2006 Mac Pro: Easy 64-BIT Windows 10 native installation (no bootloaders or EFI hacks)

[hannasdeli]

Hi! Sorry to refloat an old thread. I read all this instructions but then i decided to install/upgrade from an old windows 7 partition in my ageing Mac Pro 1.1. I made a bootable usb with the rufus application and everything worked perfectly. So now I am writing this from a Windows 10 machine running on my stock Mac Pro from 2006 (including the 7300 GT card). I had to reinstall some drivers etc. The visual performance is great for this old card!

My question is: Am I missing something important? Because everything works fine. EXCEPT i get some crazy latency and audio drops in my fireware 800 based audio card (Fireface 800). And despite i tried to identify possible offending drivers I cannot find what is wrong.

 

[flyinmac]

Hi! Sorry to refloat an old thread. I read all this instructions but then i decided to install/upgrade from an old windows 7 partition in my ageing Mac Pro 1.1. I made a bootable usb with the rufus application and everything worked perfectly. So now I am writing this from a Windows 10 machine running on my stock Mac Pro from 2006 (including the 7300 GT card). I had to reinstall some drivers etc. The visual performance is great for this old card!

My question is: Am I missing something important? Because everything works fine. EXCEPT i get some crazy latency and audio drops in my fireware 800 based audio card (Fireface 800). And despite i tried to identify possible offending drivers I cannot find what is wrong.

I haven't used any FireWire 800 audio cards in my Mac, so I cannot specifically speak to your problem. I run analog audio into my machine and then record it digitally.

But, what I would do is get ahold of the technical specs for your audio card / FireWire device. Find out who made the actual parts inside it. If you cannot find anything for that model / brand device, then you have to dig deeper and find out who's parts, and which model parts are actually inside it (remember that the brand of the device has nothing to do with the parts it contains - they always use parts made by someone else). So, inside the device is going to be a primary chip made by someone, and it will be a particular type / model. Identify that, and then look for drivers for that particular chip (possibly available by whoever made the chip inside your device). If you can download those and install them, then that may get it working for you.

With Mac's, it is very common to have devices that fail to function as you upgrade operating systems. My most recent one, is an Epson printer that failed to make the transition with Epson software. But, I found alternate tools to perform the same function, so I can still use the printer, just not with Epson's software that hasn't been updated for High Sierra.

 

[hannasdeli]

Ok! Thank you for the answer. I think i solved the issue or at least 95% of it. I actually had not installed some drivers coming with the bootcamp 5 package. There are some x64 Intel drivers in the folder that are intended for windows 7 and they have an .exe file. I clicked on a couple of them (a bit randomly) and most of the drops are gone. So it was just a problem of using wrong drivers that were causing some wild interruptions.

I am still amazed that this old machine that was an always-on demo computer on some department store back in 2006 has been with me for 11 years. A machine that has served me as a great video editing and video postproduction workstation rendering non-stop for years and has also doubled up as my Digital Audio Workstation at night. It is jut unbelievable that this great computer is still here at my home at the very center of my Music Studio. Still as powerful as then, despite the age problems resulting from Apple's lack of interest in maintaining the software.

Without a doubt the best computer I have ever had. Respect.

 

[flyinmac]

Yes, the old 2006 Mac Pro machines have definitely paid for themselves many times over. As far as computer purchases go, I’ve never gotten this much value and productive lifespan at every task imaginable out of one machine before. I’ve had machines that I’ve used for over 20 years before. But I’ve never had one that stayed this relevant and held its own against newer models for this long.

And if you decide to turn it into a Windows 10 machine, then it could potentially have another 5 to 10 years of being relevant, useful, and productive.

I do find irony in the fact that Windows 10 installs and runs just fine (wonderfully) on a machine that can’t run the current Mac OS. Ironic that Apple doesn’t support their own hardware for as long as Microsoft does (and somehow amazingly efficient).

As for your driver issues. If I remember right, downloaded whatever the current boot camp assistant was. Extracted it’s files, and altered it’s supported systems list manually to make it agree to run on the old Mac Pro.

Then, whatever drivers it was unable to install, I installed manually using device manager to point it to the proper driver. And any that weren’t in the Bootcamp sources, I went to that component part’s manufactures website and downloaded and installed.

 

[hannasdeli]

Yes, the old 2006 Mac Pro machines have definitely paid for themselves many times over.

Sorry if I ask you too many questions... I see in your signature that your mac pro has 8 cores? How come? Did you swap processors? Which ones? That would be great to try actually. Thanks for your insights! Glad to find people that actually can appreciate a great computer.

 

[flyinmac]

Sorry if I ask you too many questions... I see in your signature that your mac pro has 8 cores? How come? Did you swap processors? Which ones? That would be great to try actually. Thanks for your insights! Glad to find people that actually can appreciate a great computer.

Yes I did upgrade the processors. I put in two quad core Xeons X5365 running at 3 GHz.

As for why, it’s because I use the machine for video work. And because I wanted it to be faster.

Somewhere in my history is a post where I documented the upgrade and gave performance comparisons before and after the upgrade.

 

[skyneedle]

Great thread. I spent *way* too many hours trying to install the 32 bit version of Windows on my Mac Pro 1,1 this weekend and it is still not recognizing the audio card and using the optimized video card driver. This is all great and I'm tempted to give it a go with the 64 bit version of Windows but one dummy question: Is it not possible for one person to set it up correctly with Windows *unactivated* and then use OS X to make a disk image of the correct working Windows 10 native disk and share that? Would that work?

I had a upgraded SATA bluray optical disk which was doing some kind of weird conflict with my SuperDrive so I had to burn the Windows 10 image on the bluray drive and then boot from the SuperDrive. Weird.

 

[flyinmac]

If you have a system to set it up as inactivated, then it would be possible to install it on a hard drive in another system. Then just install that hard drive into your Mac Pro. Essentially the same thing I did with my VMware virtual machine.

Then activate it once you boot it directly in the Mac Pro

 

[Mormislaw]

Thank you soon much!!!

 

[flyinmac]

Thank you soon much!!!

You’re welcome. Glad the information is useful to people.

 

[Argyboy]

If you have a system to set it up as inactivated, then it would be possible to install it on a hard drive in another system. Then just install that hard drive into your Mac Pro. Essentially the same thing I did with my VMware virtual machine.

Then activate it once you boot it directly in the Mac Pro

I used this method to install Windows 10 on my MacPro 2,1 a while back. Windows 10 is pretty good in terms of inbuilt hardware support compared to Windows 7, and I'd no problem with starting the installation of Windows 10 on my main Windows-based PC and then moving the SSD into the MacPro at the first reboot stage of the installation. Windows 10 figured out the change of hardware and booted fine into the rest of the installation.

I've since gone back to Windows 7 because I'm not a huge fan of the privacy issues in Windows 10 but this method certainly worked fine for me. It's good to get some more years out of these great machines! Thinking of replacing El Capitan with a Linux distribution at some stage in the future, too.

 

[LIsquid]

Hi flyinmac,

I have tried your technique once before and it worked fine, but I am trying now on a different HD (Kingston SSD, formatted correctly with two partitions 1st Mac OS Extended/ Journaled and the 2nd Part is NTFS) and I'm running into issues of trying create the physical-hdd.vmdk. Do I need to create the VM in VMware like what you did with Bob 1st? Cause my directory isn't finding a library folder, my target SSD Drive is disk3.

Here is my terminal log:

Mac:~ squidman$ cd "/Applications/VMware Fusion.app/Contents/Library/"

Mac:Library squidman$ ./vmware-rawdiskCreator create /dev/disk3 fullDevice ~/physical-hdd ide
-bash: ./vmware-rawdiskCreator: No such file or directory

What am I doing wrong?

Don't remember running into this issue before, as a matter of fact it went flawless.
[doublepost=1548871197][/doublepost]

Hi flyinmac,

I have tried your technique once before and it worked fine, but I am trying now on a different HD (Kingston SSD, formatted correctly with two partitions 1st Mac OS Extended/ Journaled and the 2nd Part is NTFS) and I'm running into issues of trying create the physical-hdd.vmdk. Do I need to create the VM in VMware like what you did with Bob 1st? Cause my directory isn't finding a library folder, my target SSD Drive is disk3.

Here is my terminal log:

Mac:~ squidman$ cd "/Applications/VMware Fusion.app/Contents/Library/"

Mac:Library squidman$ ./vmware-rawdiskCreator create /dev/disk3 fullDevice ~/physical-hdd ide
-bash: ./vmware-rawdiskCreator: No such file or directory

What am I doing wrong?

Don't remember running into this issue before, as a matter of fact it went flawless.

Can I use Parallels desktop to create this fake disk?

 

[flyinmac]

Hi flyinmac,

I have tried your technique once before and it worked fine, but I am trying now on a different HD (Kingston SSD, formatted correctly with two partitions 1st Mac OS Extended/ Journaled and the 2nd Part is NTFS) and I'm running into issues of trying create the physical-hdd.vmdk. Do I need to create the VM in VMware like what you did with Bob 1st? Cause my directory isn't finding a library folder, my target SSD Drive is disk3.

Here is my terminal log:

Mac:~ squidman$ cd "/Applications/VMware Fusion.app/Contents/Library/"

Mac:Library squidman$ ./vmware-rawdiskCreator create /dev/disk3 fullDevice ~/physical-hdd ide
-bash: ./vmware-rawdiskCreator: No such file or directory

What am I doing wrong?

Don't remember running into this issue before, as a matter of fact it went flawless.
[doublepost=1548871197][/doublepost]


Can I use Parallels desktop to create this fake disk?

I don’t know if you could accomplish the task using parallels. I’ve never used it.

As far as your first question, yes... you do need to create the virtual machine in VMWare.

 

[penhaphi]

Sharing with the community

Using the below method, anyone should be able to install any version of Windows 32-BIT or 64-BIT on their Intel-Based Mac without any concern for whether the machine is EFI 32 or EFI 64, and regardless of Apple's willingness to support that version of Windows with Bootcamp.

The 2006 Mac Pro 1,1 with 32-BIT EFI can successfully and easily boot and run the 64-BIT version of Windows 10 (Final Release) without any major modifications.

For those who care, here is my Geekbench profile. I didn't pay for Geekbench, so the results are only the 32-BIT Benchmarks, despite being run on a 64-BIT version of Windows 10. Naturally, not optimal for benchmarking. But, I posted a comparison of this Mac Pro 2006 running Geekbench on Windows 10 Pro 64-BIT and Mac OS X 10.7.5 Lion. Both results are in my profile, and fairly comparable to each other. I'll probably add a couple other machines with Windows to my profile for comparison purposes.

My Geekbench test results
http://browser.primatelabs.com/user/flyinmac

Keep in mind that since we are not using BootCamp, Apple's bootcamp software appears unwilling to run in Windows 10 in this configuration (unsupported machine / Windows environment combination). So, here's what I did after Windows was installed.

Since I still have the factory nVidia 7300GT installed, I went to nVidia's website, and did a search for the latest Windows 7 x64-BIT drivers. I did not run their configuration program. I extracted the drivers, and went into Windows' Device manager, and updated the drivers in there manually for the graphics adapter by pointing it at the folder of drivers I downloaded from nVidia. This worked great.

I also downloaded both the 4.0 and 5.0 bootcamp drivers, and let Windows device manager search those extracted folders for the IDE / SATA controller drivers.

Sounds, and ethernet, etc. all seem to work fine. I can't find anything that isn't running smoothly. I have not tried Airport, I never use it anyway on my desktops. But, it should work.

My Mac Pro appears as any normal PC to Windows 10 64-BIT.

My Mac Pro has had it's firmware updated from 1,1 to 2,1 making it think it's a 2007 Mac Pro... But, that is of no consequence or effect on this operation.

This technique should work with any Macintosh with an Intel Processor that meets the requirements of Windows 10. If you don't have a 64-BIT Microprocessor, than it should work with the 32-BIT version of Windows 10 also. But, since the Xeons are 64-BIT, I went with the 64-BIT version of Windows 10.

Now, the easiest solution, would be to install Windows 10 on a hard drive using a different computer, such as a PC, and then not activate it until after you have placed the hard drive into the Mac and booted from it.

But, lacking such an option, I went a different route.

I used VMWare Fusion 5.x running on my 2006 Mac Pro under Mac OS X 10.7.5 Lion. The trick, is to make VMWare use a real hard drive instead of a virtual drive.

There are ways to do this with other virtualization software, but I don't have them, so that's your experiment

I also understand that newer versions of VMWare kind of balk at this technique... So... you might want to try an older version if you have trouble. VMWare Fusion can be used in trial mode for approx 30 days I believe, so it's a free option that'll work long enough to perform the task. You won't need it afterwards (an you won't want to use it afterwards anyway - The emulation environment will appear as a separate computer and Windows 10 doesn't like being activated twice).

And, lastly, this technique does not use bootcamp, and bootcamp will refuse to acknowledge it. So, you will not be able to pick which machine you want to boot from. You'll have to hold down the OPTION KEY at start-up and pick your Windows partition there to boot into Windows.

And, the caveat... This is all done at your own risk... It worked for me, should work for you, but it's your computer, your data, and all risk is yours. Please make backups of all your data first. Did I mention you're doing this at your own risk?

I had a hard drive already Partitioned and Formatted with the GUID scheme, and the first partition was a Mac OS Extended (Journaled) partition. The second partition was formatted to NTFS and had Windows Vista installed on it (previously used with bootcamp).

I set up a NEW virtual machine in VMware Fusion 5.x, and configured it to be a Windows 7 machine (not 64-BIT), with 4 GB of RAM and 2 processor cores. I then pointed VMWare Fusion to use my Windows 10 ISO image as the installation CD (alternatively you could point it to a real CD if you wanted).

I then saved that virtual machine as it was, without further alterations.

There are a few issues that need resolved from there. First, the Virtual Machine defaults to setting up a virtual hard drive. We need to get it to ignore that drive. We also need to point it to our real hard drive or partition for the install destination.

Go into Disk Utilities on your Mac in OS X. Click on the drive (or partition) that you wish to install Windows on. Make sure it's already formatted to NTFS, and that the partition scheme is set for GUID. If not, configure it that way now (repartitioning if you have to). Remember to backup anything important first, before doing anything (especially if repartitioning / reformatting).

Now that your drive is configured properly, click on the drive (or partition) that you will be installing windows on. In my case, my Windows partition was disk2s3.

disk2 is the drive
s3 is the partition

Your disk number and partition numbers will vary depending on your configuration.

Also, make note of the specific size of your Windows / NTFS partition. You'll want to make sure you're installing to the right partition later, so you don't accidentally overwrite something else. Make note of the other drive's and partition sizes as well, so you can easily tell which ones they are when you get to the install point.

Now for the fun

Making note of the disk number discovered above for your Windows / NTFS partition, you will need to open TERMINAL. Go to the spotlight search on your Mac, and type in terminal, and launch the program.

You'll be in a window with a command line interface. Don't be scared, it's not that bad.

copy and paste (or type) the following line exactly into Terminal and then press Enter

cd "/Applications/VMware Fusion.app/Contents/Library/"

Now we're going to make the link to the physical hard drive.

Remember my partition was located on Disk 2... you will need to be absolutely certain that you change the disk number to reflect the correct disk on your computer. Copy and paste (or type) the following line exactly into terminal MAKING SURE THAT YOU CHANGE THE DISK NUMBER TO THE CORRECT NUMBER FOR YOUR WINDOWS / NTFS DESTINATION DISK.

./vmware-rawdiskCreator create /dev/disk2 fullDevice ~/physical-hdd ide

Now... this has created a link file that should reside in your HOME folder on your Mac... go take a look and make sure that physical-hdd.vmdk is in your Home Folder on your Mac.

Now for the really fun part

Remember the virtual machine that we made earlier? I hope you remember what you named it. I'm going to call it "Bob" (I like Bob) lol.... But, you'd better remember what you named it, because whenever I say Bob, change "Bob" to whatever you named it.

Using Finder, you should be able to locate Bob in the "Documents/Vitual Machines" folder on your hard drive.

Right click on "Bob" and choose "Show Package Contents"

Now, you're looking at "Bob's" innards...

keeping this folder view open, use another finder window to locate the file we made called "physical-hdd.vmdk" in your "Home" folder.

move or copy that "physical-hdd.vmdk" file into Bob's innards.

now... you need to edit a file that is located in Bob's innards... Remember, you need to use the name you gave your machine instead of Bob...

So, the file you're looking for is "Bob.vmx" (so your machine's name with the VMX extension).

right click on Bob.vmx and select Open With, and choose Text Edit.

Go down to the very end of the file that you are now looking at, and type or copy the following lines.

ide1:1.present = "TRUE"
ide1:1.fileName = "physical-hdd.vmdk"

We're not quite done yet.

You also need to disable the SCSI devices that are listed. Scroll through the document, and anywhere that you see a reference to SCSI that says "Present" change "True" to "False".

When all that is done, go to the file menu, and choose "Save a Version". Then close Text Editor.

Now, all I can say at this point, is experiment. In my case, since I had Windows Vista already on that drive, when I launched Fusion, it booted me into Vista within the Fusion emulator. I found that amusing, it confirmed I had everything working, and I shut Vista down, and then went into the settings in Fusion for that Machine (I'm calling him Bob) and chose the Startup disk, and made the startup disk to be the CD (remember in my example, the Windows 10 Install CD is an ISO image).

When I was booting from the CD, it eventually prompted me for an installation drive. This is where it's important to be careful. Make sure that you tell Windows to install to the proper hard drive and partition. Use the name you gave the partition as a partial indicator, and pay close attention to the drive / partition capacity, and make sure that it matches what it should be for your destination location.

If everything looks right, proceed to install Windows 10 64-BIT onto your hard drive.

Once it has been completely installed, do not activate it yet. Shut it down in the emulator / Fusion.

Now, restart your Macintosh and hold down the OPTION key. Now, choose your Windows 10 disk, and boot from Windows. It may give you a white screen for a moment, just be patient. Wait.... let it do it's thing. Don't panic.

When Windows comes up, log in as normal. And, then activate it.

Do not activate it in VMWare Fusion. Your activation is tied to the computer it thinks it's on. Make sure you wait to activate it until after you are actually running it directly on your Macintosh natively. That way your Mac will forever be blessed with the privilege of running Windows 10

This method avoids all the 32-BIT / 64-BIT EFI issues. And, is working great for me.

May your machine have a long and prosperous future secure in having the latest 64-BIT Operating System installed natively.

Best of luck to all of you.

Below I have pasted the contents from my Bob.vmx for you to reference and compare should you have any trouble.

The lines in Pink are for you to notice, and compare to your situation. Add them if needed. Naturally, change "Bob" to the right name for your machine, and any path's to files modify to your system and volume / hard drive and folder names.

Lines in Blue, make sure they're there. Lines in Purple are the one's we've added based on the steps / directions above.

Good Luck, and hope this helps...

You're friend,

flyinmac



.encoding = "UTF-8"
config.version = "8"
virtualHW.version = "9"
memsize = "4248"
mem.hotadd = "TRUE"
ide1:0.present = "TRUE"
ide1:0.autodetect = "TRUE"
ide1:0.deviceType = "cdrom-image"
ethernet0.present = "TRUE"
ethernet0.connectionType = "nat"
ethernet0.virtualDev = "e1000"
ethernet0.wakeOnPcktRcv = "FALSE"
ethernet0.addressType = "generated"
ethernet0.linkStatePropagation.enable = "TRUE"
usb.present = "TRUE"
ehci.present = "TRUE"
ehci.pciSlotNumber = "35"
sound.present = "TRUE"
sound.virtualDev = "hdaudio"
sound.fileName = "-1"
sound.autodetect = "TRUE"
mks.enable3d = "TRUE"
serial0.present = "TRUE"
serial0.fileType = "thinprint"
pciBridge0.present = "TRUE"
pciBridge4.present = "TRUE"
pciBridge4.virtualDev = "pcieRootPort"
pciBridge4.functions = "8"
pciBridge5.present = "TRUE"
pciBridge5.virtualDev = "pcieRootPort"
pciBridge5.functions = "8"
pciBridge6.present = "TRUE"
pciBridge6.virtualDev = "pcieRootPort"
pciBridge6.functions = "8"
pciBridge7.present = "TRUE"
pciBridge7.virtualDev = "pcieRootPort"
pciBridge7.functions = "8"
vmci0.present = "TRUE"
hpet0.present = "TRUE"
usb.vbluetooth.startConnected = "TRUE"
tools.syncTime = "TRUE"
displayName = "Bob"
guestOS = "windows7"
nvram = "Bob.nvram"
virtualHW.productCompatibility = "hosted"
proxyApps.publishToGuest = "TRUE"
tools.upgrade.policy = "upgradeAtPowerCycle"
powerType.powerOff = "soft"
powerType.powerOn = "soft"
powerType.suspend = "soft"
powerType.reset = "soft"
extendedConfigFile = "Bob.vmxf"
numvcpus = "2"
cpuid.coresPerSocket = "2"
ide1:0.fileName = "/Volumes/OSXHardDrive/Windows10_x64_EN-US.iso"
ide1:1.present = "TRUE"
ide1:1.fileName = "physical-hdd.vmdk"
ethernet0.generatedAddress = "00:0c:29:a9:c7:ec"
ethernet0.pciSlotNumber = "33"
usb.pciSlotNumber = "32"
sound.pciSlotNumber = "34"
vmci0.id = "95012844"
vmci0.pciSlotNumber = "36"
uuid.location = "56 4d 7a bf 71 9c 20 6a-89 e7 91 03 05 a9 c7 ec"
uuid.bios = "56 4d 7a bf 71 9c 20 6a-89 e7 91 03 05 a9 c7 ec"
cleanShutdown = "TRUE"
replay.supported = "FALSE"
replay.filename = ""
pciBridge0.pciSlotNumber = "17"
pciBridge4.pciSlotNumber = "21"
pciBridge5.pciSlotNumber = "22"
pciBridge6.pciSlotNumber = "23"
pciBridge7.pciSlotNumber = "24"
usb:1.present = "TRUE"
ethernet0.generatedAddressOffset = "0"
vmotion.checkpointFBSize = "134217728"
softPowerOff = "TRUE"
usb:1.speed = "2"
usb:1.deviceType = "hub"
usb:1.port = "1"
usb:1.parent = "-1"
ide0:1.redo = ""
ide1:1.redo = ""
bios.bootOrder = "CDROM"
usb:0.present = "TRUE"
usb:0.deviceType = "hid"
usb:0.port = "0"
usb:0.parent = "-1"
gui.viewModeAtPowerOn = "windowed"
scsi0.present = "FALSE"
scsi0:0.present = "FALSE"
floppy0.present = "FALSE"

[doublepost=1548926775][/doublepost]
I found a much easier way! First get your Mac Pro running El Capitan using pikers boot EFi (see other threads). Then it’s very easy. Steps below to install windows 10 on its own disk:

1. Format disk on another Windows 10 computer NTFS and call it BOOTCAMP
2. Use Bootcamp assistant in El Capitan and install Windows 7 onto that disk
3. Boot into Windows 7
4. Insert CD Windows 10 install disk (exploded ISO file) and run SETUP.EXE from command prompt

 

[LIsquid]

[doublepost=1548926775][/doublepost]

I found a much easier way! First get your Mac Pro running El Capitan using pikers boot EFi (see other threads). Then it’s very easy. Steps below to install windows 10 on its own disk:

1. Format disk on another Windows 10 computer NTFS and call it BOOTCAMP
2. Use Bootcamp assistant in El Capitan and install Windows 7 onto that disk
3. Boot into Windows 7
4. Insert CD Windows 10 install disk (exploded ISO file) and run SETUP.EXE from command prompt

I've tried doing your method onto another hard drive and it kicks back into El Capitan, it won't let me boot into installation of windows 7. I have the same setup as you, but my CPU are upgraded to a Pair Intel Xeon X5365 SLAED 3.0GHz Quad Core Socket 771 CPU Processor. So I'm not sure if that plays a role. I also have two other HD of operating systems (Lion & El Capitan). For windows 7 I have iso that I put onto a thumb drive, would burning it onto a CD be better for the install process?
[doublepost=1548947501][/doublepost]

I don’t know if you could accomplish the task using parallels. I’ve never used it.

As far as your first question, yes... you do need to create the virtual machine in VMWare.

Tried that and still no luck, I have upgraded my cpu from the last attempt would that of made a difference? Also I am using VMware 5.0 and I keep getting kernel errors when I install Windows 10 onto a VM setup. What version of VM did you use? I don't remember what I had before.

I really pisst that my boot got corrupt on my old HD that I had of Windows 10. My original plan was to take that HD and clone it to a Kingston 128gb SSD for a faster boot. So I had purchased the SSD and retried and no luck. I feel like **** that I have an extra SSD with no usage.
[doublepost=1548947649][/doublepost]Has anyone on this board tried using flyinmac's technique using Parallels Desktop? If so can you explain your method?

 

[flyinmac]

I've tried doing your method onto another hard drive and it kicks back into El Capitan, it won't let me boot into installation of windows 7. I have the same setup as you, but my CPU are upgraded to a Pair Intel Xeon X5365 SLAED 3.0GHz Quad Core Socket 771 CPU Processor. So I'm not sure if that plays a role. I also have two other HD of operating systems (Lion & El Capitan). For windows 7 I have iso that I put onto a thumb drive, would burning it onto a CD be better for the install process?
[doublepost=1548947501][/doublepost]
Tried that and still no luck, I have upgraded my cpu from the last attempt would that of made a difference? Also I am using VMware 5.0 and I keep getting kernel errors when I install Windows 10 onto a VM setup. What version of VM did you use? I don't remember what I had before.

I really pisst that my boot got corrupt on my old HD that I had of Windows 10. My original plan was to take that HD and clone it to a Kingston 128gb SSD for a faster boot. So I had purchased the SSD and retried and no luck. I feel like **** that I have an extra SSD with no usage.
[doublepost=1548947649][/doublepost]Has anyone on this board tried using flyinmac's technique using Parallels Desktop? If so can you explain your method?

I don’t recall the exact version of 5.x that I used for VMWARE. But it was likely 5.0 upgraded to whatever the highest release of 5.x was freely available. So possibly a 5.0.1 or 5.1.x. They should have an update feature in VMware if I remember right. But stay within the 5.x range. Newer versions were stated to have issues dealing with physical disks this way.

That being said... the version of Windows 10 being distributed today, is not the same version of Windows 10 that was being distributed back when I first did this. So it is possible that if you downloaded a newer Windows 10 installer, that it may have compatibility issues with VMware 5.x.

Newer versions of Windows 10 do require more recent hardware (which keep in mind that a virtual machine is just simulated hardware). So for example, I have seen instances where a certain Windows 10 update didn’t want to install on a machine because it was evolving Windows 10 to require different hardware. Granted I got around it eventually with a slight configuration change (changing a few components).

So if you happen to still have your original older Windows 10 installation ISO file from say a few years back... perhaps try with that, instead of a recent version of Windows 10.

Alternatively... there are additional options. You could install the hard drive into another PC temporarily. Install Windows 10 on that drive without activating it. Then once it’s installed, put the hard drive back into the Mac and boot it, finish configuration, then activate it. Granted this method is easier if the drive isn’t partitioned, because a PC really doesn’t know what to do with a HFS+ partition.

 

[LIsquid]

I don’t recall the exact version of 5.x that I used for VMWARE. But it was likely 5.0 upgraded to whatever the highest release of 5.x was freely available. So possibly a 5.0.1 or 5.1.x. They should have an update feature in VMware if I remember right. But stay within the 5.x range. Newer versions were stated to have issues dealing with physical disks this way.

That being said... the version of Windows 10 being distributed today, is not the same version of Windows 10 that was being distributed back when I first did this. So it is possible that if you downloaded a newer Windows 10 installer, that it may have compatibility issues with VMware 5.x.

Newer versions of Windows 10 do require more recent hardware (which keep in mind that a virtual machine is just simulated hardware). So for example, I have seen instances where a certain Windows 10 update didn’t want to install on a machine because it was evolving Windows 10 to require different hardware. Granted I got around it eventually with a slight configuration change (changing a few components).

So if you happen to still have your original older Windows 10 installation ISO file from say a few years back... perhaps try with that, instead of a recent version of Windows 10.

Alternatively... there are additional options. You could install the hard drive into another PC temporarily. Install Windows 10 on that drive without activating it. Then once it’s installed, put the hard drive back into the Mac and boot it, finish configuration, then activate it. Granted this method is easier if the drive isn’t partitioned, because a PC really doesn’t know what to do with a HFS+ partition.

If I follow the last method (Install from a PC), will my Mac understand the SSD ?

 

[flyinmac]

If I follow the last method (Install from a PC), will my Mac understand the SSD ?

Yes, the Mac should recognize the SSD just fine. The main obstacle might be the partitioning method. I believe the Mac will require the GPT partition method. While some PC’s will default to using MBR. So you’ll want to basically partition and format the hard drive on your Mac, then put it in the PC to install Windows on it. Hopefully without Windows trying to reformat it with the MBR scheme.

Once Windows is installed on the PC, do not activate it. Then put the hard drive back into your Mac, in drive bay 1. Temporarily unplug / remove other drives just to simplify the initial process... and turn on the Mac.

Once you have Windows up and running, you can reinsert your other drives, and use the keyboard to invoke the boot menu at startup to choose which drive to boot from.

In the Mac OS, I usually set the OS X drive to be default. Then use the keyboard at startup to invoke the boot menu if I decide I want Windows.

 

[InsightsIE]

Just to chime in: I got Windows 10 installing on bootcamp with a split SSD on the Mac Pro 1,1 even easier than this BUT you will need to go out and buy a 4.7GB DVD.

Look for Windows 10 Pro 64bit that has a customised 32bit EFI installer (or make one yourself) and purchase a license key. Burn it to a DVD.

If you plan to install Windows 10 on a separate HD entirely, you can just boot into the DVD at startup and install it on an MBR partition and enjoy.

But for a split SSD that must use GPT:
Make sure the SSD/Drive is the only one installed in your computer in the first or second bay. Don't know why but I couldn't get it working with other drives in other bays - you can put them back in after Installing Windows. If you don't take them out what happens is after formatting as NTFS in the installer, it will give some weird issue.

Now you can do this with booted into Mac OS El Capitan mod BUT you need the Boot Camp app that comes with Mac OS Lion 10.7.0. Run that older Bootcamp app (can run it in El Capitan) and partition the drive in the app and insert the Windows DVD when asked and it'll boot into the installer. You format the Bootcamp partition to NTFS and it should work.

Find your drivers after and your good to go.

 

[jfkerton]

ok so i'm all good upto getting the files installed on the correct drive and partition (i'm currently trying to dualboot from 1 physical disk and 2 partitions, 1st being osx lion and 2nd the new windows 7/10 64bit). The windows installer restarts as it would do and at that point i would expect to be able to boot into the new windows install but both with the boot menu option and using the hdd as the boot drive in VMware i can't get any further.

Selecting the partition from the boot screen gives me a big x in a grey circle (standard efi boot failure fair) and the VMware gives me a black screen.

any clues as to what i can do next? Bootcamp has never worked so really struggling to get windows anywhere near my old mac pro.

Thanks

 

[penhaphi]

That's great I'm glad you got it working. I'm sorry I hadn't had time yet to work on your files. The holidays are crazy here. And it's hard to sit down at the computer and troubleshoot things until everything settles.

Thank you for posting the details of your solution. The idea is to try and provide others with a path forward.

These machines may not have much life beyond El Capitan as a Mac. But as Windows 10 computers, they still have some future years ahead of them.

And for now, being able to enjoy both worlds is nice.

I'm happy to hear that you got it working. Congratulations.

Hi @flyinmac, I'm still using my trusty old Mac Pro 1,1 which is still running El Capitan as well as Windows 10. Do you know if anyone has ever found a way of upgrading OSX on them beyond El Capitan to perhaps 10.13 High Sierra?

 

[Argyboy]

Hi @flyinmac, I'm still using my trusty old Mac Pro 1,1 which is still running El Capitan as well as Windows 10. Do you know if anyone has ever found a way of upgrading OSX on them beyond El Capitan to perhaps 10.13 High Sierra?

I have never seen anyone reporting that they could upgrade their 1.1 to anything past El Capitan. Sierra and later versions have a CPU architecture requirement that makes the 1.1 totally incompatible. El Capitan is the last version of OSX that you can run on those, and I cannot see any situation where someone would put in the work to create a patch to run later versions, if that's even physically possible.

 

[penhaphi]

I have never seen anyone reporting that they could upgrade their 1.1 to anything past El Capitan. Sierra and later versions have a CPU architecture requirement that makes the 1.1 totally incompatible. El Capitan is the last version of OSX that you can run on those, and I cannot see any situation where someone would put in the work to create a patch to run later versions, if that's even physically possible.

I have looked around and I think you're right. I'm still running El Capitan and W10 and it is working fine. I did find on youtube that you can swap the dual-core CPUs for quad-core which I might do as they are relatively cheap for more power. I'm pretty sure I'm still on firmware 1,1 and know one can upgrade to 2,1 but not sure what the advantage of that firmware upgrade is?