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acpowell

macrumors newbie
Original poster
Mar 23, 2015
5
0
I hope everyone is having a better day than I am as I am about to rip my hair out.
We are trying to install Windows 7 X64 using a standalone build from SCCM 2012 SP1. This build works on our non-mac laptops but I hit a couple snags when I try to use it on the MBP I have here.
It is a late 2014 model MBP. I have added the required drivers from apple to the Boot.wim and the windows 7 image we use. At first I was running into some EFI boot issues where I learned that windows 7 x64 cannot be installed using EFI on a machine that is not 2.0 or higher. Supposedly the early 2011 model I was originally testing on didn't meet that requirement. I am starting to think the late 2014 model I have doesn't either.

*METHOD 1
My partition setup is as follows:
•Partition disk 0 – BIOS
o 350 MB system reserved (Primary)
o 100% remaining is NTFS (Primary)
• Partition Disk 0 – UEFI
o 100% of remaining space NTFS (Primary)

When I try to do it the UEFI method, the machine will partition the drive but at the next reboot it will never reboot, the screen just stays black. If I use the option key to choose a boot device and choose the hard drive it just freezes on the boot selection screen.

*METHOD 2
The UEFI setup I was trying (because I thought I had to)
• - BIOS is the same as above method
• Partition Disk 0 – UEFI
o 300 MB NTFS (Recovery)
 Also tired without the above partition
o 500 MB FAT32 (EFI)
o 128 MB 128 (MSR)
o 100% of remaining NTFS (Primary)

Using Method 1 I have managed to get the SCCM task sequence to partition the drive, install the OS, install the drivers, and "setup windows". It will reboot and then should start running the rest of the task sequence which is installing applications and windows customizations. When it reboots and goes to finish the install it wants me to insert media #1 which of course doesn't exist as there is only one drive and it is the USB drive I already have installed.

Has anyone gotten this to work and if so could you clue me in on to what steps I need to take or something I am missing.

Before you ask why we do not want OS X on there I will explain. Basically we want these few machines to run windows because of the hardware and do not want to mess with Boot Camp if at all possible because the people that might be doing these installs have zero experience with macs. As well as a few other internal company reasons that aren't necessary to know at this point.

Any help is greatly appreciated!
 
I just learned something new. I removed all the apps from my task sequence so it just does windows, drivers, and customizations and found that it still failed. I went to copy the log and noticed that it didn't mount the USB. Is it possible that the USB drivers didn't install? (of course that is possible but I asked anyway)

----------

Whelp MSINFO32 has confirmed that I am missing about 7 drivers. So I can only assume that the driver pack I downloaded was not the correct one. I am currently downloading what I think is the right one and will let you know what I come up with.

Sometimes just writing things out to someone even if no one has looked yet is all the help I needed.
 
Macbook Pro Windows 7 x64 SCCM (no boot camp)

AC .......... am planing to follow the same path and am concerned that there may be problems getting Win 7 Pro to install....!

Did you manage to solve the problem or make any progress.

.... Would appreciate your guidance....


many thanks ...... Martin V
 
AC .......... am planing to follow the same path and am concerned that there may be problems getting Win 7 Pro to install....!

Did you manage to solve the problem or make any progress.

.... Would appreciate your guidance....


many thanks ...... Martin V

Here is what I was able to figure out. Windows 7 x64 must be installed via MBR. If you are using the actual install media ether via CD/DVD or USB creator then you should have no issues. If you are going to install this via SCCM or something similar you need to make sure your USB is MBR or Hybrid, NOT GPT.

When you boot from the USB you should see 2 options, Windows and EFI. If you choose windows it will boot from MBR, if you choose EFI it will boot GPT. I was able to make this work on a 2014 model MBP 15. How ever I have discovered that the MBP 13 late 2014 model (which I thought was the early 2015) lakes the MBR emulation that was there in older models hence the reason that apple is no longer supporting windows 7. Windows 8.1 loaded just fine on this machine.
 
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