Windows 7->10 on Late 2009 iMac BCA Always Stuck

[Waragainstsleep]

I'm trying to run Windows natively on a 21.5" Late 2009 iMac. Its been upgraded with an SSD and 12GB RAM but the optical drive appears to have failed.
I have tried Boot Camp Assistant 5.1 and 6.1 on Yosemite and High Sierra, modified to allow installation of Win 7 from USB but no matter what I try it always moans that it can't detect the Windows Support software.

I have tried downloading it again, different versions, having it on the same USB as the installer, in a folder called "Boot Camp", in a folder called "Windows Support", not in a folder at all, on a separate USB stick, with an invisible dmg of the same software mounted and unmounted, it never detects it and won't go any further.

Does anyone know a way to disable the check? Its driving me nuts.

 

[Nguyen Duc Hieu]

You have to do all of them in the MS-DOS (command lines) terminal
Run cmd as Administrator
cd to the folder Apple in the BootCamp USB.
Type bootcamp.msi or bootcamp64.msi depending on what you have.

I did this with Windows 10 64 running from a USB SSD box.

But I did a fresh install, not upgrading.

I used the guide from the below video:

 

[Waragainstsleep]

Its actually supported for everything except using the USB installer but that should be pretty trivial.

 

[Nguyen Duc Hieu]

I got issues with Bluetooth.
BootCamp 6 couldn't fix it.
I went back to Mac OS and download BootCamp that go with it (Yosemite, iMac Early 2009)
Then reboot to Windows and install only Bluetooth. (use 64 bit version and as administrator)
I now have bluetooth fully functioning in Windows.

 

[Waragainstsleep]

BCA won't even partition my drive as it says there Windows Support files are not detected.

 

[Nguyen Duc Hieu]

BCA won't even partition my drive as it says there Windows Support files are not detected.

My suggestion is: "Do not mess-up with your OSX drive"
If you really want to use Windows a lot, buy a PC, a cheap core i5 gen 4 PC will beat that old iMac in every aspect on windows.
If you only use Window occasionally, install WindowsToGo (on a USB box). It will be much easier and more flexible.
You can still use that WindowsToGo disk on other Mac/PC as well.

 

[Waragainstsleep]

My suggestion is: "Do not mess-up with your OSX drive"
If you really want to use Windows a lot, buy a PC, a cheap core i5 gen 4 PC will beat that old iMac in every aspect on windows.
If you only use Window occasionally, install WindowsToGo (on a USB box). It will be much easier and more flexible.
You can still use that WindowsToGo disk on other Mac/PC as well.

I'm re-purposing an old Mac as a PC. It needs to run Sage accounts so as a Mac its very clunky running it on top of OS 10 and won't go past Sierra or maybe High Sierra. If I stick Windows 7 on it I can get it up to 10 and it should be nice and snappy for a while yet. I guess I need to find my external DVD drive and some blank DVD-Rs.