BOOTCAMP Nightmare (Groundhog Day)

[Sea41]

I seem to be in an eternal loop of getting nowhere with a fresh Bootcamp install.

I have a 27" iMac 5k, last year I opened up the system and did a processor upgrade, ram upgrade and pulled out the 1TB Fusion drive and installed a 500 SSD which left me with a weird 24 GB Apple SSD in the system. I actually use the 24GB as a scratch disk for Backblaze.

I was running Mojave 10.14.4 and I couldn't install Bootcamp for the life of me, kept running in partitioning issues and tried a million fixes for it. So I have given up and thought I would just wipe the entire drive and do a fresh install because that should work right!? Well now I'm running in to a whole new set of issues which is pretty annoying.

First I have made a bootable Win 10 image on USB, the Bootcamp setup failed doing that so I did it on a Windows PC with Rufus using the 1803 ISO, apparently there are issues with the latest one?

Bootcamp failed at making the Windows support software USB as well so I manually downloaded that package and dumped it on another USB drive.

Now I open the Bootcamp app and it shows my 24GB and my 500GB SSD drives and tells me OVER AND OVER "The installer disc could not be found". I even tried burning a DL-DVD of Windows 10 and that's not even working. I thought the 24GB SSD might be screwing it up so I formatted that as NTFS so the system would kind of see it as a useless unusable drive. But that just made the drive name disappear from the Boot Camp Assistant app but still shows the icon. I even disabled SIP to install OnyX to try and hide the 24GB SSD but it says it's a read only file system. I'm not sure if the 24GB SSD is a root to my problems or not but I was trying to get rid of it so there are less variables.

What is happening!?

 

[cruisin]

Bootcamp is always glitchy. I have reinstalled Bootcamp a few times due to some error after a Windows update, but I have always used the USB drive made by Bootcamp. I would reformat the USB drive and try to get the official installation media again, as this known to work. Perhaps try formatting your chosen partition as NTFS from Mojave in case the installer cannot handle it somehow.

The main problem from what I remember is that Mac uses both EFI (not BIOS) and GPT formatted drives (not MBR) and the default Windows installation has some kind of issue with this. The installation media made by Bootcamp handles this, and I currently have Windows on an external SSD (which is also glitchy to do as Windows insists it cannot be installed or used from an external drive). Recently it has also developed a problem where it cannot update and rolls back every major update, so it looks like Bootcamp is due for yet another reinstall.

See: https://fgimian.github.io/blog/2016/03/12/installing-windows-10-on-a-mac-without-bootcamp/
This might help.

 

[Sea41]

Bootcamp is always glitchy. I have reinstalled Bootcamp a few times due to some error after a Windows update, but I have always used the USB drive made by Bootcamp. I would reformat the USB drive and try to get the official installation media again, as this known to work. Perhaps try formatting your chosen partition as NTFS from Mojave in case the installer cannot handle it somehow.

The main problem from what I remember is that Mac uses both EFI (not BIOS) and GPT formatted drives (not MBR) and the default Windows installation has some kind of issue with this. The installation media made by Bootcamp handles this, and I currently have Windows on an external SSD (which is also glitchy to do as Windows insists it cannot be installed or used from an external drive). Recently it has also developed a problem where it cannot update and rolls back every major update, so it looks like Bootcamp is due for yet another reinstall.

See: https://fgimian.github.io/blog/2016/03/12/installing-windows-10-on-a-mac-without-bootcamp/
This might help.

I have always been able to install Bootcamp using the assistant app by letting it create the bootable USB and Windows Support software in the past. Now I can't seem to do either. I think the last time I was successful was before Mojave and the APFS changes. I did try formatting the USB drives many times, 8 GB sticks, 16 GB sticks. Different brands
[doublepost=1554994422][/doublepost]So interesting, I have a USB stick with Windows 8.1 on it and tried the Bootcamp assistant and it recognized that drive no problem. It also told me it can only install Windows 10 but it recognizes it. I'm not sure what the difference between the two are, even the Windows USB comes up as "Untitled" and it still likes it better.

 

[Sea41]

Just chatting with myself now but if anyone else has this problem hopefully it helps. I think tomorrow night I'm going to open up my iMac again and remove the 24GB SSD that is installed on the mainboard. I have a weird feeling it may be screwing this up, it's always listed as the first drive when the Bootcamp assistant comes up. I have searched every where for a solution to disable the drive (not just unmoving it) but I can't find anything that works.

 

[pecosjohn]

Bootcamp sucks. I keeps saying there is not enough space available. Actually, the USB volume is 32G

 

[Riwam]

Just chatting with myself now but if anyone else has this problem hopefully it helps. I think tomorrow night I'm going to open up my iMac again and remove the 24GB SSD that is installed on the mainboard. I have a weird feeling it may be screwing this up, it's always listed as the first drive when the Bootcamp assistant comes up. I have searched every where for a solution to disable the drive (not just unmoving it) but I can't find anything that works.

I believe also, as the user "pecosjohn", what he wrote "Bootcamp sucks" and AFAIK it is not a Mojave only problem but a general one..
I sweated truly a lot (!) in High Sierra after for some reason my Bootcamp Windows got corrupted abd stopped working. The Bootcamp Assistant after partitioning and rebooting insisted every time "it could not create or find a suitable partition" to install Windows 10 in it.
And then it insisted it could not try it again because now the hard drive was no longer in a single volume.
A Kafka situation!
The only solution which worked for me was to use a "Winclone" image I had luckily made before and recover a working Windows partition in this way.
I do not like "Winclone" but have not found any other way to make a safety back up of Bootcamp Windows...
Those running Windows in a PC have it much better than those wanting it in a Mac.
In theory Windows should work in any Intel based Mac... but that is the theory...
Albert Einstein once said:
"Theory is when we know everything but nothing works.
Practice is when everything works and nobody knows why.
We have succeeded to join theory to practice.
Nothing works and nobody knows why"
Wise words indeed!
Ed

 

[crjackson2134]

Not sure what the beef is with Winclone, but I live by it. It has saved my butt more times than I can count. I always have at least two images. One with an updated totally clean install, and the other a running weekly backup of my current win-drive.

Actually, Win10 - CSM install has been working very well for a very long time now on my system. It does break sometimes after hardware upgrades, but it’s been easy to fix.

Good luck guys...

 

[Sea41]

Well I tore apart my Mac again this evening and pulled out that tiny blade SSD. What do you know.... Bootcamp worked right away flawlessly. Unbelievable. I have spent so much time on this. I guess that's what you get when you mess around modifying your Mac. Lesson learned, make sure whatever you do.... only have one internal drive.

I'm thinking there may be a possibly of it working with two drives if the blade SSD was your main drive. (If it was big enough)

 

[Riwam]

Not sure what the beef is with Winclone, but I live by it. It has saved my butt more times than I can count. I always have at least two images. One with an updated totally clean install, and the other a running weekly backup of my current win-drive.

Actually, Win10 - CSM install has been working very well for a very long time now on my system. It does break sometimes after hardware upgrades, but it’s been easy to fix.

Good luck guys...

The problem regarding Winclone is...when a problem appears!
And you have a BIG problem when it reports it failed to create an image or clone the Windows partition.
It does not help to solve the problem but leaves the user by him/herself.
But it is true that often it works up to the end and then one has a working back up which otherwise would not be possible.

 

[crjackson2134]

The problem regarding Winclone is...when a problem appears!

Cryptic - A problem is a problem when it appears. No disagreement.

And you have a BIG problem when it reports it failed to create an image or clone the Windows partition.

Yes, that wouldn’t be good, but in literally hundreds of uses, that hasn’t happened to me yet.

It has always worked well for me, once I learned how to use it (not that it’s complicated). It’s important that your target drive is healthy.

 

[Tech198]

Sounds like 'dooms-day' alright.

I've always thought as soon as Apple switches Mac's to ARM chips, they could more easily abandon Bootcamp entirely. Since you have Parallels, and VMWare Fusion, Virtualbox offerings anyway, the only usefulness would be gaming in Bootcamp, at full frame rate.

If you can introduce it when you move to Intel in 2006 from PowerPC , you sure take it away again...

 

[Riwam]

Cryptic - A problem is a problem when it appears. No disagreement.

I tried to write a pun. It was not a mistake but my experience compared to yours. Sorry if not funny.

Yes, that wouldn’t be good, but in literally hundreds of uses, that hasn’t happened to me yet.

It has always worked well for me, once I learned how to use it (not that it’s complicated). It’s important that your target drive is healthy.

Maybe I was unlucky but it often reported a failure I could not mend.
It's true that Winclone is picky regarding the condition in which it believes is the Windows partition.
However it happened to me that sometimes it failed and afterwards it succeeded.
Newer versions of Winclone give me seldom problems but they don't work with older MacOS I often use.

 

[MisterSavage]

I have to wonder if it's something with 14.4. I was able to upgrade to Mojave just fine but when I tried to update to 14.4 I got into the reboot loop from hell. "The installer disc could not be found" was one of the errors I would see. No Bootcamp, installed drives, etc.

 

[Riwam]

I have to wonder if it's something with 14.4. I was able to upgrade to Mojave just fine but when I tried to update to 14.4 I got into the reboot loop from hell. "The installer disc could not be found" was one of the errors I would see. No Bootcamp, installed drives, etc.

I am sorry for your problems and hope the next update of Mojave solves them.
I must admit that when I read of problems related to Mojave I feel less stupid and scary for not having jumped yet and remaining in 10.13.6.
I get more and more convinced of the wisdom of the user who wrote that he upgraded his MacOS only at the moment in which an even newer MacOS was ready and he could install the last issue of the (now finished to update and improve) previous MacOS.
Computers and software are enough prone to cause hard and soft problems.
No need to add to them difficulties related to the OS...

 

[MisterSavage]

I am sorry for your problems and hope the next update of Mojave solves them.

I actually ended up taking my Mac to the Genuis Bar because I couldn't even boot into safe mode. After running diagnostics their solution was to wipe my drive. The only good thing was that they installed Mojave 14.4 before I left.

 

[Crash0veride]

2017 27" 5k iMac bootcamp. It was a pain to set up, but not that bad. A couple things: certain builds of 1803 installer just don't install on Macs and Microsoft has acknowledged that. I'm running 1809 fine anyways. I also have had problems with rufus and now i have no idea why it's recommended to make the USB when Microsoft actually produced a perfectly fine windows install media creator. Lastly, I would definitely manually create the partitioning and do so after booting macos in recovery.

I have since moved my bootcamp onto a samsung T5 external ssd with pretty good performance.

 

[Riwam]

2017 27" 5k iMac bootcamp. It was a pain to set up, but not that bad. A couple things: certain builds of 1803 installer just don't install on Macs and Microsoft has acknowledged that. I'm running 1809 fine anyways. I also have had problems with rufus and now i have no idea why it's recommended to make the USB when Microsoft actually produced a perfectly fine windows install media creator. Lastly, I would definitely manually create the partitioning and do so after booting macos in recovery.

I have since moved my bootcamp onto a samsung T5 external ssd with pretty good performance.

Would you kindly rxplain how you "move" an inner Bootcamp Windows to an external drive?
The only tool I found to backup (either clone or image) and restore a Bootcamp Windows is "Winclone" and AFAIK it does not clone or restore to an external drive.
Thanks!

 

[Crash0veride]

I didn't have much going on in my windows install that wasn't easy to reset so I scrapped my install and used VirtualBox to start the install on the external drive (as the windows installer won't let you choose an external), then finished it normally. EaseUS will clone to an external though, and you may be able to just clone it. Not as fast as the internal Mac SSDs but the T5 gives close to internal Sata III SSD performance over USB-C (if not equivalent). I've been using the set-up pretty regularly for gaming lately as I purchased some windows only sale games on steam. It holds up to that no problem. I did have to change some usb related sleep settings to stop it from powering down the ports during sleep (and crashing windows).

Windows 10 Pro also (since I did this) supports "Windows-to-Go" installs meant to configure the OS for this kind of set-up on install, but I've never used it.

Edit: this guide seems like the equivalent of what I followed: https://hackernoon.com/how-to-run-bootcamp-windows-10-on-a-usb3-86551dc3def8