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Win7 x64 booting natively via EFI (no bios emulation)?

Hi, has anyone got Win7 x64 booting natively via EFI without bios emulation or know of any resources elsewhere that discuss this? I understand it would have to be on an independent GUID partitioned HD... so not using bootcamp... ruling out all but Mac Pro's I suppose.

Any insights would be helpful.

2009 Mac Pro, 2008 MBA, 3G iPhone, Mac OS X (10.5.6), 2009 Time Capsule

Posted on May 5, 2009 10:33 AM

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8 replies

May 5, 2009 11:25 AM in response to VirtualRain

They do, I've done it twice if you want to boot from a system and avoid the "Select..." screen that comes up. That is not native EFI, this is to bypass the UEFI screen and be able to boot Windows 7 64-bit.

The article by Jowie was updated, it isn't easy to follow as far as step by step but it is one of the 2-3 methods that will.

You have to burn the ISO to DVD, write the DVD back to disk and then write a modified DVD that now will boot.

I have the 2006 Mac Pro that otherwise can't boot from 64-bit Vista SP1 or later due to the EFI64 UEFI boot menu "Select 1, 2" that otherwise comes up.

-----

Using latest Imgburn and following tips on what options to select, was able to take and modify the ISO to allow booting and not getting the EFI boot menu.


http://jowie.com/blog/post/2008/02/24/Select-CD-ROM-Boot-Type-prompt-while-tryin g-to-boot-from-Vista-x64-DVD-burnt-from-iso-file.aspx

http://www.imgburn.com/

Just entered the parameters from Jowie and it did the rest.

Took DVD I had burned with 7077, wrote to disk, modifies it, and when burned back to new (bootable) DVD. Also worked with the system recovery CD that Windows 7 now offers to create, just have to redo the CD, but boots fine and lets me see and repair both Vista and Windows 7 operating system volumes.

What I don't want is to change that FAQ thread - it was not intended for anything except a reference - not a place for Q*A.

May 5, 2009 12:32 PM in response to The hatter

Thanks... there are three kinds of Windows installs possible...

1. Using Bootcamp
2. Not using Bootcamp but still relying on BIOS emulation
3. Not using Bootcamp and not relying on BIOS emulation

The last one can only be accomplished with Win7 x64 or Vista SP1 x64 as they are apparently able to boot natively with EFI... no bios emulation required. However, they will obviously work as well with bios emulation.

As far as I kno Jowie's technique is to address #2... a Win 7 install without Bootcamp... but with BIOS emulation.

All Jowie has to say about #3 is at the end of his blog link...

"+Now I just need to verify if Vista SP1 is able to install on a GPT disk, as I'm still getting the error "Windows cannot be installed to this disk. The selected disk is of the GPT partition style." Looking at the following page leads me to believe that I should be able to:+


+Notable Changes in Windows Vista Service Pack 1+


+Adds support for new UEFI (Unified Extensible Firmware Interface) industry standard PC firmware for 64-bit systems with functional parity with legacy BIOS firmware, which allows Windows Vista SP1 to install to GPT format disks, boot and resume from hibernate using UEFI firmware.+


+At this point I'm able to delete and create partitions, but I am still getting that error. I'll have to dig into it further, but at this point I was happy to post about the resolution to the ability to boot from the DVD.+ "

I'm interested in finding out any resources or folks that have done #3.

BTW, I didn't mean to screw up your other thread, but there was nothing to indicate otherwise. It came up in a google search. You might want to make the title and/or first post clear about that.

Message was edited by: VirtualRain

Message was edited by: VirtualRain

May 21, 2009 1:01 PM in response to VirtualRain

VirtualRain wrote:
Hi, has anyone got Win7 x64 booting natively via EFI without bios emulation or know of any resources elsewhere that discuss this? I understand it would have to be on an independent GUID partitioned HD... so not using bootcamp... ruling out all but Mac Pro's I suppose.

Any insights would be helpful.


I have not heard of such a case. I spent a considerable amount of time
trying to find a single success with Vista x64 SP1 (or x64 Server 2008).
I did not find one instance. I am not convinced that ryannazaretian in
the other forum succeeded either. If his Windows disk had been GPT-only,
that would have been an indicator of success. But it sounds like he does
not know and it's too late to find out.

May 22, 2009 5:12 AM in response to improwise

I think people confuse what they want or need, and are usually just confronted with the boot menu now with Vista SP1 and Windows 7, asking to use BIOS or UEFI, and how to get it to work.

There is no requirement that you use GPT or that you can't still use MBR for your partition table.

I used Boot Camp Assistant only once or twice to see how it works - or fails. Vista and Windows 7 on a Mac Pro, there is no need for the Assistant to install or prep a drive.

I wish Apple had never - or I had known more ahead of time - that, A) an EFI firmware update only applied to XP, and made booting Windows slower; B) the lack of official support was contingent on use of UEFI for 64-bit OS; C) Does that mean even OS X booting with EFI 1.1 is not full 64-bit hardware implementation either? Can't see how it can apply to Windows and not other operating systems.

I use Windows Vista to install 7.7100 on another drive, or to be able to boot from 7's DVD I have to modify and stip the UEFI boot menu option so it will allow me to boot and continue.

Win7 x64 booting natively via EFI (no bios emulation)?

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