Thanks, the end-of-support for Windows 10 was my concern. I heard about the Extended Security Update program Microsoft announced, but figured one year of Win 10 updates vs being on the current Win 11 left something to be desired.
Back to what I did: I managed to get Windows 11 on my 2011 MacBook Pro, and like others had issues with audio/sound but managed to get that to work too. In the end I re-installed Win 11 too many times and it must have gotten so hot (my city is super hot now) that I suppose the Wifi and Bluetooth parts were fried and don't work anymore. The sound driver works after reinstalling Opencore, but there is not sound in Windows 11. However, if I boot back into macOS Monterey (running Opencore Legacy Patcher), the sound works there (and I can confirm wifi + bluetooth are both dead on my machine even in Monterey). I suppose the dead wifi + bluetooth somehow affects the sound chip in Win 11. I have ordered a USB wifi module to use for Win 11 and that will have to do in my case.
*Edit* -- right after I posted this, I turned on that computer, first in Monterey to confirm the bluetooth and wifi are dead, then I rebooted to Win 11, and somehow the wifi is working again in Win 11 (though still no bluetooth and sound). I have no explanation for this pleasant but bizarre situation.
Anyways, for anyone who wants to give it a go, here's what I did to get Windows 11 on the 2011 MacBook Pro (8,1):
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Note that in my case, the trackpad is pretty awful in Win 11 in the end (I can't figure out how to do a right click), so you have to accept that and just use a USB mouse. I would suggest NOT using BootCamp drivers to fix the trackpad, as it made Win 11 unstable for me.
Here's what you'll need and how I did it, and I'll list the videos at the end that I followed to pull this off, which was to go through:
a. High Sierra
b. Opencore Legacy Patcher (OCLP) + Monterey
c. Windows 11
d. then back to OCLP one last time to fix the audio for Win 11
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Need:
a) another computer running Windows 10/11 already (to run Rufus), though I suppose if you have Win 10 on the current Mac already, then you can do the Rufus step first, nuke the Win 10 install and you won't need a separate computer with Win 10? I'll re-order my steps to account for this possibility.
b) need multiple USB drives at least 16+ GB for various installers. I supposed you could get away with using only one such USB drive and deleting and reusing it each time for the next bootable USB, but then if you mess up and have to start over, it's a huge pain to redo it all. I guess having 3 such USBs will do (one for High Sierra, one for Monterey, one for Windows 11)
c) ethernet cable to plug into your router for wired internet access
d) DO NOT use Apple BootCamp drivers at any point. I tried using BootCamp to fix the audio problem and trackpad under Win 11 at the end, and it made Win 11 unstable for me and it went into infinite reboot, forcing me to reinstall Win 11
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Steps:
1) using a Windows 10 computer, I downloaded the latest Windows 11 ISO from Microsoft. Then I used Rufus (which doesn't run on Mac) to create a GPT version of the Win 11 installation USB and checked all boxes to bypass Win 11 install checks
2) Have the highest macOS it would natively support, macOS 10.13 High Sierra on the Mac (I had to put it back since I had deleted it and put on Fedora which I never used). See videos below if you need to do this step, or skip it if you already have High Sierra.
3) then I used Opencore Legacy Patcher (OCLP), specifically version 0.4.9 to install macOS 12 Monterey (I had problems with using version 0.4.11 to install Monterey)
For details of #3, see the Mr. Macintosh video for it below, but note that I used OCLP v0.4.9, which worked for me for this specific 2011 MacBook Pro model when I first tried OCLP in back in 2022.
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For #4-5 below, I followed a video called "Windows 11 Install On 2011 Macbook Pro" (see below)
4) back under the 2011 MacBook Pro and macOS Monterey, I used Disk Utility and created a partition of my SSD, making format "MS-DOS (FAT)". You may have to format this partition again to MS-DOS (FAT), and this is where I installed Windows 11 on later.
Note: you absolutely need to know which partition you created to install Windows 11 on. While in Disk Utility, on the left side, select the partition you created to do so, and then near the bottom right corner of the window, you'll see it say:
Device: (and then something like Disk0s*, where the * is the number that goes with it)
In my case, my partition is Disk0s3 but yours may be different. Knowing how many GB you allocated to this partition also helps to identify it. I would say know both pieces of info, which you'll need in #5c below.
5a) Then I plugged in the Win 11 installer USB from #1, reboot and held down the Option key, go to the yellow EFI Boot (which is the USB Win 11 installer).
5b) During Windows 11 installation, on the third menu where it says, "Select setup option," I clicked on the bottom left corner where it says "Previous Version of Setup," which then got me the menus that match the video I followed for this part.
5c) I had to reformat the partition I created in step #4. Here's where you'll need the info I mentioned earlier to identify which partition to choose. I choose to Format it (instead of deleting it like the video I followed did) and then it would be allowed to installed Win 11.
5d) I plugged in my ethernet cable to my router for wired internet when prompted by the Win 11 install to updates. (Later I tried skipping this step to fix the audio in Win 11, and it didn't work, so I would go with the ethernet update)
Eventually Windows 11 finishes installing, and then I used Windows Update (still connected via ethernet) to download updates, and rebooted the computer multiple times for each update.
Using the drivers listed on the video's description, and Device Manager under Win 11, I got the Camera working.
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6) the last thing that won't work in Win 11, no matter what you try, is the audio. The guy in the video I used for steps #4-5 says he got the audio working, but his driver didn't work for me. I found other places say that you can fix the audio by changing DSDT something or other and it looked super complicated and tricky to pull off.
Luckily I found another video that shows that to fix the audio, you simply reboot back into macOS Monterey, and reinstall Opencore onto your built-in SSD (which I was reluctant to do at first but did in the end), then reboot back into Windows 11, and sound works now! I can dual boot Windows 11 (the whole point of this exercise) and also macOS Monterey.
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For step #2, the videos I referenced for putting High Sierra back on the 2011 MacBook Pro
How to Install a Fresh macOS on a 2011 MacBook Pro - new SSD.mp4
How to download and create a macOS High Sierra bootable USB using Mist.mp4
For step #3, the Mr. Macintosh video I followed for installing Monterey using OCLP
macOS Monterey on Unsupported Macs [2008-2015] OpenCore Legacy Patcher!!!
For steps #4-5, the video I followed for installing Windows 11
Windows 11 Install On 2011 Macbook Pro
For step #6, the video I followed for fixing audio in Win 11 by using OCLP to reinstall OpenCore:
Fix No Audio Output Device is Installed on Windows 10 Bootcamp
