I'm going for a second drive in place of the DVD bay with a caddy. Can you partition the second drive and run Windows 7 via Boot Camp and boot from it ?
I think you can. I haven't tried but you can boot from SuperDrive so you should be able to boot from the drive too
Anyone with two drives in their MBP -- could you please do me a really big favor -- open Boot Camp Assistant under /Applications/Utilities, click Continue and tell me if you're given an option to select the drive you want to partition to load Windows on ? With one drive it looks like this: Thank you very much for your kind help, I won't be able to place my order before knowing about this, do please help me out..
how are you putting in a second drive? and is it a mechanical drive or an ssd? I want to put an SSD in, but i'm dreading having to do it myself. Are you getting it done professionally?
SSD, since HDD will have vibrations due to absence of dampeners on the caddy. I will replace the DVD drive of the MBP with a caddy (newmodeUS) and place another SSD in it. Doing it myself..
well, why don't you just put your ssd in the hard drive bay, install windows 7 on it, and then put it in the cd drive? even if boot camp doesn't recognize the other sata port, i know the macbook pro's firmware does, because thats how you boot from the install disc. p.s. i'm so jealous of you right now its unbearable. I can't make the decision of whether i want an internal cd drive or not.
Just found this : http://discussions.apple.com/thread.jspa?messageID=11372586� I'm in complete dilemma right now on what to do..
don't be in a dilemma! try what i said! it should work! you can only use bootcamp on the partition that you boot from, thats why it doesn't see the other disk.
There are some drunken hooligans under my first floor window right now screaming and dancing. Its so hard to concentrate. Be right back.
Okay, Madking, I don't want to use the entire second SSD as a Windows partition. I need only ~50 GB out of 128 GB. Do you have an idea ?
Create your Windows and Mac partion how you want them to be in size in your internal HDD. Then use disk Utility to put them in the SDD. Shouldn't that work?
How would I put them in the SSD ? The SSD itself is a different storage drive. Also, there's the question about drivers in Windows, I don't know if Boot Camp drivers will work at all if I don't install Windows via Boot Camp Assistant. Rats.
One more time, Do your boot camp install in your internal HDD. Then using disk utility or other app like it (I don;t recall right now the name), you copy that partition to your SDD. So you do that after you are sure Windows actually works, it will have all the drivers in it, if you properly follow the boot camp installation instructions. See it like copying or cloning your Windows PC HDD partition to a different media volume.
it has been answered before.. you get to choose between drives in bootcamp, had it myself but changed back (minimal usage of win) of course you dont need bootcamp if you intend to use the whole second hdd edit: like so -> http://macs.about.com/od/bootcamp/ss/bootcampassist_4.htm
Thank you very much, that's really encouraging to say the least. However, does this work on a notebook ? I can understand this working on a Mac Pro desktop computer where Apple officially lets you put in more than one internal hard drives. But does the SATA connector of the optical drive in a MacBook Pro identify the second disk as an internal disk ? Someone tried this, turned out Boot Camp didn't link the second drive to install Windows on: http://discussions.apple.com/thread.jspa?messageID=11372586�
like my sig says I´ve got a mbp-"early 2010" installed extra ram and optibay myself, had only started up once and done the personalization used disk utility and formatted the intel ssd, checked so it was ok, then partioned using bootcamp now I got an external case to the superdrive,in the discussion you´re linking the trouble seems to be with the cd/dvd-rom I never had any issues with that, I´ve got original win7 dvds and hitting alt after apple sound allowed booting from the disc
if you have access to a Pc with windows, you could create an usb with win7-install http://store.microsoft.com/Help/ISO-Tool try booting from that before removing your superdrive, at least its faster
Thanks again What personalization are you talking about please ? Did you format it to Mac OSX Journal Extended ? I want to partition the drive (128GB SSD) in the Optibay, lets say to 40GB / 88GB and want to use the 40GB part for Boot Camp. Can you do that ? So when you run Boot Camp Assistant, will it ask you to pick one from 3 internal drives ?
yeah, that's what i'd do, because i'd want the boot camp drivers. but i don't think you're getting what i'm saying, let me try explaining it step by step. 1. buy your ssd. Hopefully a nice intel x-25m g2. 2. since you're going to use it as your boot drive, stick it in your main hard drive bay and install mac os x on it using the mac os x dvd through your superdrive. 2. Or, use carbon copy cloner to clone your hard drive data to your ssd. you would need a hard drive enclosure to put the ssd in though, so that you could clone it over usb or firewire. 3. keep/put your ssd in the main hard drive bay, and install windows 7 on it through boot camp. then put the boot camp driver disc in your superdrive and install the drivers onto your windows 7 installation. 4. now, take out your ssd, and put your main hard drive back into its proper place. take out your ssd and put it into your cd/dvd drive place. 5. success! you should be able to boot off of the ssd. p.s. disclaimer: i haven't done this, but this process seems to work for everyone else.
Can you please post a screenshot of how your Boot Camp Assistant (selection of drives) looks like right now ? Grateful thanks once again for all the help.
yes i formatted to hfs+ j... the only use in bootcamp is to re-partition fast and easy just drag the bar to what size you want and it´s automated you dont need to do anything in diskutility
Sounds interesting but I don't it will work. That's because when you partition one disk via Boot Camp and install Windows on it, it is written down in the Boot Camp preference files. When I move it out of the original hard drive bay, OSX won't be able to find it (since the second drive appears as an external drive without its own directories, ie. non-bootable). Also, I'll be left with a full Mac OS partition on the second drive which I won't need so I'm wondering if that would make things worse...