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My 2012 iMac boot from an external SSD. Can I install Boot Camp on this drive?

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)

Posted on Aug 10, 2019 11:06 PM

Reply
Question marked as Top-ranking reply

Posted on Aug 11, 2019 8:30 AM

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.

4 replies
Question marked as Top-ranking reply

Aug 11, 2019 8:30 AM in response to Mark Rathgeber

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.

Aug 11, 2019 5:57 AM in response to Mark Rathgeber

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.

My 2012 iMac boot from an external SSD. Can I install Boot Camp on this drive?

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