Can i install windows XP on Lion?

Yes you absolutely can install Windows XP on Mac Lion OSX. "When there's a will, there's a way". Here's how:

1. Go to Applications

2. Go to Utilities

3. Go to Bootcamp Assistant

4. Follow the instructions, but do not install Windows XP using Bootcamp Assistant. Just create a partition using it

5. Insert your Windows XP disc into your Mac

6. Restart your Mac

7. Upon hearing the startup chime, press and hold 'Alt' on your keyboard

8. Select the Windows XP disc

9. Press 'Enter'

10. Press F8

11. Choose the option to install Windows XP on your Bootcamp partition

12 Choose the option to format the partition as NTFS

13. Sit back, relax, and let your Mac do the rest

14. When your Mac automatically reboots, be sure to be there

15. Upon hearing the startup chime, press and hold 'Alt' on your keyboard

16. Go ahead and select your 'Windows' partition

17. Well, you probably know the drill for the rest of the steps

-Supported from my iPhone. Any questions? Please ask.

It is worth noting that while Lion/Bootcamp are still compatible with XP, some of the newest Apple hardware does not support dual-booting into it. For example, the 2011 MBPs will only support Windows 7 via Bootcamp. However virtualization software (vmware, parallels, etc.) should continue to support it even on these devices.

Elmundo, your advice sounds great but I can't seem to figure out how to use Bootcamp Assistant to create a partition without having the Windows 7 disc. I asked for Apple's help but they couldn't figure out how to do it either (and warned me that I could only run Windows 7 on Lion). I'd appreciate any help. We'd really like to be able to run XP on our Mac Mini. Thanks 🙂

I had to buy a copy of windows XP to load on my Mac (running Snow Leopard) to run Parallels (which is similar to Bootcamp). :-(

It isn't a Lion issue as much as a Windows licensing issue.

Bootcamp won't create the partition without a Win7 disc, and then there's the drivers, or lack thereof.

JohnTheAppleFan wrote:

I had to buy a copy of windows XP to load on my Mac to run Parallels (which is similar to Bootcamp). :-(

Parallels is not similar to Bootcamp, one is an emulated environment and one is a native environment.

Csound,

You are mistaken. Both Boot Camp and Parallels are virtualized environments. The difference being Boot Camp has to format an actual Windows bootable partition, and requires booting into a separate partition instead of file. Emulation is when CPU is immitated by software. That's what VirtualPC did before Intel Macs

I entirely disagree, when Windows is running in a partition created by bootcamp it is running on the hardware natively, Parallels emulates an environment, try this, delete OSX and you can still run Windows on the bc partition, what's doing the emulation?

You are quite correct, Csound1

John, and CSound,

Perhaps you misunderstood it.

http://www.griffincaprio.com/blog/2006/08/virtual-machines-virtualization-vs-emu lation.html

http://www.computerworld.com/s/article/338993/Emulation_or_Virtualization_?taxon omyId=174&pageNumber=1

And most importantly, read the header of the browser window. It says "Virtualization & Automation Solutions..." on:

http://www.parallels.com/

So even the company you call as emulation is actually virtualized. The difference is VirtualPC was emulation, because it allowed a PowerPC platform to run Windows. With VMWare, Virtualbox, Parallels, and BootCamp, the CPU is already an Intel CPU, so no CPU has to be emulated. Only the drivers have to be installed as if they were installed on a common PC. An Intel Mac of the CPU speed and GPU speed of a non-Mac is identical in speed to the non-Mac. VirtualPC, RealPC, and Softwindows all had to emulate the Intel CPU, and thus were much slower than the virtualized solutions, and barely capable of doing any Windows video software.

Win 7 on a Dell needs drivers, by your logic that's an emulation?

PowerPC Processor > OS X/partition > VirtualPC > Windows = Emulation

Intel Processor > OS X/partition > VirtualBox or Parallels or VMFusion > Windows = Virtualization

Intel Processor > Bootcamp created partition + hardware drivers, etc. > Windows = Native boot

Bootcamp is software that only sets up the Windows partition on a Mac's boot drive.

it does this by carving out a new partition (if there is space), assigns it a MSDOS (Fat32) format and updates the GUID partition table (GPT) . For Vista and Win 7, one has to change the partition format in the installer to NTFS before installing Windows.

Windows XP and 32 bit versions of Windows doesn't support booting from GPT and EFI firmware, only 64 bit versions of Vista and Win 7.

https://secure.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/en/wiki/GUID_Partition_Table#OS_support_o f_GPT

In the older Bootcamp versions created a Hybrid MBR which allowed these older Windows versions to boot on a Mac GPT and EFI machine. If one has a Bootcamp partition and upgraded the OS, naturally the Hybrid MBR is installed and supported.

If one wants to get XP working on their new Lion Mac, they will likely have to install their own Hybrid MBR

http://www.rodsbooks.com/gdisk/hybrid.html

And use a EFI bootkit calle rEFIt

http://refit.sourceforge.net/

And if a NEW Mac work out all the pain with the hardware drivers, if one can find them, or be stuck with a default screen resolution, no wifi and runaway fans, as the Mac's default setting is to make the fans go strong if there is no signal from the OS.

Older Mac's that had XP before and upgraded to Lion is likely easier, as one just goes back to the OS X version that came with their machine and start the whole Bootcamp process over again and then upgrade to Lion.

In my opinion installing XP or even Vista is way too much headache for little gain, use a virtual machine software to run Windows Vista and XP, yes one takes a 1/5 performance hit, but both are dinosaurs anyway.

Bootcamp is nothing more than a set of Windows drivers for the hardware found on Macs.

Virtual Machines present a fake machine to Windows. Windows then uses the drivers it already has. The VM software will re-route the hardware interfaces that those drivers use and send them to the MacOS X interfaces. They are essentially PC simulators.

a brody

Sorry, I was responding to the statement "I entirely disagree, when Windows is running in a partition created by bootcamp it is running on the hardware natively", not the use of the term "emulation" later in Csound's post.

Bootcamp-installed Windows is in no way virtualized, any more than OS X is virtualized if a user sets up multiple bootable OS X partitions on a Mac.

The only way one may consider Boot Camp virtualized is the fact that Windows on Boot Camp requires bypassing an EFI Firmware chip not normally found on PCs that is uniquely on Macs. Otherwise I can see why some may not even consider it virtualized.