Q: Bootcamp without Optical disc drive

ops .. I'm sorry, had ignored this part is very well explained ..

yet still not displaying "bootable = yes" in the "Disk Utility", see:

(remembering that the prints were made after restarting my imac)

The boot ability on this screen is EFI-based boot ability. MBR-based boot ability is determined by the CSM-BIOS layer. Can you try to power-cycle the Mac and hold the Alt/Option key. Do you see a Windows selection?

no, not yet appeared the option of initialization for windows .. = (

There is still something I can do?

I need to install a boot loader?

No. The Apple Bootmanager should allow you to boot from the partition.

- Do you think it did not work yet because I'm doing something wrong?

- Repeat the steps again to see if it's wrong?

- To boot the installation you need only copy the files inside the .ISO into the NTFS partition created?

Hey, for the people out there who are having trouble with this subject, I'll give you my solution. I have an early 2006 iMac that I installed bootcamp on by creating a bootable usb on a windows computer and holding down the c key when my mac turned on. One day, that didn't work. It really sucked. I has been months now, but from other forums, I got this figured out. First, download this file from my dropbox https://www.dropbox.com/s/rekxut9ogimv7z6/refind-bin-0.8.7.zip?dl=0 Then, unzip it. Then, open Terminal and drag the file to the terminal window until a green plus appears and release. Then, hit enter. It will begin installation. After that, reboot your Mac and the bootmanager will show up!

Can you please provide us the installation procedure on this? Any command on the terminal we should use after we drag and drop your file? Do we need the USB Win7 bootable disk ready?

how can I do this? 5. Use GPT Fdisk to mark the NTFS partition as bootable.

GJZen wrote:

 

how can I do this? 5. Use GPT Fdisk to mark the NTFS partition as bootable.

Please see the second set of Gdisk steps in the solved section Windows 7 Vanished after Yosemite update... help? .

This is what I got from my terminal window. Seems I can't go any further?

MacBook-Pro:~ Daddy$ sudo gpt -vv -r show /dev/disk0s5

Password:

gpt show: unable to open device '/dev/disk0s5': Resource busy

MacBook-Pro:~ Daddy$ Sudo gdisk /dev/rdisk0s5

GPT fdisk (gdisk) version 1.0.0

Partition table scan:

  MBR: MBR only

  BSD: not present

  APM: not present

  GPT: not present

***************************************************************

Found invalid GPT and valid MBR; converting MBR to GPT format

in memory. THIS OPERATION IS POTENTIALLY DESTRUCTIVE! Exit by

typing 'q' if you don't want to convert your MBR partitions

to GPT format!

***************************************************************

Exact type match not found for type code 7000; assigning type code for

'Apple HFS/HFS+'

Exact type match not found for type code 4300; assigning type code for

'Apple HFS/HFS+'

Exact type match not found for type code 7200; assigning type code for

'Apple HFS/HFS+'

Warning! Secondary partition table overlaps the last partition by

3576515959 blocks!

You will need to delete this partition or resize it in another utility.

Command (? for help):

I got stuck here:

GPT partition #4 does not exist or is too big; skipping.

Unused partition space(s) found. Use one to protect more partitions? (Y/N): N

Recovery/transformation command (? for help):

Your environment seems different with an MBR disk. Please 'q' out of GPT Fdisk.

Can you start a new discussion and post the output of

diskutil list

diskutil cs list

sudo gpt -vv -r show /dev/disk0

sudo fdisk /dev/disk0

Thank you for your kind assistance.

BTW, I was able to successfully:

5. Use GPT Fdisk to mark the NTFS partition as bootable.

6. Power cycle your Mac and hold the Alt Key and select the NTFS partition and test.

But after reboot with Alt/Option key on hold, I can select the NTFS partition it boots to just black screen (with blinking underscore at the upper left corner.

BTW, where do you live? I live in HK.

I'll do what you ask for in a separate discussion. Please go to this link: How to Install Windows via USB with iMac with No Optical Drive

If the output of

sudo dd if=/dev/rdisk0sN count=1 2>/dev/null  hexdump -C

shows a valid NTFS header, and you can see files in the Bootcamp volume, then you will needs Windows Startup repair.

The value of 'N' in the command must point to the disk which has your Windows partition. You can find it using diskutil list command in Terminal.