[help] windows 7 on bootcamp without an optical drive..

[nelz886]

Hello!

I needs some help. I have a MacbookPro6,2 (mid 2010). I replaced my optical drive with an OptiBay 500GB hard drive before I realized I wanted to do bootcamp. So, I did a lot of searching and found that I would be able to install windows 7 onto my bootcamp partition using Parallels 6 (from an image of the retail windows 7 disk).

The install from parallels was successful so I used parallels to install the bootcamp drivers to the windows partition. However, when I try to boot TO the windows partition, it starts up, displays the 'starting windows' message w/ the windows icon then BAM--Blue Screen of Death flashes on for less than a second and the machine restarts. I can't even read what the error is, thats how quickly it restarts. I also searched the partition looking for the BSOD error log but no log was generated.

All my searches have led nowhere. Can anyone take a guess as to whats going on?

Thanks.

 

[balamw]

Read through our thread on the topic and see if anything in there might help.

https://forums.macrumors.com/threads/601414/

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[Tmacfan4321]

Do you still have the ODD? Where are you installing Windows?

I have an Optibay setup and I decided to install Windows on my HDD. All I had to do was relocate the HDD to the main drive bay, put the ODD back in, and install Windows from a DVD. Once I relocated the HDD to the Optical bay and put the SSD back into the main drive bay, both of the OSes were recognized by the bootloader and were working.

 

[nelz886]

Do you still have the ODD? Where are you installing Windows?

I have an Optibay setup and I decided to install Windows on my HDD. All I had to do was relocate the HDD to the main drive bay, put the ODD back in, and install Windows from a DVD. Once I relocated the HDD to the Optical bay and put the SSD back into the main drive bay, both of the OSes were recognized by the bootloader and were working.

I'm trying to install windows to the optibay drive. I'd really like to not have to re-install my odd

 

[balamw]

Wirelessly posted (Mozilla/5.0 (iPhone; U; CPU iPhone OS 4_1 like Mac OS X; en-us) AppleWebKit/532.9 (KHTML, like Gecko) Version/4.0.5 Mobile/8B117 Safari/6531.22.7)

I already linked the main thread on this topic earlier. Have you read it?

Edit: Basically two approaches. Use a VM solution like Parallels or Fusion OR create an internal partition with the Windows installer files on it.

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[nelz886]

Wirelessly posted (Mozilla/5.0 (iPhone; U; CPU iPhone OS 4_1 like Mac OS X; en-us) AppleWebKit/532.9 (KHTML, like Gecko) Version/4.0.5 Mobile/8B117 Safari/6531.22.7)

I already linked the main thread on this topic earlier. Have you read it?

Edit: Basically two approaches. Use a VM solution like Parallels or Fusion OR create an internal partition with the Windows installer files on it.

B

I read through that thread twice, just to make sure I didn't miss anything. I have tried both suggested methods and I get get the same results. In addition, I've tried installing from a usb drive, internal partition, external superdrive, parallels, fusion, and through prayer to the EFI gods.

I really don't want to re-install my superdrive but I looks as though my options are very limited.

 

[Tmacfan4321]

Reinstalling the Superdrive is the easiest option, trust me.

 

[ActionableMango]

Why would a reinstalled internal superdrive work if an external superdrive didn't?

 

[nelz886]

Why would a reinstalled internal superdrive work if an external superdrive didn't?

An internal would work because bootcamp drivers only support installation via optical drive on the SATA bus. Apple's EFI bootloader doesn't have much support for USB or firewire external superdrive (and booting from them).

 

[balamw]

Apple's EFI bootloader doesn't have much support for USB or firewire external superdrive (and booting from them).

Minor point. Mac OS and Linux generally boot fine from USB/FW, it's really only an issue with Windows.

One thing you haven't mentioned is if you tried booting in safe mode? It sounds like a driver incompatibility issue to me.

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