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Also, if so, can I technically create a 2nd Mac OS X boot drive and install Boot Camp on that? I saw other methods to install Windows on an external drive, but this usually comes with limitations –such as the lack of support for some Apple hardware and system updates.
iMac Line (2012 and Later)
Mark Rathgeber wrote:
The hard drive in my iMac died, and in lieu of sending it in to get a slow HDD replacement, I’ve opted for a thunderbolt 2 SSD which is much faster than even my internal HDD was in the SATA slot.
Nice!
Now I want to ask again, since I can boot from Mac OSX on my external ssd, theoretically couldn’t I just install boot camp on that?
BC Assistant will not support external disks. You will need to bypass BCA and try it manually.
Run
diskutil info
on your external disk and check. See the highlighted example.
diskutil info disk0
Device Identifier: disk0
Device Node: /dev/disk0
Whole: Yes
Part of Whole: disk0
Device / Media Name: APPLE SSD SM1024F
Volume Name: Not applicable (no file system)
Mounted: Not applicable (no file system)
File System: None
Content (IOContent): GUID_partition_scheme
OS Can Be Installed: No
Media Type: Generic
Protocol: PCI
SMART Status: Verified
Disk Size: 1.0 TB (1000555581440 Bytes) (exactly 1954210120 512-Byte-Units)
Device Block Size: 512 Bytes
Read-Only Media: No
Read-Only Volume: Not applicable (no file system)
Device Location: Internal
Removable Media: Fixed
Solid State: Yes
Virtual: No
OS 9 Drivers: No
Low Level Format: Not supported
The disk needs to show up as 'Internal' for BCA to work.
Mark Rathgeber wrote:
The hard drive in my iMac died, and in lieu of sending it in to get a slow HDD replacement, I’ve opted for a thunderbolt 2 SSD which is much faster than even my internal HDD was in the SATA slot.
Nice!
Now I want to ask again, since I can boot from Mac OSX on my external ssd, theoretically couldn’t I just install boot camp on that?
BC Assistant will not support external disks. You will need to bypass BCA and try it manually.
Run
diskutil info
on your external disk and check. See the highlighted example.
diskutil info disk0
Device Identifier: disk0
Device Node: /dev/disk0
Whole: Yes
Part of Whole: disk0
Device / Media Name: APPLE SSD SM1024F
Volume Name: Not applicable (no file system)
Mounted: Not applicable (no file system)
File System: None
Content (IOContent): GUID_partition_scheme
OS Can Be Installed: No
Media Type: Generic
Protocol: PCI
SMART Status: Verified
Disk Size: 1.0 TB (1000555581440 Bytes) (exactly 1954210120 512-Byte-Units)
Device Block Size: 512 Bytes
Read-Only Media: No
Read-Only Volume: Not applicable (no file system)
Device Location: Internal
Removable Media: Fixed
Solid State: Yes
Virtual: No
OS 9 Drivers: No
Low Level Format: Not supported
The disk needs to show up as 'Internal' for BCA to work.
Apple officially does not support Windows on external disks, neither does Microsoft except under Windows Enterprise licensing.
You can try using third-party tools.
There is not much advantage running Windows from external disks, because of slower external media. If you can test with Thunderbolt/USB3, your results should be better than USB2.
The hard drive in my iMac died, and in lieu of sending it in to get a slow HDD replacement, I’ve opted for a thunderbolt 2 SSD which is much faster than even my internal HDD was in the SATA slot. Now I want to ask again, since I can boot from Mac OSX on my external ssd, theoretically couldn’t I just install boot camp on that?
Boot Camp does not support installing Windows on an external drive. You will be bypassing Microsoft Licensing if you install a version of Windows other that Windows Enterprise on an external drive. We can not advise you how to bypass Microsoft licensing. Ask Microsoft.
My 2012 iMac boot from an external SSD. Can I install Boot Camp on this drive?
