Windows 8.1 on External Hard drive with Bootcamp/Virtual Machine

[ChelseaiAM]

The first questions is can I put Windows 8.1 on an external hard drive? I've called apple a couple of times. The first guy said I could and the second guy said they "don't support it."
Is there an easy way to do this through bootcamp?

If it is not possible or not easy, can I put Windows 8.1 on an external hard drive using a Virtual Machine (Parallels or VMFusion).

Thank you,
Chelsea

 

[antonis]

You can install windows on an external usb3 / thunderbolt drive by following this guide.

 

[memomo]

You can install windows on an external usb3 / thunderbolt drive by following this guide.

it's works in my macbook pro retina (late 2013) - windows 8 with USB 2.0 hard drive
i think it's time to buy a new USB 3.0 hard drive , because windows runs a little bit slow


thanks

 

[ross1999]

You can install windows on an external usb3 / thunderbolt drive by following this guide.

NOT REALY, Its doesnot work at ALLLL

 

[Toutou]

Is there an easy way to do this through bootcamp?

No, Apple doesn't officially support this, so BootCamp won't help you with that.

But don't worry, there IS another EASY way to do this.
If you have a Windows machine around, download Rufus. It's a lightweight (under a megabyte!) tool that can do all sorts of magic with disk images. In the 2.0 version a new feature called "Windows To Go" was introduced, that allows you to create a bootable installation of Windows 8/8.1/10, which is exactly what you're looking for.

And it's a pretty straightforward process, you will need your Windows ISO, Rufus, a flash drive and that's about it.
I tried it out of curiosity a month ago and everything worked flawlessly and I got Win 10 up and running the same evening.

can I put Windows 8.1 on an external hard drive using a Virtual Machine

Yes, you can put the whole virtual machine on your external disk and run it from inside macOS with the disk connected.

 

[antonis]

NOT REALY, Its doesnot work at ALLLL

How's that ? I've had my Mac Pro running windows 8.1 that I installed following this guide.

 

[gnohgniy]

How's that ? I've had my Mac Pro running windows 8.1 that I installed following this guide.

Hi, can i know how did u go through step 2 of the process? I am using solely my mac to do this, and I'm not too sure how to do step 2. It requires either a windows machine, or a VM. But how can i open cmd when its a windows program on my mac?

 

[antonis]

Hi, can i know how did u go through step 2 of the process? I am using solely my mac to do this, and I'm not too sure how to do step 2. It requires either a windows machine, or a VM. But how can i open cmd when its a windows program on my mac?

Hi.
It's just a step where you need to connect your external disk on a windows system (either it is a virtual machine running on your mac or a real windows pc). The rest of the commands should be completed on the windows side (all these commands are available in a cmd session).

No matter if windows run in a vm on your mac; when you try to connect an external disk on a mac running vmware or parallels you get the option to connect it directly to the virtual machine (so it will be available on the guest OS).