2011 MBP 2nd HDD mod with SSD

I have been trying for days to successfully get Bootcamp 4 +win7 onto my 2011 MBP.

I have modded my MBP to have a second hard drive (ssd in main bay, original 750gb HDD in sled where optical drive used to be.)

SSD is in the main HDD slot, and was put there since the main sata bus is native 6gbs (sata3), where the optical drive bus is sata 2.

So since my ssd is sata3, and the original drive is sata2 it made sense, also it made sense since the main bus is where the computer is designed to boot from.

Ok, so heres what I have done.

1. I have used Bootcamp, with all combinations of the three boxes checked. (after editing files in my mac i was able to use the "create windows 7 USB installer" function)
2. I purchased a macbook air super drive (after editing files on my mac, i was able to view and use the drive normally in my OS, but unable to boot from it.) Ended up returning it because an $80 that you can ONLY use on very specific systems is outragous... $25 bucks for a super generic one that has an infinite amount more compatability, or $80 for a locked drive...and here I thought the days of doing stupid proprietary crap to hardware was over
3. Gparted, testdisk, pdisk, and other table editors have been no help... (cant even get gparted to boot past video drivers, even in vga mode it errors)
4. I can successfully install windows when i replace the original superdrive that shipped with the system, with the original HDD in the main bay. When I install using this method, as soon as I rebuild my system (ssd main bay, hdd in second bay) my mbp fails to see the windows install (blinking ? folder). I think has to do with the drivers for the 2 sata busses are different.
5. Holding "alt/option" sees a "Windows" partition that is bootable. when selected, my mbp fails to see the windows install (blinking ? folder)
6. Disconnected the drive from MBP, connected it to my desktop, viewed / edited in gparted. Same outcome...my mbp fails to see the windows install.
7. When I follow the main bootcamp instructions for a USB install, I can successfully create a bootable USB with windows 7 on it (works great on my PC) when my computer restarts to install... cant boot from usb, i get the blinking folder (in this config, the drives are in my preffered locations: ssd main bay, hdd in second bay)
8. Someone said certain USB sticks may not work to boot from... the same USB stick boots up to gparted fine on both my iMac, my PC and this MBP... and the Windows 7 on USB that bootcamp created boots my PC seamlessly. so I doubt its the USB being "unbootable" (just to check this, i erased, reconfigured gparted live USB, and plugged in... not only does it boot, it boots fast, same with a MSDOS recovery USB stick and Unbuntu Live USB)
9. I disassembled an External DVD drive, and tried about 8 different drives connected directly to the circut board of the external... Can see whatever disc i put in the drive, but only in the OS, Can not boot from any of them (windows dvd shows up as bootable when that disc is in, but selecting it gives me a blinking "_" on a black screen, a black screen, or the message "no bootable devices found, insert boot disc and press any key" depending on where I am at in my process

How on earth should I go about completing this bootcamp install... Im beginning to lose my mind about this.

I have been a computer tech for over 10 years and every logical solution seems to fail for reasons not apparent to me... maybe jobs was in a bad mood when they discussed how my MBP should function.

Why not let me boot from an $80 superdrive?

Why not let me boot Windows 7 installer from anything besides the original drive?

Seriously... Why?

$2000 dollars for a computer should be more than enough cheddar to get a system that isnt locked to Apples way...

I was always a PC loyalist, and my MBP started to change that a little. But then the simple things like... booting from a different source, cant use external drives.

My next best guess on what to do is:

• reconfigure the mac to factory, install bootcamp and configure windows on the main HDD bus.
• Take out that HDD configured the way i want it.
• put in ANOTHER DIFFERENT spare drive.
• rebuild
• install bootcamp again, go through options, partition drive and when it restarts to install, shut it down
• take spare drive
• connect both bootcamp drives to my PC, use GParted to compare the partition tables. Edit one to reflect other
• restart and see if bootcamp is bootable...

The number one reason i was told i would enjoy my apple...

"it just works"

lmao