Install Windows On A Mac Using Boot Camp

03.01.2021
53 Comments
  1. In this article we explain how to install Windows on a Mac, first with Apple's dual-booting Boot Camp Assistant and then with third-party virtualisation software. We also discuss the pros and cons.
  2. Mar 23, 2019 Windows 10 will now boot fully, and you'll be able to use Windows normally. How to install Boot Camp software on your Windows 10 partition. When Windows 10 loads for the first time on your Mac, a Boot Camp software installer will automatically pop up. Click Install. Click I accept the terms in the license agreement. Click Install.
  1. Boot Camp Install Windows
  2. Switch Between Mac And Windows Boot Camp

Install Windows on your older Mac using Boot Camp Step 1: Check for software updates. Before you install Windows, install all macOS updates. Step 2: Get a Windows ISO image. You need to create or download a Windows ISO image. Step 3: Prepare your Mac for Windows. Boot Camp Assistant helps.

Modifying this control will update this page automatically

Boot Camp Assistant User Guide

Newer Mac computers use a streamlined method to install Windows on your Mac. To find out whether your Mac uses this method, see the Apple Support article Install Windows 10 on your Mac with Boot Camp Assistant. If your Mac is an older model, follow the instructions in Install Windows on your older Mac using Boot Camp instead.

What you need

  • The keyboard and mouse or trackpad that came with your Mac. If they aren’t available, use a USB keyboard and mouse.

  • A full-installation, 64-bit version of Windows 10 on a disk image (ISO file) or other installation media.

    You can download a Windows 10 Disc Image (ISO File) from Microsoft.

  • Sufficient free storage space on your startup drive. For information about the amount of free space needed, see the Apple Support Article Install Windows 10 on your Mac with Boot Camp Assistant.

Before you begin

Before you install Windows, make sure you back up important files.

You can use Time Machine or any other method to back up your files. For information about backing up files, see Back up your files with Time Machine and Ways to back up or protect your files.

Perform the installation

On your Mac, do the following steps in order.

Step 1: Check for software updates

Before you install Windows, install all macOS updates.

  1. On your Mac, log in as an administrator, quit all open apps, then log out any other users.

  2. Choose Apple menu > System Preferences, click Software Update, then install all available macOS updates.

    If your Mac restarts after installing an update, open Software Update again to install any additional updates.

Step 2: Prepare your Mac for Windows

Boot Camp Assistant prepares your Mac by creating a new partition for Windows named BOOTCAMP and downloading the Boot Camp support software.

Important: If you’re using a portable Mac, connect it to a power source before continuing.

  1. On your Mac, open Boot Camp Assistant , located in /Applications/Utilities.

  2. At the Introduction screen, click Continue.

    The system is checked for total available disk space. Older Time Machine snapshots and cached iCloud files are removed to make space for Boot Camp. This process may take a long time to complete (you can click the Stop button to skip this process).

  3. At the Install Windows step, click Choose, then select the Windows ISO image.

  4. Specify a partition size by dragging the divider between the macOS and Windows partitions.

  5. Click Install.

When this step is complete, the Windows installer starts.

Step 3: Install Windows

  1. In the Windows installer, follow the onscreen instructions.

    When the installation is finished, your Mac automatically restarts using Windows.

  2. Follow the onscreen instructions to set up Windows.

Step 4: Install Boot Camp on Windows

After installing Windows, Boot Camp drivers that support your Mac hardware start installing.

Note: If the support software doesn’t install automatically, you need to install it manually. For instructions, see the Apple Support article If the Boot Camp installer doesn't open after using Boot Camp Assistant.

  1. In the Boot Camp installer in Windows, follow the onscreen instructions.

    Important: Do not click the Cancel button in any of the installer dialogs.

    If a message appears that says the software you’re installing has not passed Windows Logo testing, click Continue Anyway.

    You don’t need to respond to installer dialogs that appear only briefly during installation, but if a dialog asks you to install device software, click Install.

    If nothing appears to be happening, there may be a hidden window that you must respond to. Look behind open windows.

  2. When the installation is complete, click Finish.

  3. After your Mac restarts, follow the instructions for any other installers that appear.

See alsoGet started with Boot Camp on MacTroubleshoot Boot Camp Assistant problems on MacApple Support website: Boot Camp Support

Installing Windows on a Mac should be a piece of cake with Bootcamp, but thatrarely is the case. In fact, I would personally say that Boot Camp Assistantis one of the worst apps that comes with OS X and unlike the rest, it doesn’twork seamlessly.

A few of its drawbacks:

  • It only supports a drive with a single partition.
  • It often throws very obscure error messages with limited detail.
  • It re-downloads 1.6 GB Windows drivers every single time it runs. These areplaced under /Library/Application Support/BootCamp/WindowsSupport.dmg anddeleted and re-downloaded each time Boot Camp Assistant starts processing.

This post did take a lot of work to complie and I did bone my hard drive afew times while trying certain ideas, so please throw out a thanks if ithelped you out :)

Disclaimer: This guide below contains procedures which can potentiallydestroy your partitions and data. I accept no responsibility for such loss soplease proceed at your own risk.

Update (2016-07-20): I have updated this post with further improvementsrelating to downloading of Boot Camp drivers and ensuring that a Hybrid MBR isnot used (which would cause issues when installing Windows).

  • An 8 GB or larger USB stick
  • A copy of the Windows 10 ISO
  • A valid Windows 10 license
  • A downloaded copy of unetbootin
  1. Start Boot Camp Assistant
  2. Select Action / Download Windows Support Software
  3. Choose your Downloads directory, enter your password and then clickSave

This will be the only step that we will use Boot Camp Assistant for.

Formatting Your USB Stick

Attach your USB stick and start Disk Utility, select your USB drive in theleft panel under External, click Erase and set the options as follows(exactly) and click Erase:

Name: FAT32
Format: MS-DOS (FAT)
Scheme: Master Boot Record /traktor-scratch-pro-2-mk2-software-and-media-kit.html.

Turning Your USB Stick into a Windows Installer

Open unetbootin, enter your password, set the options as follows andclick OK:

Diskimage: checked, set to ISO and browse to your Windows 10 ISO
Type: USB Drive
Drive: Your USB drive (you should only see one entry here)

If you see more than one drive listed, you may confirm which is your USB driveby opening the Terminal and typing:

You’ll see your USB drive in the output and it should look something like this:

Once you have kicked off unetbootin, grab a snack while the Windows ISO iscopied to the USB stick. This process takes around 15 minutes to complete.

Finishing Up

When this has completed, you may right click on the USB stick in Finder,select Rename “FAT32” and rename it as you like (I’ll call mine“WINDOWS 10”).

Finally, copy the WindowsSupport in your Downloads directory tothe Windows 10 USB stick so it’s easy to get to after our installation.

In Disk Utility, select your internal hard drive on the left panel, andclick on Partition.

Click the + button and create a new partition of your desired size for yourWindows installation and name it as you wish (I’ll call mine “BOOTCAMP”). Ensure that the Format is set to MS-DOS (FAT) and click on Apply.

Huge thanks to Rod’s post from the superuser post titledWindows detects GPT disk as MBR in EFI boot.

Once you add a FAT32 partition with either Boot Camp Assistant or Disk Utility,your disk is converted into a hybrid GPT / MBR disk which is actually notsupported by newer versions of Windows. In this step, we revert thisadditional change made by Disk Utility by switching back to a pure GPTpartition table.

  1. Dowload the latest version ofGPT fdiskby browsing to the version, then gdisk-binaries and clicking the filewith the *.pkg extension (e.g. gdisk-1.0.1.pkg).
  2. Install GPT fdisk by running the installer you downloaded

  3. Open a Terminal and check the state of your MBR

    If your MBR partition is set to hybrid, please continue with step 4,otherwise if it is set to protective, you may skip the rest of thissection. Simply type q and hit return to exit GPT fdisk.

  4. Type p to view the existing partition table and verify you’re workingon the correct disk

  5. Type x to enter the expert menu

  6. Type n to create a fresh protective MBR

  7. Type w to save your changes and confirm the change when asked

  8. Type q to exit GPT fdisk

  9. Run GPT fdisk to show your disk layout:

    Your partition table should look something like this:

Disconnecting All Devices From USB Ports

This step is critical as I have had rather serious problems during Windowsinstallation when certain external drives are connected.

Unplug everything from your Mac except your keyboard (if wired) and yourbootable Windows USB stick (which we prepared earlier).

If your Mac contains multiple physical drives, you will need to disconnectall disks except the one which you intend to install Windows on or you mayencounter the following error:

Windows could not prepare the computer to boot into the next phase of installation. To install Windows, restart the installation.

Booting From the USB Stick

Ensure that the USB stick containing the Windows installer is inserted andthen restart your Mac while holding down the option (alt) key.

You should now be presented with a list of bootable drives. Select the USBdrive (usually titled “EFI Boot”) to begin installing Windows.

Boot Camp Install Windows

Correcting Your Windows Hard Disk Partition

When you are asked Where do you want to install Windows?, select theWindows partition created earlier (which I called “BOOTCAMP”) and clickDelete.

Next, select the chunk of Unallocated Space and click on New to createa proper Windows NTFS partition.

Note: OS X only supports creation of FAT filesystems, so this is why we needto re-create the partition ourselves during install.

Completing the Installation

Allow the installer to complete and boot into Windows.

Installing Boot Camp Support Software

Once Windows is up and running, install the Boot Camp Support software runningWindowsSupport/BootCamp/Setup.exe on your USB stick.

Note: The installer takes a little while to show up, so please be patient.

You may encounter a known issue whereby the Boot Camp Support Softwareinstaller locks up while installing Realtek audio.

If this occurs, you will need to open Task Manager and kill theRealtekSetup.exe process.

After the installer has completed, answer No when prompted to rebootand install the Realtek drivers manually by running%USERPROFILE%AppDataLocalTempRarSFX0BootCampDriversRealTekRealtekSetup.exe.If you can’t find this file, check any other directories starting withRARSFX under %USERPROFILE%AppDataLocalTemp.

Once complete, reboot Windows.

  • The latest version of SharpKeys
  • The flipflop-windows-sheel binary (see README for a download link)

Mapping Your Mac Keyboard

Install and run SharpKeys and then configure the following mappings tocorrect your Mac keyboard so that it behaves like a regular Windows keyboard:

Switch Between Mac And Windows Boot Camp

Function: F13 -> Special: PrtSc
Special: Left Alt => Special: Left Windows
Special: Left Windows => Special: Left Alt
Special: Right Alt => Special: Right Windows
Special: Right Windows => Special: Right Alt

Note: for F13, you’ll need to select Press a key and click F13 on yourkeyboard.

Switching to Natural Scrolling

If you wish to flip scrolling direction to match that on OS X, runFlipWheel.exe and then click on Flip All.

Enabling Num Lock on Boot

Paste the following into a file named Enable NumLock on Boot.reg thenimport this into the registry to enable NumLock when Windows boots up(it doesn’t by default).

Completing Configuration

That’s it, give your machine one last reboot and you’ll have a fully workingWindows 10 installation.

Note: I have found Apple’s Magic Mouse to be extremely unreliable usingthe Boot Camp drivers from Apple. As such, I recommend purchasing a Logitech(or similar) mouse for use in Windows. I have no trouble plugging thewireless receiver for my Logitech mouse into one of the USB ports of my wiredApple Keyboard and it’s so tiny that you can’t see it at all.

Removing the Windows Partitions

If you decide to remove Windows, you may find that Disk Utility doesn’t allowyou to delete the two partitions that have been created by the Windowsinstaller.

This happens due to the fact that the first small partition created is of atype called Microsoft Reserved which OS X’s Disk Utility doesn’t support.

The safest way to delete these partitions is through the Windows installer. Sosimply boot from your USB stick as we did before and when you reach theWhere do you want to install Windows? question, you may delete your“BOOTCAMP” partition and the small 16 MB partition of type MSR (Reserved)just above the BOOTCAMP partition.

Once done, simply quit the installer by clicking the X in the top right cornerof each Window and reboot back into OS X.

Removing the Boot Entry

Even though we have removed the Windows partition, a boot entry will still bepresent when holding down option (alt) during boot.

You may remove these items by running the following in your Terminal: