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Installing Windows 8.1 and Bootcamp on 2013 nMP 6,1

I did an NVRAM reset on my nMP just for giggles and it definitely did something because the next time I booted into Windows I got an option to choose which Windows installation to boot into -- Windows 8.1 on "Volume 11" or to Windows 8.1. I have no idea why the bootloader suddenly thought there were two Windows installations. Choosing the first option caused Windows to boot as normal but the computer completely restarted if I selected the second option. I had to use the bcdboot command to re-copy the boot files to my SSD's boot partition to get rid of the two-option boot.

I am starting to be more and more convinced that ytoyoda is really onto something. I've got my installation working now but if it craps out in the future or if I have to reinstall Windows it's nice to know it's possible to get it working the "right" way with Boot Camp. Nice job!
 
mogens said:
Great guide thanks! Has anyone tried this with an external USB3 SSD? It should work right?
Click to expand...

The short answer is NO, unfortunately.

I tried this first thing this morning. However, Windows installer does not allow me to install on the disk through USB.
I also tries to boot from the SSD, which was installed on Thunderbolt connection.
On Mac Pro's boot screen, the SSD is recognised, and Mac Pro tries to boot from it. However, boot fails, probably because the incompatibility on EFI information.
I attached the screen. This is exactly same screen when I tried to boot the installed disk by other Mac. (I tried both MBA and iMac).

So, detail answer is, new Mac Pro can boot from USB3 but Windows installer does not allow to install on the disk through USB.
 

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kfscoll said:
I installed Windows 8.1 using an EFI install (thus avoiding Boot Camp) more than a week ago and have posted about it numerous times in this thread. Even so, some folks have still had no success getting an EFI install to work on their nMPs, even when completely avoiding Boot Camp, so I wouldn't assume it's a cure-all for the problems many are facing. ytoyoda had luck installing Boot Camp on his nMP on the first attempt, so it's a stretch to assume that what works on his computer will work for everyone.

I'm not trying to be a wet blanket, but there are a lot of recent posts claiming to have once and for all solved the nMP's Windows installation issues, and until we get more than one person reporting success, those are tough claims to substantiate.
Click to expand...

I think, the error encounter on EFI install and Boot Camp install is same.
After my first success, I removed the Bootcamp Partition by Boot Camp Assistance, then I encountered "can't update boot configuration" error at the first step of windows installer.
And the important thing is, during this period, I also encountered the same error on EFI install trials, I repeated many times.

Then, I did two things.
1. I found partition map error on internal SSD. Fixed it by Disk Utility in Recovery Disk. (But issue has not solved.)
2. Reset NVRAM

Then everything turns to workable. Now Boot Camp install works, EFI install works.

So, I conclude that when Boot Camp Assistant remove the Boot Camp Drive some error was introduced. It prevents Windows installer to change boot configuration, which is necessary for the following steps of the installation.

This error, at least my case, was recovered by these two steps.
So I would like to encourage people try these simple two steps, if still have Windows installation issue.

----------
TekAzurik said:
I installed using a toshiba 1tb usb3 spinning external.
THANK YOU THANK YOU THANK YOU!!!
Click to expand...

Hi TekAzurik, I missed this part yesterday. Did you install windows on 1TB disk connected through USB3.0?

I tried this, but Windows installer did not allow me to do that.
 
Another effect of NVRAM reset

After my last post, my Windows 8.1 on internal bootcamp partition became not bootable by some error on boot process. (Because I tried to boot from external drive in USB3.0 JBOD box and caused boot error).
I tried NVRAM reset, and was able to restore Windows 8.1 last night.
But this is not my main point.

This morning, I realised that my external JBOD box on USB3.0 and Nikon D800 connected through USB3.0 were not recognised by Mac Pro at all.
I connected D800 on USB2.0 port of TB Display, and I was able to read the photos I needed.

If one of them had been recognised, I would doubt the failure of the hardware. But two devices became non recognisable at same time, and USB2 device are working. This was funny.

I tried NVRAM reset again. Then those USB3.0 devices started working fine!
I am not sure if there' something wrong on my nMP, or I did something wrong to confuse nMP, but NVRAM reset also worked on this problem also.
 
I had a separate issue where I could not even get the Windows installer to begin - OSX would restart after partitioning, grey screen then restart again back into OSX. The bootcamp partition was there, and I tried option booting the USB installer with no luck.

The solution was to re-download the Windows ISO and let OSX create the USB key instead of using the keys that were created by the Windows 8 upgrade program.

Strange, though, since the same USB keys worked on other Macs as recently as last week on a late 2013 rMBP. These were just the ISOs, as I had the windows support software on a separate key.

So, clean install 8.1 working on a hex/256/d700 now.
 
Last edited:
Wish someone would share a working winclone image with a evaluation copy install of windows 8.1, this is getting to technical :)
 
Gav Mack said:
I'm going to attempt a Win 7 x64 EFI installation next month when the next nMP lands. The autounattend.xml file on the bootcamp driver usb may possibly be modified to support Win 7.
Click to expand...
Hi, Gay Mack! Have you had the chance to try installing Windows 7 on the MP 6.1? Based on my few attempts it doesn't seem possible, but I haven't given up hope!
 
Windows 8 ISOs

Note, I used my own ISOs, but the 1st method worked (someone needs to figure out how to change versions) and did not try the 2nd.

(1) download the x64 8.1 Enterprise Edition ISO and change the Windows version after install. I believe this used to work but now the "Windows Anytime Upgrade" is gone so maybe someone can figure out a work-around?

ISO - http://technet.microsoft.com/en-us/evalcenter/hh699156.aspx
Old instructions - http://www.petri.co.il/change-windows-8-1-edition-without-reinstalling.htm

(2) this might be the same ISO as 1 but didn't try it myself - http://go.microsoft.com/fwlink/?LinkId=302161
 
Thanks to ytoyoda!

So after lots of struggling with this issue and getting all manner of the errors described previously, what finally got Win 8.1 64-bit OEM version to install for me was a combination of suggestions from ytoyoda and adr1974 (THANKS GUYS!).

I'm sorry it wasn't very scientific, but what finally changed my outcome was to:
1. Unplug my external solid state drive and
2. Resetting my NVRAM (control+option+r+p)

I then just followed the standard bootcamp instructions from Apple:
Used disk utility to make an .iso of the Windows 8.1 disk
Used Bootcamp to make the install thumb drive
Followed the remaining instructions
I DID have to FORMAT the new Bootcamp partition once in the Windows installer, but that was just as easy as clicking a button.

No issues so far - I'm going to go plug in that external drive again and see what pukes :)

THANKS Y'ALL!

Trumpanche
 
I'm trying to install Windows 8.1 on my nMP with BootCamp following the steps discussed in the previous posts. I'm installing from the 64-bit DVD in the external SuperDrive attached to a USB-2 port on the Thunderbolt Display. I also have the USB stick with drivers inserted in a similar USB-2 port. When Windows Setup starts I'm faced with a screen telling me that "A media driver your computer needs is missing...".
Apparently, Windows does not recognize the USB stick as containing the needed driver, not even when I point to the BootCamp drivers.

Any suggestions? Are the BootCamp drivers (downloaded in Boot Camp Assistant) the right ones, i.e. 64-bit? Should I let Boot Camp Assistant make a bootable USB stick with Windows copied from the DVD? :confused:
 
Does anyone know if it is possible to use a drobo mini and ssd to install windows on that with thunderbolt?

Then you could later on if you need more space, just buy a new hdd or ssd and just plug that in one of the empty slots.
 
Last edited:
Hello,

Not sure if this will help anyone but just want to add my experience with Windows installation on the nMP.

I have been trying to install windows 8.1 on my nMP since mid last week. A few days ago I found this thread and was delighted to see the solution from ytotoda.

I followed the steps first only resetting the NVRAM and later also doing a disk repair. Unfortunately it didn't help. I then realised I hadn't read the disk repair steps very well as I did a disk repair from within OS X, so I did another check via the Recovery option. This actually showed up another error which also from within Recovery could not be fixed. Sorry I don't remember the error code.

Not really knowing how to continue I decided to just re-install OS X from the Recovery, hoping somehow it would help.

And to my surprise it did!

It took about 30 minutes to re-install OS X, then I did another NVRAM reset and started the BOOTCAMP procedure with a USB stick installation. Worked without any problem. I did have to plug in a wired mouse to finish the installation.

One thing I had done before the initial W8 installation attempts was to install rEFInd and before that rEFIt. This as I intended to make a triple boot with Linux. Not sure if that caused the problems.

Talking about that did anyone try a triple boot with rEFInd or rEFIt?

I'm a little hesitant to re-install either as I'm afraid I'll mess up my windows installation.

Any advice?
Also which one to go for, rEFInd or rEFIt?

And off course many thanks to ytoyoda for the NVRAM and disk repair steps!

Cheers, Marcel.
 
etxmato said:
Hello,

Not sure if this will help anyone but just want to add my experience with Windows installation on the nMP.

I have been trying to install windows 8.1 on my nMP since mid last week. A few days ago I found this thread and was delighted to see the solution from ytotoda.

I followed the steps first only resetting the NVRAM and later also doing a disk repair. Unfortunately it didn't help. I then realised I hadn't read the disk repair steps very well as I did a disk repair from within OS X, so I did another check via the Recovery option. This actually showed up another error which also from within Recovery could not be fixed. Sorry I don't remember the error code.

Not really knowing how to continue I decided to just re-install OS X from the Recovery, hoping somehow it would help.

And to my surprise it did!
...

Any advice?
Also which one to go for, rEFInd or rEFIt?

And off course many thanks to ytoyoda for the NVRAM and disk repair steps!

Cheers, Marcel.
Click to expand...

What I did in order were:
  1. Fixed Disk Error using Disk Utility under Recovery partition. ( But I did not recover entire OS X disk).
  2. Did NVRAM reset

So I think, if there is any problem on booting into OS X, recovery of OS X disk is not necessary.
 
ytoyoda's NVRAM reset did the trick for my Mac Pro 8-core 32Gb ram 512Gb SSD D700

• I'd tried boot camp alone,
• Booting to the Win 8.1 Pro DVD installer.
• Booting to the USB drive I'd made using a disk image of that DVD and Boot Camp.
• Reformatting the boot camp partition in disk utility to FAT, to exFAT, before trying to install Windows.

Nothing worked. At worst Windows would complain it couldn't install to the partition, even after formatting. At best it'd run through one set of installs and then complain that "Windows could not update the computer's boot configuration. Installation cannot proceed." That best-case was really a sort of worst-case in terms of the amount of time wasted before failure. At least when Windows didn't like the partition table type it'd just fail before the installation could happen.

So I again used boot camp assistant to remove the boot camp partition. Then booted into the recovery volume and tried to repair the disk. I think this step wasn't necessary, at least in my case, as disk utility first told me "The partition map needs to be repaired because there's a problem with the EFI system partition's file system.", but would then fail when I tried to repair with "Alert: Live file system repair is not supported." It would make sense that it'd be difficult to repair the partition table while booting from a volume described by that table. Had there been a problem with my Macintosh HD volume, I could have fixed it, but no such problem was detected in that volume. Given that the next step worked, I think it's not unlikely that there was no real error in the partition map, it's just that Disk Utility doesn't know how to tell the workarounds used to shoehorn Windows into the boot camp partition apart from an actual partition error.

So that next step which worked: I booted holding command-option-p-r, and after the nvram reset I created a new boot camp partition, and booted from the usb flash drive, and had windows reformat that partition, and the Windows 8.1 Pro installation continued and finished successfully. For a few minutes I thought it was never going to finish the last couple of steps, in which the Windows screen fades between colors while stating that the process is nearly done and please don't shut off the computer. But it finished before I could manage to get a higher score than 15 in Flappy Birds. The boot camp installer popped up, I installed that, and then I was in Windows.

After hours of trying, the command-option-p-r trick did do the trick for my new mac pro, so count me as another data point. I'd first tried every other suggestion that was not a non-EFI install.
 
Last edited:
Another data point here:

I spent literally hours fighting this problem (I must've typed in my Windows key at least 20 times), including rather advanced things like using the recovery terminal in the Windows 8 installer and manually adjusting stuff on the EFI partition.

The solution that worked was resetting everything to non-Boot Camp state then resetting the PRAM/NVRAM (⌘+⌥+P+R) on the reboot immediately after the Boot Camp assistant creates the partition for Windows, before the Windows installer runs.

Resetting the NVRAM before you run Boot Camp Assistant or after the Windows installer has failed once did not solve the problem.
 
Kenndac said:
Another data point here:

I spent literally hours fighting this problem (I must've typed in my Windows key at least 20 times), including rather advanced things like using the recovery terminal in the Windows 8 installer and manually adjusting stuff on the EFI partition.

The solution that worked was resetting everything to non-Boot Camp state then resetting the PRAM/NVRAM (⌘+⌥+P+R) on the reboot immediately after the Boot Camp assistant creates the partition for Windows, before the Windows installer runs.

Resetting the NVRAM before you run Boot Camp Assistant or after the Windows installer has failed once did not solve the problem.
Click to expand...
Good tip!
 
Kenndac said:
Resetting the NVRAM before you run Boot Camp Assistant or after the Windows installer has failed once did not solve the problem.
Click to expand...

Strange, because the poster who originally mentioned the PRAM reset along with others seemed to have success just doing it vs your point of doing it exactly in the middle of the windows install restart.
 
Long story but just had to redo W8 on a late 2013 rMBP - for those where the PRAM reset did not work, try this:

Internet recovery (command R) and use disk utility option to delete all partitions back to single Mac journaled disk
Do not use time machine to repopulate files; keep machine stock for now
Install any system updates and restart machine
Restart machine again but this time run PRAM reset
Run BCA (I used 2 separate USB2 keys, one for ISO and other for windows drivers but do not think this made a difference)

Hopefully, this works for some of you still stuck.
 
resetting vram/pram fixed "can't update boot configuration" error for me

ytoyoda said:
[What is required]
1. USB memory for Boot Camp drivers.
2. Proper windows installation disk or ISO image. Win 8 or Win 8.1, 64bit
3. either - External optical disk drive ( if you install from DVD)
or - USB memory as installer disk (if you install from USB)
Windows 8.1 professional requires 4.1GB, so I recommend to use 8GB or grater capacity.​
[Note]
Basically there is no difference in result between using optical disk or USB memory.
USB memory is little faster for the 1st installation phase. If you are planning to install many times. USB is recommended.
However, in most case, the installation must be once ( if you don’t fail) so just using install DVD and optical drive is much easier.
​

[Preparation]

Before you start Boot Camp Assistant, following preparations are recommended.
If you have already experienced “can’t update boot configuration” error on your previous trial, please follow the instruction and reset your nMP’s NVRAM. http://support.apple.com/kb/HT1379?viewlocale=en_US
If after reseting NVRAM and you still encounter problems, please check the internal SSD using disk utility. (I'll post the detail procedure later.)
​
  • Determine the size of the Windows partition on your internal drive. This is important because once you install the Windows, there is no way to change the size later, other than delete the partition and re-install Windows.
  • Update EFI and OSX to most recent. Check updates on App Store or Software Update under Apple menu.
  • Backup your disk using Time Machine, just in case you erase your disk accidentally.
  • Disconnect all unnecessary external drives. This is for avoiding confusion to select the right drive and partition at Windows installer. Also many external disks slows down re-boot process.
  • Disconnect or leave connected LAN
If LAN is connected during installation, Widows installer ask many questions, like your Microsoft account. Answering those questions, you will get better personalized Windows at the first boot. However those settings can be done after the installation.
If you want quicker installation, please disconnect LAN. If you want more complete installation, leave LAN connected.
Windows installer does not access to Wi-Fi, so you do not worry about Wi-Fi connection.
​
[Procedure]
  • Start Boot Camp Assistant
    When you start Boot Camp Assistant, three check box, (all of them checked) appear. As title says “Select Tasks”, all those three are options. (You must select at least one to continue)
    - Create a Windows 8 or later install disk
    If you install from DVD or you already have installer USB, uncheck this box and connect optical disk drive and insert Windows installer DVD or installer USB. Otherwise, Boot Camp Assistant will not let you proceed.
    If you want to create USB installer disk, leave it checked.
    ​
    - Download the latest windows support software from Apple
    If you already have downloaded Boot Camp drivers, you can uncheck this box. However, please insert USB which contains Boot Camp drivers. Otherwise Boot Camp Assistance will not let you proceed after step 2.​
    - Install Windows 8 or later version
    This is the main task to perform. Please levee this box Checked.​
    press “Continue”.
  • Select partition size for Windows
    The window shown in Fig. 2 appears. You can drag the border between OS X and Windows to adjust the size of Windows partition. (20GB or “Divide Equally” are not only choices)
    When done, press “Continue”.​
  • Follow instructions of Windows installer
    Select Language, Keyboard etc. Just follow the installer guidance, until selecting partition to install Windows.​
  • Select Partition to install Windows
    When the installer asks to select the partition to install, you have to carefully pick the correct partition. Select the last partition named “Boot Camp” and double check the size of the partition is what you chose at step 3. (the size may slightly different, because OS X and Windows calculate differently)
    Then the installer says “can’t install Widows on partition 4”. This is because the partition is not NTFS. Select “Format(F)” located under partition list box.
    Then press "Next"
    ​
  • Answer questions from Widows installer
    After Step 4, the installer reboot the system several times, and ask you to input computer name, settings, user name, password etc. Just follows the instructions.​
  • Complete
    After that, installation will finish soon. The Widows starts and Boot Camp drivers are installed automatically.​

Please remember to re-connect your necessary peripherals.
I hope you will have successful installation.
Click to expand...

Thank you ytoyoda! I was having trouble all day ("can't update boot configuration" error). Resetting nvam/pram did the trick. Windows 8.1 successfully up and run-on on my internal ssd.

My setup: 8 core / D700 / 32Gb ram / 1Tb ssd
 
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