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Getting bootcamp to work on MBPwRD is a royal pain!

P

primalyeti

macrumors newbie
Original poster
Jul 3, 2012
6
0
I have a MacBook Pro with Retina Display that I'm trying to get Windows 7 installed on via Bootcamp.

I put my Windows disk in to my old MBP and created a .cdr of the disk, change the extension to a .iso and then used the Bootcamp Assistant on my new MBPwRD to create a USB installer of Windows. That goes fine and dandy, but when I finally get to the installation part, Windows craps out at the "expanding" stage and says some files are corrupt or missing.

I've managed to get my hands on some other ISOs of Windows 7 to see if maybe it was just mine but no, it happens every time.

What am I doing wrong and how can I fix this, please help! :(

Also, my copy of Windows 7 is legal and legit, just in case anyone thinks i'm playing with pirates, arrrrr.
 
Hey primalyeti,

You're in luck because I've been struggling with this for the last month and only last night got it fixed with a little help from this link:

https://forums.macrumors.com/showthread.php?p=13897359#post13897359

Basically the gist is, you copy the iso files onto a hard drive which IS bootable if you install something like rEFIt.

Give it a shot, you'll need a copy of Parallels installed to get you kick started.
 
MittyG said:
Hey primalyeti,

You're in luck because I've been struggling with this for the last month and only last night got it fixed with a little help from this link:

https://forums.macrumors.com/showthread.php?p=13897359#post13897359

Basically the gist is, you copy the iso files onto a hard drive which IS bootable if you install something like rEFIt.

Give it a shot, you'll need a copy of Parallels installed to get you kick started.
Click to expand...

This looks VERY promising! Going to try it out tonight when I get home from work. Thanks!
 
primalyeti said:
I have a MacBook Pro with Retina Display that I'm trying to get Windows 7 installed on via Bootcamp.

I put my Windows disk in to my old MBP and created a .cdr of the disk, change the extension to a .iso and then used the Bootcamp Assistant on my new MBPwRD to create a USB installer of Windows. That goes fine and dandy, but when I finally get to the installation part, Windows craps out at the "expanding" stage and says some files are corrupt or missing.

I've managed to get my hands on some other ISOs of Windows 7 to see if maybe it was just mine but no, it happens every time.

What am I doing wrong and how can I fix this, please help! :(

Also, my copy of Windows 7 is legal and legit, just in case anyone thinks i'm playing with pirates, arrrrr.
Click to expand...
I've wasted about 3 hours trying to get W7U to install via a USB3 flash drive. At the end I gave up and used an external ODD... and that took half an hour.
 
So I finally managed to get this working using a method that was similar to what was posted above, but I ran in to errors doing it that way so I had to improv.

Here's how I did it:

1. Partition with BootCamp, create install USB then let bootcamp assistant begin install.

2. In Windows format drive to NTFS then exit installer and go back to OS X

3. Set up a Parallels VM using bootcamp partition as HDD and installer ISO as CD drive.

4. Boot via parallels in to bootcamp and select repair, then command prompt and type the following: XCOPY D:\*.* C:\ /e/h

5. When it's done, shut down parallels

5. Install rEFIt, disconnect windows installer usb and restart in to windows partition. The install will not proceed as planned.

Hope that helps someone.
 
Why not install Parallels AFTER you have finished installing W7 on Bootcamp, and have Parallels run the Bootcamp as a VM?
 
primalyeti said:
So I finally managed to get this working using a method that was similar to what was posted above, but I ran in to errors doing it that way so I had to improv.

Here's how I did it:

1. Partition with BootCamp, create install USB then let bootcamp assistant begin install.

2. In Windows format drive to NTFS then exit installer and go back to OS X

3. Set up a Parallels VM using bootcamp partition as HDD and installer ISO as CD drive.

4. Boot via parallels in to bootcamp and select repair, then command prompt and type the following: XCOPY D:\*.* C:\ /e/h

5. When it's done, shut down parallels

5. Install rEFIt, disconnect windows installer usb and restart in to windows partition. The install will not proceed as planned.

Hope that helps someone.
Click to expand...

And here was me thinking Bootcamp was easy as 1,2,3! Never had any issues with bootcamp on my MBA so curious as to why the rMBP would be any different.
 
primalyeti said:
So I finally managed to get this working using a method that was similar to what was posted above, but I ran in to errors doing it that way so I had to improv.

Here's how I did it:

1. Partition with BootCamp, create install USB then let bootcamp assistant begin install.

2. In Windows format drive to NTFS then exit installer and go back to OS X

3. Set up a Parallels VM using bootcamp partition as HDD and installer ISO as CD drive.

4. Boot via parallels in to bootcamp and select repair, then command prompt and type the following: XCOPY D:\*.* C:\ /e/h

5. When it's done, shut down parallels

5. Install rEFIt, disconnect windows installer usb and restart in to windows partition. The install will not proceed as planned.

Hope that helps someone.
Click to expand...

Seems quite a bloated method. IIRC, I just booted into the rEFit drive after partitioning, formatted the partition from the windows install screen then continued to install from there.

Then again, as is is for the retina display version I can't verify that method.

----------
daleski75 said:
And here was me thinking Bootcamp was easy as 1,2,3! Never had any issues with bootcamp on my MBA so curious as to why the rMBP would be any different.
Click to expand...

Ditto.
 
Ya it was a pain in the arse because there's no disk drive on the rMBP and for some reason the USB drive installer than Bootcamp Assistant created didn't work properly.

Now my laptop is acting all weird so when 10.8 comes out I'm going to reformat the whole drive and just borrow a buddies external drive for my bootcamp partition. And for those who are going to ask, he only told me he had it... AFTER i went through hell and back.
 
BootCamp assistant created a bootable USB thumb drive for me flawlessly with a Windows 7 ISO, worked the first time. Perhaps try a different thumb drive?
 
The rMBP USB creater didn't work for me either. I created a bootable usb drive in a parallels virtual machine using win2flash. Then I installed windows on an external SSD via thunderbolt.
 
MS has ISOs for all versions available for free download. No piracy since you need the license to activate. Speed depends on your connection but it might be faster than messing with getting that image to work.
 
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