Booting Windows 10 from TB3 NVMe drive on 2011 iMac

[mdgm]

You can boot Windows 10 from a TB3 NVMe drive with a 2011 iMac (that's the first iMac to have a Thunderbolt port)!

iMac -> TB (1/2) cable -> TB3 to TB2 adapter -> TB3 dock -> TB3 NVMe drive.

Whilst the speeds are bottlenecked by the TB1 port on the iMac, the speeds are faster than what an internal SATA III SSD would provide.

Here are some of the steps:

I downloaded the 2020 H2 Windows iso.

Formatted a USB key to EXFAT (The FAT32 that Bootcamp Assistant - modified in High Sierra to allow creating USB installer - installed wouldn't fit the wim file as it's > 4GB) and copied the contents of the iso onto the USB key.

Added an EXFAT partition to the internal hard drive and installed to that. Had to uninstall the Intel HD Graphics Driver from safe mode. Put the drivers I wanted on and applied the DSDT patch to get audio working in UEFI Windows.

Ran a sysprep generalise and created a Winclone 7 image.

Added an EXFAT partition to the TB3 SSD and restored the Winclone image onto it. Used the Winclone option to make the Bootcamp volume EFI bootable.

Booted off the USB key and went into command prompt. Needed to remove the Intel HD Graphics Driver that was on the restored image (must not have removed it properly earlier) and then rebooted back to Mac OS X to create a new Winclone image for future use.

Booted off the Bootcamp partition on the Thunderbolt drive and booted into Windows and did the setup. Had to re-enable test signing mode to get the speakers working again.

 

[mdgm]

You should get Windows to install the EFI bootloader onto the internal disk’s EFI. You can use bcdboot in Windows to achieve this.

If you had EFI boot files for Windows on the external SSD once you've changed it over successfully to the internal drive you can remove them from the external drive.

So when you boot the external Windows install will appear as an internal drive even though it's external.

Also when you go to Startup Disk in High Sierra system preferences it won't let you select the Bootcamp volume as it will fail to bless it.

There are ways around that e.g. using rEFInd or using the Terminal to manually bless the correct file on the EFI volume.

 

[mdgm]

I've been having a problem where my Windows 10 sometimes fails to come up after a reboot. Disabling Fast Boot has resolved this.

 

[mdgm]

Hmmm, I just installed updates today and it failed to come up again after it rebooted. This is frustrating as I mainly RDP into the machine from another location. I might need to try Open Core and see if that works better once the OCLP that supports the GPUs used in these Macs is available.

 

[Nguyen Duc Hieu]

I used Rufus, then when Rufus failed to extract the files from the Windows ISO, I switched to Hasleo WintoUSB.
These 2 applications (running in Windows environment) allow me to create a Windows volume that can boot from an external USB enclosure.
OCLP and Mac OS can see the Windows volume as bootable devices.
It failed to come-up once after update, but after a careful checking on the root folder, I detected that two files missing. Restore those 2 files (from another similar WintoUSB volume on another machine) to the root folder made the WintoUSB volume bootable again.

 

[mdgm]

The thing about booting off USB is that the 2011 only has USB2 so performance will be pretty poor. Or have you found a way to get USB3 speeds booting off USB via a TB3 dock?

 

[Nguyen Duc Hieu]

The thing about booting off USB is that the 2011 only has USB2 so performance will be pretty poor. Or have you found a way to get USB3 speeds booting off USB via a TB3 dock?

It's not that bad, even on USB 2.0.
Much faster than my company issued laptop, which is still running from HDD.
For light Offices works, web surfing and watching Youtube videos, nothings to complaint about.
Also, I'm only use it for several months during the work-from-home period.
The SSD can be moved to internal anytime, without re-installing. Just take it out of the USB enclosure, and put it inside the iMac with SATA port.

 

[ThanosDJ]

You can boot Windows 10 from a TB3 NVMe drive with a 2011 iMac (that's the first iMac to have a Thunderbolt port)!

iMac -> TB (1/2) cable -> TB3 to TB2 adapter -> TB3 dock -> TB3 NVMe drive.

Whilst the speeds are bottlenecked by the TB1 port on the iMac, the speeds are faster than what an internal SATA III SSD would provide.

Here are some of the steps:

I downloaded the 2020 H2 Windows iso.

Formatted a USB key to EXFAT (The FAT32 that Bootcamp Assistant - modified in High Sierra to allow creating USB installer - installed wouldn't fit the wim file as it's > 4GB) and copied the contents of the iso onto the USB key.

Added an EXFAT partition to the internal hard drive and installed to that. Had to uninstall the Intel HD Graphics Driver from safe mode. Put the drivers I wanted on and applied the DSDT patch to get audio working in UEFI Windows.

Ran a sysprep generalise and created a Winclone 7 image.

Added an EXFAT partition to the TB3 SSD and restored the Winclone image onto it. Used the Winclone option to make the Bootcamp volume EFI bootable.

Booted off the USB key and went into command prompt. Needed to remove the Intel HD Graphics Driver that was on the restored image (must not have removed it properly earlier) and then rebooted back to Mac OS X to create a new Winclone image for future use.

Booted off the Bootcamp partition on the Thunderbolt drive and booted into Windows and did the setup. Had to re-enable test signing mode to get the speakers working again.

View attachment 1699576

Hello, can you inform me which dock have you used, to check if it is available? Cause i am searching to buy a dock but i don't know which one is bootable with MacOS and/or Windows for the iMac mid2011 27'' that i have. I want to make the same connections but i am looking for a docking station that support bootable options. Can you help or suggest one?