How To Install Windows 8 On Mac
Posted September 15, 2011 – 5:37 pm in: Windows 8 GuidesFor all those Mac users who have been eagerly waiting to test drive the next generation Windows 8 operating system on their Mac, here is the simple procedure that you need to follow to install Windows 8 on your Mac using the Boot Camp Assistant software.
What you will need:
# Windows 8 DVD, ISO, or USB
(Download Windows 8 Developer Preview ISOs)
# A USB drive with 8GB or more capacity
# One hour free time
We are going to use the Boot Camp Assistant software available on Mac. Boot Camp helps you install Windows OS on Intel-based Mac by downloading the necessary support software, creating a partition on your disk for Windows, and then starting the Windows installer.
NOTE: We assume that you have an Intel-based Mac machine with Boot Camp Assistant version 4.0 or later. It’s always a good idea to backup the important data on your computer before installing Windows on Mac. We used Mac mini (mid 2011) to install Windows 8 on the Mac. The procedure to install Windows 8 on other Mac machines might be a bit different.
Procedure:
Step 1: Launch Boot Camp Assistant software. To launch it, go to Utilities and click on Boot Camp Assistant to open it.
Step 2: Once launched, click Continue button on the introduction screen to see the list of options available for your Mac. You will see three options:
# Create a Windows 7 install disk
# Download the latest Windows support software from Apple
# Install Windows 7
If Create a Windows 7 install disk option is not available on your Mac, it’s because your computer doesn’t support installing Windows from USB flash drive. Simply select the other options available and click Continue button.
By default, all three options are enabled. If you are on Mac Mini or MacBook Air, use the first option (Create a Windows 7 install disk) to create a bootable Windows 8 USB flash drive to install Windows 8 directly from USB flash drive. Click Continue button to proceed to the next step.
Step 3: (Please skip this step if you haven’t selected Create a Windows 7 install disk option in the above step) In this step, you need to select the Windows 8 ISO file and the USB device that you want to use to install Windows 8. Boot Camp Assistant will create a bootable USB drive for Windows 8 installation. Once you select the ISO file and destination USB drive, click Continue button.
Click Continue button if you are prompted with “The drive will be erased” message. Boot Camp Assistant may take a several minutes to create the bootable Windows 8 USB drive (it will also download Windows support software from Apple). Once Boot Camp Assistant finishes creating bootable Windows 8 USB, you will get “Boot Camp Assistant is trying to add new helper tool. Type your password to allow this” message. Type in the password and click Add Helper button to continue.
Step 4: Boot Camp Assistant now takes you to Create a partition for Windows window. Drag the divider between the partitions to set the size of the partitions. We recommend a minimum of 30 GB for Windows partition (Microsoft recommends 16 GB but if you want to install other software on Windows 8, allocate 30GB).
Click Install button to start partitioning the drive and then begin installing Windows 8 on your Mac. Your Mac machine will automatically reboot to begin installing Windows. You will see “Booting from Boot Camp Assistant created boot drive” message.
OR
If you haven’t selected Create a Windows 7 install disk option in step 2, please insert the Windows 8 installation DVD into the tray and click Install button to start partitioning the drive and then Windows installation. Your Mac machine will automatically reboot to begin installing Windows.
From here on follow the on screen procedure until you need to select a partition to install Windows. In the Where do you want to install Windows? screen, select the partition named BOOTCAMP to install Windows 8. Make sure that you format the BOOTCAMP partition before selecting it as an unformatted drive may give “Windows cannot be installed to this disk x partition x” error.
To format the BOOTCAMP partition, select the partition in the list, click Drive options (advanced) and then click Format button. Click Ok button for the prompt.
Click Next button to begin installing Windows 8 on BOOTCAMP partition. Follow the on screen instructions to finish installing and configuring Windows 8. If you are new to installing Windows 8, follow our step-by-step Windows 8 installation procedure.
Step 5: Once Windows 8 is installed and running, you need to install Mac-specific drivers and other support software for Windows. The support software is on the same USB drive if you have selected Download the latest support software from Apple in step 2. Open the Windows 8 USB flash drive (that you have created using Boot Camp Assistant)and navigate to WindowsSupport folder and then double-click on setup.exe file to start installing all drivers and Apple Software Update.
If you are getting “Boot Camp requires that your computer is running Windows 7” error, then you need manually install all drivers and Apple Software Update. Open the Windows 8 USB drive and navigate to Drivers > Apple. Here you will find all Apple drivers and other software. Manually install all required drivers one-by-one.
If you want to install drivers for third-party hardware such as NVidia and ATI, you can find the required drivers under Drivers folder in the same drive. Good luck!
If you get Software you are installing has not passed Windows Logo testing message, click Continue Anyway button.
When you switch on your Mac, hold down the Alt key or Option key to see an option to boot into Windows or Mac. Good luck!
Also check out these guides:
# How to install Windows 8 from USB flash drive
# How to install Windows 8 from ISO file
# How to install Windows 8 on VMware virtual machine
# How to install Windows 8 on VirtualBox virtual machine
# Windows 8 installation procedure (step-by-step)
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6 Comments
Thanks for the writeup, I was just looking for this for almost an hour.
Will give windows 8 a shot soon in my mac
I followed all the above steps and it worked fine, I did have the issue of right click and wifi and what not working.
I decided to install the drivers as per the last part, but after restarting it now displays the windows unlock screen for a second and then goes black. nothing I do after that will wake the screen. I think that maybe it was the mac display driver that has caused this. I have tried to locate the driver in the system 32 folder but cant. Looks like a fresh install for me.
@Matthew
Are you trying to install Windows 8 on Apple iMac?
@Karthik
Make sure that you install all drivers (as mentioned in the last part of the guide) for a good experience.
Didn’t work for me. Using OSX Lion and downloaded the latest support software. Had to create a CD for the support software, and a DVD for the Windows 8 ISO… Windows 8 installed fine via bootcamp, however, it wouldn’t allow me to install any drivers or run the setup.exe from the support CD, so it was kinda silly to try the OS without any proper drivers….
To install drivers,
1. Select the BootCamp setup
2. Right click and select TroubleShoot Compatibility. If not able to right click, select the ‘Application Tools’ from the ribbon bar and click ‘TroubleShoot Compatibility’
3. Select Windows 7 and run. If it shows Windows XP, click next, select the first checkbox saying ‘This program worked in earlier version’, click next and select windows 7 option.
The BootCamp will install all drivers like Sound, WiFi for you.
Happy Programming Windows in Mac