Resolved rMBP, Bootcamp off thunderbolt drive - MORE COMPLETE SOLUTION

[shortcut3d]

I have been running Windows 7 Professional x64 from the Seagate GoFlex Thunderbolt 2.5" adapter with a 256GB Samsung 830 since the adapter was released. The most basic process is the following:

1. Install Windows 7 via Boot Camp to the internal drive and complete all the driver installation.

2. Install Norton Ghost for shadow copy (free with Samsung 830)

3. Clone the Windows 7 partition copying the MBR to the external Thunderbolt drive.

4. Shutdown. Disconnect the external Thunderbolt drive.

5. Restart to OSX.

6. Remove the Boot Camp partition created in step 1.

7. Restart to OSX.

8. Connect external Thunderbolt drive with clone of Windows 7.

9. Select Boot Camp drive from Startup Disks in Utilities and restart to Windows 7.

10. Check to ensure Windows 7 successfully boots.

11. Restart Windows 7 and use the Option key to boot to OSX.

12. Shutdown the system and restart doing a PRAM reset.

Use the Option key while booting to select the OS or Startup Disk in Utilities. Do not use Apple's Boot Camp software under Windows 7 to change the start disk.

 

[iMacDragon]

I have been running Windows 7 Professional x64 from the Seagate GoFlex Thunderbolt 2.5" adapter with a 256GB Samsung 830 since the adapter was released. The most basic process is the following:

I assume not read the thread.. something in rMBP setup breaks this.

 

[Mikewh]

I have been running Windows 7 Professional x64 from the Seagate GoFlex Thunderbolt 2.5" adapter with a 256GB Samsung 830 since the adapter was released. The most basic process is the following:

1. Install Windows 7 via Boot Camp to the internal drive and complete all the driver installation.

2. Install Norton Ghost for shadow copy (free with Samsung 830)

3. Clone the Windows 7 partition copying the MBR to the external Thunderbolt drive.

4. Shutdown. Disconnect the external Thunderbolt drive.

5. Restart to OSX.

6. Remove the Boot Camp partition created in step 1.

7. Restart to OSX.

8. Connect external Thunderbolt drive with clone of Windows 7.

9. Select Boot Camp drive from Startup Disks in Utilities and restart to Windows 7.

10. Check to ensure Windows 7 successfully boots.

11. Restart Windows 7 and use the Option key to boot to OSX.

12. Shutdown the system and restart doing a PRAM reset.

Use the Option key while booting to select the OS or Startup Disk in Utilities. Do not use Apple's Boot Camp software under Windows 7 to change the start disk.

Actually I tried your method during this process but the rMBP and likely the 2012 MBP are requiring a small internal partition in order to run the external thunderbolt windows 7.

 

[shortcut3d]

Actually I tried your method during this process but the rMBP and likely the 2012 MBP are requiring a small internal partition in order to run the external thunderbolt windows 7.

I had the same issue when initially trying to clone the partition. The two key steps are to make sure the MBR is copied using Norton Ghost (full complete clone) AND you must not go through any boot process with both partitions connected. This will corrupt the Windows bootloader. I have not figured out a way to revert this. I've tried editing the bootloader and it does not fix the problem. Shutdown immediately after cloning and disconnect the external drive. I remove the Boot Camp partition in Disk Utilities as well.

When I first tried this method, I restarted to OSX with the drive connected and deleted the first Boot Camp partition and it behaved as everyone has noted. Disconnecting the external cloned Boot Camp drive was the missing step.

 

[Mikewh]

I had the same issue when initially trying to clone the partition. The two key steps are to make sure the MBR is copied using Norton Ghost (full complete clone) AND you must not go through any boot process with both partitions connected. This will corrupt the Windows bootloader. I have not figured out a way to revert this. I've tried editing the bootloader and it does not fix the problem. Shutdown immediately after cloning and disconnect the external drive. I remove the Boot Camp partition in Disk Utilities as well.

When I first tried this method, I restarted to OSX with the drive connected and deleted the first Boot Camp partition and it behaved as everyone has noted. Disconnecting the external cloned Boot Camp drive was the missing step.

I'll try again but I did use your method prev. What partition did you have on your external: guid or mbr?

 

[Mikewh]

I had the same issue when initially trying to clone the partition. The two key steps are to make sure the MBR is copied using Norton Ghost (full complete clone) AND you must not go through any boot process with both partitions connected. This will corrupt the Windows bootloader. I have not figured out a way to revert this. I've tried editing the bootloader and it does not fix the problem. Shutdown immediately after cloning and disconnect the external drive. I remove the Boot Camp partition in Disk Utilities as well.

When I first tried this method, I restarted to OSX with the drive connected and deleted the first Boot Camp partition and it behaved as everyone has noted. Disconnecting the external cloned Boot Camp drive was the missing step.

It's official, your method for rMBP does not work. I indeed removed the drive before reboot as well. the rMBP and likely the new cMBP's need an internal partition in which windows 7 will place a bootloader even with primary install to thunderbolt drive. My method of installing a small partition manually seems to be the only solution at this time. For some reason(Likely with the internal partition a "hybrid" mbr is updated on the internal drive to allow the external boot) without the internal partition, the external thunderbolt will not boot into windows.

 

[zwaldowski]

I got Windows 8 To Go running on my rMBP with an external Thunderbolt by booting from a WinPE USB stick with the install.wim and applying it using dism and bcdboot. However, I was only able to get it to work with BIOS boot; I had to convert the drive back to MBR. The EFI boot files would copy just fine and the Startup Manager would recognize it, but the Windows loader would never be able to actually start. Either it would fail out immediately being unable to find the winload.efi or would start loading and then bluescreen with INACCESSIBLE_BOOT_DEVICE. I'd survive if I couldn't get it working with EFI, but I'd like to if at all possible. What gives?

 

[Mikewh]

I got Windows 8 To Go running on my rMBP with an external Thunderbolt by booting from a WinPE USB stick with the install.wim and applying it using dism and bcdboot. However, I was only able to get it to work with BIOS boot; I had to convert the drive back to MBR. The EFI boot files would copy just fine and the Startup Manager would recognize it, but the Windows loader would never be able to actually start. Either it would fail out immediately being unable to find the winload.efi or would start loading and then bluescreen with INACCESSIBLE_BOOT_DEVICE. I'd survive if I couldn't get it working with EFI, but I'd like to if at all possible. What gives?

Have you tried creating the small partition on the internal drive and then doing the install? (I haven't played with win 8 yet, I have no idea if the install method has changed) For Windows 7, the install puts a small bootloader on the internal partition that likely maps the external drive.

 

[mixvio]

I didn't need to do anything on the internal drive at all (in fact I wiped the boot camp partition I'd made before because when trying to get Windows 7 to work I kept booting into that installation and not the one on the USB disc) to get Windows 8 to work. It was all on the external disc.

I just followed the instructions in the link I posted earlier (here, if anyone missed it) within Windows 7 and it worked fine for me. I just had to create the two partitions as directed and that's all it took. It was absolutely painless.

I'm wondering if some of these issues involve the disc and/or enclosure itself. I finally got it working over a USB 2.0 enclosure, and when I went to put the same working SSD in a USB 3.0 one it wouldn't boot at all anymore. It took two other USB 3.0 enclosures before I found one that would let me boot, but meanwhile the USB 2.0 one gave me no trouble. I vaguely remember some issues like this around making bootable HD clones with Carbon Copy Cloner.

Personally USB 2.0 worked fine and I really cannot tell you if there's any performance impact going over the USB bus, and I only tried thunderbolt because it looked like that would be more compatible with Windows 7. I upgraded to USB 3.0 because it looked like a decent performance middleground but even using that for a few days I don't notice any difference between that and the old USB 2.0 enclosure. The Windows Performance Index reports one (5.3 on USB 2.0 vs 5.6 on USB 3.0 and 5.9 with a normal 5400RPM HD in my desktop) but in an "actually using it" sense I really can't tell.

 

[zwaldowski]

Have you tried creating the small partition on the internal drive and then doing the install? (I haven't played with win 8 yet, I have no idea if the install method has changed) For Windows 7, the install puts a small bootloader on the internal partition that likely maps the external drive.

Yeah, I've tried it all sorts of different ways. This is the basic method. Do note that even Microsoft creates an MBR disk.

My rMBP's internal SSD has the typical 3-partion layout: EFI system partition, OS X, and Recovery. My external drive has four: EFI system partition, Time Machine, a 350 MB support partition, and the Windows NTFS. I was able to do it before by putting the boot stuff on the EFI system partition of the external disk and using a hybrid MBR. I'll probably go back to that once I finish being frustrated with this situation.

I've tried it every way I could, and here are the results:

• External hybrid MBR, EFI boot files on internal EFI system partition: can't find win load
• External hybrid MBR, EFI boot files on external support partition: can't find win load
• External hybrid MBR, MBR boot files on external support partition: boots successfully
• External hybrid MBR that contains the EFI partition, and MBR boot files on EFI system partition: boots successfully
• External GPT, boot files on internal EFI partition: starts booting, INACCESSIBLE_BOOT_DEVICE
• External GPT, external EFI partition: same.
• External GPT, external support partition: same.

Obviously, I can't try MBR boot when it's GPT; the Startup Manager avoids it like the plague.

The weird issue seems to be that in proper EFI/GPT mode, the loader is able to find the boot executable (I'm able to get to the options menu, safe mode and all that) and start loading things. Might have something to do with SATA/AHCI when the Windows 8 drivers try and take over. It's even loaded enough to recognize when it fails multiple times. So that's weird.

I didn't need to do anything on the internal drive at all (in fact I wiped the boot camp partition I'd made before because when trying to get Windows 7 to work I kept booting into that installation and not the one on the USB disc) to get Windows 8 to work. It was all on the external disc.

I just followed the instructions in the link I posted earlier (here, if anyone missed it) within Windows 7 and it worked fine for me. I just had to create the two partitions as directed and that's all it took. It was absolutely painless.

I'm wondering if some of these issues involve the disc and/or enclosure itself. I finally got it working over a USB 2.0 enclosure, and when I went to put the same working SSD in a USB 3.0 one it wouldn't boot at all anymore. It took two other USB 3.0 enclosures before I found one that would let me boot, but meanwhile the USB 2.0 one gave me no trouble. I vaguely remember some issues like this around making bootable HD clones with Carbon Copy Cloner.

Personally USB 2.0 worked fine and I really cannot tell you if there's any performance impact going over the USB bus, and I only tried thunderbolt because it looked like that would be more compatible with Windows 7. I upgraded to USB 3.0 because it looked like a decent performance middleground but even using that for a few days I don't notice any difference between that and the old USB 2.0 enclosure. The Windows Performance Index reports one (5.3 on USB 2.0 vs 5.6 on USB 3.0 and 5.9 with a normal 5400RPM HD in my desktop) but in an "actually using it" sense I really can't tell.

Yeah, upsettingly, having it be MBR (or hybrid MBR) seems to be the key. Doesn't explain to me why none of the EFI stuff works at all, though.

 

[murphychris]

[*] External hybrid MBR, EFI boot files on internal EFI system partition: can't find win load
[*] External hybrid MBR, EFI boot files on external support partition: can't find win load

I can't tell if you're actually getting an EFI boot or MBR boot. If you have hybrid MBR with an entry that has the active flag set and the MBR boot code area contains code, then Apple's EFI loads a CSM which in turn executes the boot code in the MBR. If you have two such disks, you have no control over which code is executed and there's some (weak) evidence different firmwares behave differently.

[*] External hybrid MBR, MBR boot files on external support partition: boots successfully

This is expected behavior, although I don't know exactly what you mean by MBR boot files - maybe you mean the BIOS bootloader stage files.

The disk does not need to be a hybrid MBR however, the disk can be (pure) MBR only without any GPT structures at all. This is a CSM boot. Not EFI boot.

[*] External hybrid MBR that contains the EFI partition, and MBR boot files on EFI system partition: boots successfully

The MBR itself does not contain an entry for the EFI system partition, but rather an entry for the sectors that compromise the GPT and the EFI System partition. So how are these boot files getting on the EFI system partition? Benign but doesn't seem to be a good idea.

The way BIOS booting Windows works on Apple hardware is once the CSM is loaded, it blindly loads code in the first disk's MBR (the first 440 bytes of LBA 0). That code is so tiny all it can tell the CPU is to jump to a different LBA and start loading the code. The computer doesn't know anything about a file system at this point, let alone a partition map. So it's just blindly loading and executing code. At each bootloader stage, it gets smarter, and can do more things, pretty quickly it knows about MBR only and then NTFS and then it can start locating executables by reading the NTFS file system rather than blindly asking for a series of LBAs.

EFI booting is completely different. The firmware itself already understands MBR, GPT, FAT16, FAT32, and HFS+ (Apple EFI firmware does, anyway).

[*] External GPT, boot files on internal EFI partition: starts booting, INACCESSIBLE_BOOT_DEVICE
[*] External GPT, external EFI partition: same.
[*] External GPT, external support partition: same.

What boot files? The problem with all of this testing is that it's not obvious whether you're getting an EFI boot, or CSM-BIOS boot. If CSM-BIOS mode boot can boot from Thunderbolt (or USB) without the bus resetting then certainly EFI booting can. So it's a bit unclear to me why this starts to work and then fails.

I'd say you need a different EFI bootloader and possibly a different kernel, that have debug modes to provide more detailed information about what's happening as it happens.

Those would be GRUB2 for CSM-BIOS booting, and Linux.

And either GRUB Legacy EFI, or GRUB 2 EFI, for EFI booting. I'm not sure if all of the Apple EFI support code from Red Hat's GRUB Legacy EFI have been incorporated into GRUB 2 beta 6, which is currently in Fedora 18 alpha. In Fedora 17 they are still using GRUB Legacy EFI. So it's an open question which of them to use.

Obviously, I can't try MBR boot when it's GPT; the Startup Manager avoids it like the plague.

I'm not sure what you mean by MBR boot. Do you mean CSM/BIOS boot?

Windows detecting BIOS will only honor an MBR on boot disks. Windows detecting EFI will only honor a GPT on boot disks.

Apple's EFI recognizes and will boot from either MBR or GPT disks, even Mac OS X (it's just the installer that will refuse to install Mac OS X to an MBR disk).

The weird issue seems to be that in proper EFI/GPT mode, the loader is able to find the boot executable (I'm able to get to the options menu, safe mode and all that) and start loading things. Might have something to do with SATA/AHCI when the Windows 8 drivers try and take over. It's even loaded enough to recognize when it fails multiple times. So that's weird.

What model Apple computer?

I know that on a MBP 4,1 and MBP 8,2 that EFI mode booting of either an MBR or GPT disk from USB is possible because I've done it many times with GRUB and Linux. The hardware can do it. I don't know about Thunderbolt because I don't have a Thunderbolt disk to test on the MBP 8,2.

Yeah, upsettingly, having it be MBR (or hybrid MBR) seems to be the key. Doesn't explain to me why none of the EFI stuff works at all, though.

Well the MBR or hybrid MBR is one requirement to get the CSM to activate, that's one of the keys.

Why the Windows 8 EFI bootloader isn't working I'm not sure, but it wouldn't surprise me if it has something to do with Windows Vista, 7, and 8 all requiring UEFI 2.x as a minimum firmware for EFI booting. And Apple does not implement UEFI 2.x, but rather Intel EFI 1.10 with some bits of UEFI 2.x (i.e. GOP). There is a separate thread of people working on getting EFI mode boot of Windows to work on Apple hardware but it's taking some hacking.

 

[zwaldowski]

I can't tell if you're actually getting an EFI boot or MBR boot. If you have hybrid MBR with an entry that has the active flag set and the MBR boot code area contains code, then Apple's EFI loads a CSM which in turn executes the boot code in the MBR. If you have two such disks, you have no control over which code is executed and there's some (weak) evidence different firmwares behave differently.

Both of the first two are (failing) EFI boots - the error screen is in full resolution.

This is expected behavior, although I don't know exactly what you mean by MBR boot files - maybe you mean the BIOS bootloader stage files.

The disk does not need to be a hybrid MBR however, the disk can be (pure) MBR only without any GPT structures at all. This is a CSM boot. Not EFI boot.

Yes, I do mean the BIOS bootloader stage files. Right, I know that. I prefer to have it with hybrid MBR because having GPT allows me to cram the boot files into the EFI System Partition (Windows refuses to mount it when in pure GPT mode, rightly, of course) while also hiding any support partitions in OS X.

The MBR itself does not contain an entry for the EFI system partition, but rather an entry for the sectors that compromise the GPT and the EFI System partition. So how are these boot files getting on the EFI system partition? Benign but doesn't seem to be a good idea... (snip)... What boot files? The problem with all of this testing is that it's not obvious whether you're getting an EFI boot, or CSM-BIOS boot. If CSM-BIOS mode boot can boot from Thunderbolt (or USB) without the bus resetting then certainly EFI booting can. So it's a bit unclear to me why this starts to work and then fails.

The Windows To Go method involves using an updated version of bcdboot in Windows 8 that copies the necessary files for both a BIOS boot and an EFI boot to a specified volume. Since this is just an external drive, EFI partition or not, a 200MB FAT volume is a 200MB FAT volume.

I'm just as confused. In the end I'm able to boot Windows just fine entirely from my USB 3 drive by having the boot files be on the external drive's ESP, of course, that's just in BIOS mode.

I'd say you need a different EFI bootloader and possibly a different kernel, that have debug modes to provide more detailed information about what's happening as it happens.

Those would be GRUB2 for CSM-BIOS booting, and Linux.

And either GRUB Legacy EFI, or GRUB 2 EFI, for EFI booting. I'm not sure if all of the Apple EFI support code from Red Hat's GRUB Legacy EFI have been incorporated into GRUB 2 beta 6, which is currently in Fedora 18 alpha. In Fedora 17 they are still using GRUB Legacy EFI. So it's an open question which of them to use.

Good insight. I'll investigate later.

I'm not sure what you mean by MBR boot. Do you mean CSM/BIOS boot?

Yup.

Windows detecting BIOS will only honor an MBR on boot disks. Windows detecting EFI will only honor a GPT on boot disks.

Apple's EFI recognizes and will boot from either MBR or GPT disks, even Mac OS X (it's just the installer that will refuse to install Mac OS X to an MBR disk).

Right, but a full (non-hybrid) GPT disk seems to have any MBR-capable boot partitions ignored.

What model Apple computer?

The Retina MacBook Pro (10,1).

I know that on a MBP 4,1 and MBP 8,2 that EFI mode booting of either an MBR or GPT disk from USB is possible because I've done it many times with GRUB and Linux. The hardware can do it. I don't know about Thunderbolt because I don't have a Thunderbolt disk to test on the MBP 8,2.

I've done it many times before myself, though not yet on this precise machine. It's definitely capable, but USB3 and/or Thunderbolt may be throwing a spanner in the works.

Why the Windows 8 EFI bootloader isn't working I'm not sure, but it wouldn't surprise me if it has something to do with Windows Vista, 7, and 8 all requiring UEFI 2.x as a minimum firmware for EFI booting. And Apple does not implement UEFI 2.x, but rather Intel EFI 1.10 with some bits of UEFI 2.x (i.e. GOP). There is a separate thread of people working on getting EFI mode boot of Windows to work on Apple hardware but it's taking some hacking.

Yeah, I fear that that's the culprit. It's the strangest thing, though. If I were to pop in a fresh Windows 8 DVD and/or USB stick and install it fresh to my internal disk, everything would work great in full native EFI. Though, I think at last attempt there were video card issues, so maybe it's better that it's not working. Oh well, I'm happy with what I've arrived to. Now to reboot into Windows and play some games.

 

[mixvio]

Oh well, I'm happy with what I've arrived to. Now to reboot into Windows and play some games.

Uh oh!

 

[murphychris]

Right, but a full (non-hybrid) GPT disk seems to have any MBR-capable boot partitions ignored.

Apple's CSM is only loaded when the following three things are true: There is an MBR with more than a single 0xEE entry (i.e. if it is only a PMBR the CSM is not activated); one MBR entry, other than the 1st 0xEE entry, has the active flag set; there is bootloader code in the first 440 bytes of LBA0.

So if you want CSM-BIOS boot on Apple hardware, you must have either a hybrid MBR, or pure MBR only. The hybrid MBR is non-standard and basically dangerous, it invites data loss, so it's a huge criticism of mine when it comes to Boot Camp. That we also don't get full AHCI or ACPI support with the CSM means the foreign OS is limited in performance as well.

I've done it many times before myself, though not yet on this precise machine. It's definitely capable, but USB3 and/or Thunderbolt may be throwing a spanner in the works.

I'd suggest it's a Windows EFI bootloader bug or deficiency, but could just as well be a kernel or driver bug or deficiency. The fact is starts to boot OK but subsequently fails probably indicates it's not a firmware problem.

Yeah, I fear that that's the culprit. It's the strangest thing, though. If I were to pop in a fresh Windows 8 DVD and/or USB stick and install it fresh to my internal disk, everything would work great in full native EFI.

Again, seems to indicate it's not a firmware problem, but is happening in later bootloader or kernel and driver execution portion of bootstrapping.

Now to reboot into Windows and play some games.

Too bad there isn't a :vomit: smiley.

 

[shortcut3d]

It's official, your method for rMBP does not work. I indeed removed the drive before reboot as well. the rMBP and likely the new cMBP's need an internal partition in which windows 7 will place a bootloader even with primary install to thunderbolt drive. My method of installing a small partition manually seems to be the only solution at this time. For some reason(Likely with the internal partition a "hybrid" mbr is updated on the internal drive to allow the external boot) without the internal partition, the external thunderbolt will not boot into windows.

Maybe its the AHCI hack. Or Apple changed something with Ivy Bridge.

 

[jamswirl]

I'm coming to this party a little late sorry, has anybody actually been able to reliably boot off an external thunderbolt drive into windows on the MBPr? Thanks.

 

[Mikewh]

absolutely. using my method of a small internal partition and then install to the thunderbolt. see beginning of thread for method.

 

[jamswirl]

Thanks for the guide. Has worked well so far and was easy enough to set up.
Just one question, when resizing your disk with the partition, I typed 1g instead of 5g, but the partition still formed at 5gb. Doesn't matter at all, but is that the minimum it will do in this situation?

 

[Mikewh]

I think by adjusting the Mac partition a few moe gb it would allow a smaller partition. I also know that what ever is unallocated goes to this smaller new partition

 

[ma.con]

I didn't need to do anything on the internal drive at all (in fact I wiped the boot camp partition I'd made before because when trying to get Windows 7 to work I kept booting into that installation and not the one on the USB disc) to get Windows 8 to work. It was all on the external disc.

I just followed the instructions in the link I posted earlier (here, if anyone missed it) within Windows 7 and it worked fine for me. I just had to create the two partitions as directed and that's all it took. It was absolutely painless.

I'm wondering if some of these issues involve the disc and/or enclosure itself. I finally got it working over a USB 2.0 enclosure, and when I went to put the same working SSD in a USB 3.0 one it wouldn't boot at all anymore. It took two other USB 3.0 enclosures before I found one that would let me boot, but meanwhile the USB 2.0 one gave me no trouble. I vaguely remember some issues like this around making bootable HD clones with Carbon Copy Cloner.
[...]

I have exactly the same situation on my MacBook Pro Retina.
I followed the instructions from your link (thanks for that) and I can get windows to boot from an USB 2.0 enclosure, but it's just not working over USB 3.0 (Lian-Li EX10)..
Would you mind telling me what kind of USB 3.0 enclosures you tried and especially which one is working?

thanks in advance!

 

[Mikewh]

I've used the enclosure from macsales.com for USB 3 and th combo buffalo drive with thunderbolt and USB 3. I have not had windows boot from USB. only thunderbolt via method. windows likely needs mod to load USB 3 drivers. since thunderbt works no need for USB 3 for me. I do use USB 3 to clone the Mac drive and will boot Mac OS via usb3 no problem

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it looks like your quote came from mixvio who may have more insite

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it looks like your quote came from mixvio who may have more insite

 

[mixvio]

I have exactly the same situation on my MacBook Pro Retina.
I followed the instructions from your link (thanks for that) and I can get windows to boot from an USB 2.0 enclosure, but it's just not working over USB 3.0 (Lian-Li EX10)..
Would you mind telling me what kind of USB 3.0 enclosures you tried and especially which one is working?

thanks in advance!

It might not help much since I'm in Australia, but this is the one I'm presently using:

http://www.skycomp.com.au/item/Shin...SATA-HDD-to-USB-3-0--One-Touch.aspx?id=265731

The USB 2.0 enclosure I had working before was from ASTONE, I think. I did also have some luck with those Seagate plug and play ones but they needed an external plug in addition to the USB one and I wanted something that only needed one cable.

 

[ma.con]

It might not help much since I'm in Australia, but this is the one I'm presently using:

http://www.skycomp.com.au/item/Shin...SATA-HDD-to-USB-3-0--One-Touch.aspx?id=265731

The USB 2.0 enclosure I had working before was from ASTONE, I think. I did also have some luck with those Seagate plug and play ones but they needed an external plug in addition to the USB one and I wanted something that only needed one cable.

I was trying to find the one you have here in Germany, but it Looks like that's impossible.
Then I exchanged my enclosure for another one, seems i was lucky since now it's working via USB 3.0 flawlessly.
In case anyone might be interested which enclosure I bought, it's this one: http://www.sharkoon.com/?q=en/node/1245

 

[kimovski]

Today tried installed on a HDD (WD Scorpio blue) through a thunderbolt adapter , after loading the windows files, the setup freezes
Before tried with a 128 M4 SSD, installed without problems. Any thoughts about it? Is this way of installation don't accept HDD drives?

Cheers

 

[Mikewh]

Today tried installed on a HDD (WD Scorpio blue) through a thunderbolt adapter , after loading the windows files, the setup freezes
Before tried with a 128 M4 SSD, installed without problems. Any thoughts about it? Is this way of installation don't accept HDD drives?

Cheers

I've been able to install to both ssd and hdds without a problem. only word of advice is to start the install over