Windows 8 bootcamp new drivers?

people repport that it took many month for apple to make drivers for win7 back when that was released

Same thing happened to me.

Just reinstal Boot Camp 4.0 over Win 8 and it works perfectly.

Except the screen brightness function keys.

Ok, this is what I did using a Macbok 13" Aluminum (2008) dual boot:

- had windows 7 ultimate 32-bit

- upgraded directly to windows 8 pro 32-bit, no OSX involved

- upgraded ok, but...

- system crashed after a couple of minutes in windows

- installed Boot Camp 4.0 in windows 8, installed ok without crashing

- now runs ok

except:

- screen brightness function keys don't work, fixed brightness

- now found another problem: wifi in windows 8 too slow, less than 10% than before; looks like it's a Broadcom driver problem, have to wait for official boot camp for win 8...

Hey, solved the slow wifi problem!

Replacing Broadcom 802.11n Network Adapter driver 5.100.245.20 (the one in bootcamp 4) with older driver 5.100.196.81.

Find it here: http://www.wireless-driver.com/broadcom-wireless-driver-utility-winxp-vista-win7 -ver51001968/

Seems like the safest way to play this is to run Windows 8 in VMWare Fusion and keep Windows 7 Bootcamp until they hash out the new drivers. This is the route I've gone and seems to be fine, I keep Windows 7 strictly for gaming purposes and VmWare for development...

Windows 8 Preview version was on the Internet like almost a year now. Even Windows 8 RTM enterprise RTM evalutation was released BY Microsoft 3 months ago. Lots of major companies like Samsung/Asus/LG/Dell/Sony.. already made Windows 8 laptops (thus, the drivers, too). What have Apple been doing not updating drivers? They only have a very few, similar hardwares to support. And they are very rich, rich, rich! They can hire any amount of engieers to update the softwares.

I don't know about Windows 7 because I wasn't using Mac back then, but if it takes many months for Apple to release Windows 8 drivers, I have no choise but to think that Apple is either incompetent or purposely delaying it.

Since Apple does not seem to be incompetent.... Come on, let us use Windows, too. Sometimes we need it.

Jeong-hun Sin wrote:

Windows 8 Preview version was on the Internet like almost a year now. Even Windows 8 RTM enterprise RTM evalutation was released BY Microsoft 3 months ago. Lots of major companies like Samsung/Asus/LG/Dell/Sony.. already made Windows 8 laptops (thus, the drivers, too). What have Apple been doing not updating drivers? They only have a very few, similar hardwares to support. And they are very rich, rich, rich! They can hire any amount of engieers to update the softwares.

I don't know about Windows 7 because I wasn't using Mac back then, but if it takes many months for Apple to release Windows 8 drivers, I have no choise but to think that Apple is either incompetent or purposely delaying it.

Since Apple does not seem to be incompetent.... Come on, let us use Windows, too. Sometimes we need it.

If Windows 8 is so important to you, just install a virtual machine like Parallels, Fusion, or VirtualBox. Then run Windows 8 in the virtual machine. There are no driver issues if running Windows 8 on your Apple computer using a virtual machine.

No, that is not a solution. VirtualBox *****, and Paralells/Fusion are expensive. Plus virtual OS significantly has lower graphics performance. Besides, that is not a real solution. That is just a workaround.

If Apple is a small company, I would tolerate this slow update, because I would understand that it takes people and time... But seriously, Apple? The most advanced, amazing and rich company in the world?

Anyways, I ordered a new Sony laptop to use Windows on it. But I stil want to use it on my MacBook, because the large trackpad and nice keyboard are to die for.

Ummm, If you want to run Windows 8 so bad, then why even bother buying a Mac? You say you need Windows because sometimes you need it, and if that's the case then run Fusion, (expensive? it's $50?). I run Windows 8 in Fusion, and with 16GB of ram and SSD, it runs flawless.

I still got Windows 7 on a second drive, but strictly for gaming.

Jeong-hun Sin wrote:

No, that is not a solution. VirtualBox *****, and Paralells/Fusion are expensive. Plus virtual OS significantly has lower graphics performance. Besides, that is not a real solution. That is just a workaround.

If Apple is a small company, I would tolerate this slow update, because I would understand that it takes people and time... But seriously, Apple? The most advanced, amazing and rich company in the world?

Anyways, I ordered a new Sony laptop to use Windows on it. But I stil want to use it on my MacBook, because the large trackpad and nice keyboard are to die for.

$50 for Fusion is a lot less expensive than buying a Sony laptop for occasional use. Unless you are running resource heavy games, Windows in a VM works very well. You would never detect any slowness.

But the Sony will work well so enjoy it.

Windows 8 is likely freezing on your 2011 MacBook Air 11" because there is some sort of issue when running the default power plan (Balanced). Switching to a High Performance or Power Saver power plan should fix your issue.

And, if you want to get through installing Windows 8, I've found that not having the power adapter plugged in during the install process also avoids any freezing you might normally experience with a plugged-in MBA running the Balanced power plan (which is the default plan).

Also, the running the Boot Camp 4.0 drivers works fine, but as mentioned above, you want to switch the wireless adapter back to the default Broadcom adapter that ships w/ Windows 8. (Device Manager > Network adapters > Broadcom 802.11n Network Adapter > Properties > Driver tab > Update Driver... > Browse... > Let me pick... > Broadcom 802.11n... (Microsoft))

Hope that helps.

You can also fix the screen brightness controls by selecting the advanced power options under your power plan (Power Options > Change plan settings > Change advanced power settings > Display > Enable adaptive brightness > Set On Battery and Plugged In both to Off)

By disabling adaptive brightness, screen brightness controls work as expected, minus the lack of display overlays that are missing for all functions like brightness, volume, etc. (Oddly enough, these display overlays appear on your second monitor if you plug one in...)

To fix the freezing issue on windows 8 just run CMD and paste in the following, this should resolve your issue.

bcdedit /set disabledynamictick yes