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Run Win7/8 on MBP from external drive?

iVikD

iVikD

macrumors regular
Original poster
As the title implies, I'd like to know if I can install windows 7 (possibly 8 later) on an external HDD and boot from there on my Mac?
The thing is, for reasons out of my control, I can't get a (legal) copy of Parallels. As far as BootCamp goes, let's just say I would rather use it only as a last resource, as I would rather not partition my main drive. How plausible would it be to load up the OS from an external HDD and have my Mac's full power? (all cores, RAM)
I know PCs can just boot from any drive, provided it has an OS installed, but I'm new to Macs, so I have no idea if the same can be done.
 
I've looked around, still nothing... By the way, what is a better choice, VMWare's Fusion 4 or Parallels 7?
 
iVikD said:
As the title implies, I'd like to know if I can install windows 7 (possibly 8 later) on an external HDD and boot from there on my Mac?
The thing is, for reasons out of my control, I can't get a (legal) copy of Parallels. As far as BootCamp goes, let's just say I would rather use it only as a last resource, as I would rather not partition my main drive. How plausible would it be to load up the OS from an external HDD and have my Mac's full power? (all cores, RAM)
I know PCs can just boot from any drive, provided it has an OS installed, but I'm new to Macs, so I have no idea if the same can be done.
Click to expand...

Windows will not boot from USB without modifying it :S
 
Operating system wise you might not want to go with booting windows 7/8 from a usb in the first place I would imagine with the transfer rate you might be better off with windows xp. Anything else would most likely lag like crazy. And I prefer using Parallels 7 since its created by the maker of WINE for Linux it works really well I seem to have problems every time I try using VMWare.
 
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