iMac Windows Partition gone wrong - Several Issues, need help!

[Insight]

Hi,

So I (very) recently bought my first mac after being a windows user for so many years. Naturally the first thing I tried to do as soon as I set up the mac was to run Boot Camp and create a windows partition, but a lot of things went wrong in that process that I hope some of you may help me with.

Problem 1: I ran boot camp, it told me to install my windows CD, which I did. I followed the steps of installation until the step where it asked me to select the disk space in which windows was going to be installed into. I selected the boot camp disk driver, but there was an error message saying windows could not be installed into the disk driver because it needed to be in NTFS format (which apparently it was not, maybe I missed a step asking me?) anyway I didn't pay much attention to this message, I selected the same driver and clicked format, the error message went away, so I continued with the installation of windows on that partition. Little did I know this (probably, my theory at least) removed the boot camp part of the partition and now I'm stuck in windows and cannot change back and forth (yes I tried holding alt etc on startup)

Problem 2: I ignored this problem temporarily and continued to configure my windows settings and programs (mainly games) and realised that the graphics card in the iMac was not being recognized by Windows and that it was using a Standard VGA Driver and not even noticing that there was an ATI in there. On top of this my iMac wireless keyboard and magic mouse are also not working on the windows OS (I used them, however briefly, on the mac OS and they worked fine)

Can anyone help me fix my problem? Is there a way to switch between my mac OS/windows OS without the need for boot camp? And are there specific drivers I need to download to make the keyboard/mouse/graphics card recognizable/readable by windows? (I already tried installing the ATI video driver, with no effect) I'm guessing this all has to do with the fact that I formatted the partition before installing windows, but I dont know for sure.

I am very mac illiterate at the moment, I'll learn eventually, but until then I thought I'd get help from people who actually know what they're talking about.

Thanks in advanced!
-Insight

 

[alust2013]

EDIT- first try installing the drivers in windows from the OS X disk. Then there will be an icon for bootcamp in the system tray. You can click on that and select the option that says restart in Mac OS X. If that doesn't work, follow steps below.

I think what you may have done was install windows on your mac partition. So I think what you will have to do is boot from the gray OS X disk that came with your computer, go into disk utility and reformat/reinstall OS X. Then when you go to do boot camp again, be sure to select the drive that is the same size as the partition you made in boot camp assistant. It may appear slightly smaller than what you made it, but that is due to formatting and the way a GB is actually counted. It will tell you to format it in NTFS again, so do that. Then when windows is installed, and you are running windows, put in your OS X disk, and it will install the drivers for you.

 

[Insight]

Hey thanks for the reply

I'm 100% sure I didn't install windows on the Mac partition, because the size of my Windows partition was only 200gb and the mac one was 800gb, because I'm planning on using the mac 80% of the time anyway.

What do you mean by "Formatting it in NTFS"? Is that what I did when I selected the partition and clicked format? Because when I did that the name of the partition changed from "Disk Partition 2: BOOT CAMP" to "Disk Partition 2" which is what makes me think that I deleted the Boot Camp aspect of the partition which is what is not allowing me to switch between windows and mac on startup by holding alt.

I will try installing the applications on the mac disk on windows and get back to you.

 

[alust2013]

Hey thanks for the reply

I'm 100% sure I didn't install windows on the Mac partition, because the size of my Windows partition was only 200gb and the mac one was 800gb, because I'm planning on using the mac 80% of the time anyway.

What do you mean by "Formatting it in NTFS"? Is that what I did when I selected the partition and clicked format? Because when I did that the name of the partition changed from "Disk Partition 2: BOOT CAMP" to "Disk Partition 2" which is what makes me think that I deleted the Boot Camp aspect of the partition which is what is not allowing me to switch between windows and mac on startup by holding alt.

I will try installing the applications on the mac disk on windows and get back to you.

Boot Camp is actually the stuff you install from the OS X disk after installing windows, so you didn't delete that. I am going to assume you have the wireless keyboard, which may take a few seconds to connect when the computer is started. I believe that is why it appears that you are stuck on windows. Could be wrong there, but that is what happens when I use my wireless mouse to select the disk. Anyhow, the boot camp system tray icon will give you the option to restart in mac

 

[Insight]

Okay I understand now, I installed boot camp in windows and that fixed most of my problems. I can switch between operating systems now, and the graphics card is being recognized.

The only problem I have now is that the wireless keyboard and mouse refuse to work (or be recognized at all) while in the Windows OS, they work fine in Mac however.

 

[alust2013]

Okay I understand now, I installed boot camp in windows and that fixed most of my problems. I can switch between operating systems now, and the graphics card is being recognized.

The only problem I have now is that the wireless keyboard and mouse refuse to work (or be recognized at all) while in the Windows OS, they work fine in Mac however.

That is the really fun part. They don't want to connect to windows for some reason, and I had the same issue with my bluetooth mighty mouse. It made me want to cry. I think when you get to the menu that searches and finds your devices, rather than just clicking connect, right click and select connect from that menu. It took me a solid 20 minutes, maybe more to figure it out.

 

[Insight]

See thats the thing, when I search for bluetooth devices they don't even appear in the list, my phone and stuff appear, but no mouse or keyboard