get my new SSD.

rip1999eternal said:

the unsigned drivers:

The way i ran into this was a little different. I found that i was getting an error when trying to slipstream the nVidia drivers for my MBA. And if i slipstreamed ALL the drivers, my system would crash and go into a reboot loop. So what i did:

Regular Bootcamp Bios install onto bootcamp partition -> install a program called Drivermax, which can export all the drivers you select on your system to a windows friendly directory structure packed into a zip file -> exported windows drivers that my system uses into zip file -> unzipped,

Code:

mounted image using DISM to C:\wim directory
the drivers were extracted to a directory, tree was created - C:\drivers\vendorID
ran DISM /image:C:\wim /add-driver /driver:C:\drivers /recurse /ForceUnsigned

#the recurse makes it look in the entire subdirectory tree, and the ForceUnsigned makes it inject unsigned drivers, which windows will load without any issues if imported this way

committed image changes and unmounted:
DISM /unmount-wim /mountdir:C:\wim

copied the newly created wim onto usb replacing old one.

removed bootcamp partition using bootcamp to convert my disk back into a pure gpt disk, created some free space at end of drive using disk utility.

install windows without any hiccups.

For me this works, the only issue is that my nvidia drivers go BLACK. everything else works.

Click to expand...

I KNEW I should have used /ForceUnsigned. I've never had to use it before. I've always used signed drivers. I thought Apple would sure use only signed drivers... wrong.

rip1999eternal said:

One thing i'm going to try is installing with bios emulation but using BOOT_DUET, seeing if everything runs right in the virtual bios/virtual efi clusterF***, and if it does, grab the way the registers are configured using
the following from the shellx64.efi before booting windows

Code:

fs0:     #change to the efi boot directory to save the files to...
pci -i 00 17 00 > pcibridge.txt     #output the configuration for my pci bridge to file
pci -i 02 00 00 > nv320M.txt     #output the configuration for my video card

and compare the results to the outputs for the above devices WITHOUT any kind of bios emulation. If there are any differences, then i'll change them so they match and take it from there...

Click to expand...

Let us know how that goes.

most recent MBP 2011 15"

I left my air at home, so i'm messing around with one of the mbps at work. I'm happy to say - I HAZ SUCCESS!! On the most recent 15" macbook pro with ATI card, the procedure is actually pretty simple. You need just install in bios legacy mode first to install drivers from bootcamp - delete the folders for broadcom, nvidia, and ati, as the wifi makes the whole system crash unexpectedly and you won't be using the ati drivers packaged in bootcamp, and this model mbp doesnt have anything from nvidia on it to begin with, and go ahead and install bootcamp like you normally would. You don't get any errors for missing folders, bootcamp just goes ahead and installs whatever's there (nifty little trick to skip the hefty nvidia installation on systems that dont need it).

Once this is done, install drivermax to export the drivers out of your installation. The unique thing that i like about this tool is that it exports all your drivers into a zip file, which when unzipped spread out into a nice little directory tree, and it does a bit of cleaning up of the inf files used to install the hardware also. I've run into this a lot when creating images for different machines (an enterprise environment) so this tool is actually pretty nifty for making driver packages for windows. When i would try to import my nvidia drivers via dism, i'd get an error when trying to import nvao no matter what i'd do - solution: install via bootcamp, export drivers from bootcamp installation, the newly created import cleanly into an image using dism.

Anyways, once you import those drivers into your install.wim, just clear out your hard drive from the install usb using diskpart, convert it to gpt and create a 200mb partition. i had to reboot for the installer to detect it was gpt now and not bios after i cleaned and converted to gpt. Once that's done, install windows like normal. After the installation, you just need to remember to set the registers for the vga bus to 8 - on this model it was mm 0001013E -PCI 8. this needs to be done before windows starts enumerating devices and installing them, or else you're going to get stuck with a windows crying 'setup could not continue waa waa waa' reboot loop. After that, you're good to go. just don't bother loading the drivers for the wifi for now... you'll regret it later.

---oops. ah well.

so i guess i jumped the gun a little too fast. everything installs right with no hiccups, however, once in windows, i found that my system is using neither graphics card, neither the intel nor the ati, since it doesn't know what driver to choose. i just get a little warning in device manager that says 'in order to use this device free up another device' bla bla bla. disabling the intel card doesnt do anything either... blah.

Are you using a late 2011 15" MBP? I'm using an early 2011 and the WiFi has been stable. I've also heard others complain about the WiFi, but it hasn't given me any problems.

duffman9000 said:

Are you using a late 2011 15" MBP? I'm using an early 2011 and the WiFi has been stable. I've also heard others complain about the WiFi, but it hasn't given me any problems.

Click to expand...

late

finally got around to dumping the registers into txt files. noticed only 2 differences between the two - on the nvidia card bus master and io are at 0 in efi mode, but that's expected and i already give those a value of 7 to set them to 1 in the startup.nsh script, but the other difference is the interrupt line 3C was on 0 in efi and on 0B in bios via boot_duet efi.

I did a reinstall and changed this value to 0B before the first startup, but still got the same results.

mac-hacks said:

Not sure if these features MacPilot.app offers would help. 3rd screenshot probably the one u want to look at.

https://www.sugarsync.com/pf/D7631334_4994359_687554

https://www.sugarsync.com/pf/D7631334_4994359_687552

https://www.sugarsync.com/pf/D7631334_4994359_687592

FYI - I fix 3rd shot if u look at it in last 15 mins.

Click to expand...

Hi,
I just enabled AHCI in Windows 7 on my Mac Pro 3.1 with a non EFI Graphics card and now the bootcamp panel is gone.
Long and short of it I need to boot back into OSX . I will probably have to install an EFI card to do this in the short term.
Anyone know if Apples Bootpicker will work for me - The beauty of this program is allows you to choose your operating system at the login screen- not ideal but still a workaround for a non EFI card?
Sorry I should probably start a new thread - I will try this when I get home and let you know how I go..