How to install Windows 8 on Mid 09 Macbook Pro (10.8.3)

So i loved the new Windows 8, and even had it installed before bootcamp supported windows 8 on my new iMac, i waited to buy a bigger hard drive and more ram for my mid 09 Macbook Pro. The day i bought the new hardware, Apple released 10.8.3, and an updated bootcamp to support Windows 8! Yay! I got my install disc out (iso file burned to DVD), opened up bootcamp assistant, only to get an error saying apple dropped support for my mid 09 Macbook Pro and Windows 8. Making the install impossible through bootcamp. Do not fret, i have the solution, and EVERYTHING works perfectly. Here we go.

Gather your Windows 8 install disc AND a Windows 7 install disc (you can surely find one by searching the net, use your old one, or borrow a colleagues... we are licensing Windows 8, NOT 7, this is just for my trick to fool bootcamp assistant and no i do not condone piracy)
Inside BootCamp Assistant, the driver download may hang,it did for me, twice..could be heavy usage due to the popular new update...so i recommend downloading it faster, and manually here http://support.apple.com/downloads/#macoscomponents and get 4.1.4586 yes this is for windows 7, ALSO while you are there, download the windows 8 support pack 5.0.5033, as we will need that later as well. As a matter of fact, DO IT THIS WAY and dont bother
That being said and done, in BootCamp Assistant (OSX), only check off Install Windows 7, leaving the download support software unchecked
Partition your hard drive as youd like, this splits up your storage space however you like, keep in mind which OS you plan to run the most, and obviously give that one more room, i.e you do all your Photoshop work, and app development in OSX, and only use Windows for office stuff, you'd want to give yourself more room on the OSX side. I however bought a huge new internal drive to split them basically in half, as i use them both frequently.
This step is where the trick comes. OSX 10.8.3 / BootCamp will advise you there is no support for Windows 8..only 7 with your Mid 09 Macbook Pro if you have put your Windows 8 disc in, upsetting you as it did me...possibly bringing you to this post, thats not FAIR is it? Your 09 MacBook Pro is still JUST AS GOOD as a lot of PC's running Windows 8, why they excluded this model i have no idea...im sure they had reasons, but i dont care at the moment..lol
INSTEAD place a Windows 7 install disc in, and click next. BootCamp Assistant will now partition your drive, make the windows side bootable and restart your MBP.
Let it do its thing, and eventually you will land at the Windows 7 installation interface. We don't really want that, we want Windows 8 right?
Click the "x" to close the installation for Windows 7, it threatens your MBP will restart, and allow it to do so.
**IMPORTANT** Once you hear the beloved Mac chime, quickly press and hold the "option" key.
This brings you to an area where you can select a startup disk. At this point, lets get rid of the trick. Hit your eject button and get rid of the Windows 7 install disc, we are done with it now.
You now, well in my case anyway, should only see your Mac HD, and the Recovery Disk.
Insert your Windows 8 install disc
Now WAIT. Eventually, you should see a new DVD looking icon that says Windows pop up next to the MacHD and Recovery Disk. (depending on what you called your iso, it may something else...not sure, but you cant miss the new entry)
This is where a wired mouse will be needed, or use tab/space/enter to navigate to the new Windows Disc icon and launch it.
You are now in Windows 8's installation interface, cool!
Follow the steps until it asks you where you want to install it. You should see a partition about equal to what you set earlier in BootCamp Assistant, and it SHOULD say Bootcamp right on it. Select this partition. (mine was the last one, the fourth i believe)
OH NO, it says you cant install it to that partition, this is normal. You need to highlight/select this partition, and click format. I cant remember, but i think you have to click "options" to get to a the spot where you can format it. Pretty straight forward. Safety check, obviously make sure you have the Bootcamp partition selected, dont format your Mac OSX partition!
After the quick format is done, Windows 8 installer will then allow you to click "next" and from there the magic happens.
Go through the whole Windows 8 install, and setup how you would like, this takes awhile, and im not covering that, as its a hand in hand walkthrough like any other install.
Once your inside your new Windows 8, you'll see a bunch of things not working, like tap to click on your trackpad, no on screen displays for brigtness, volume, and possibly other stuff. Not cool right?
Grab your USB stick, or Burnt disc that you applied the bootcamp support downloads to in the begining of this tutorial.
FIRST open the Windows 7 Bootcamp install, 4.1.4586, open the folder and find setup.exe and run it (we are in windows 8 now)
It takes a while, but Apple's BootCamp will install a bunch of drivers, etc, and eventually restart your MBP, which is cool, let it do it.
Upon finishing, lets go back to the USB/Burnt Disc where all your support software was saved, and lets get the newly support BootCamp 5.0.5033 opened up.
Big Thanks to a post by ErikVanD i seen on this forum for the next step.
If you want, try and click setup in this latest BootCamp support set, and you will get another sad error claiming x64 is not supported, something awful to that nature. Awww man, this far, only to get let down. Nope. We are going to fix that. And this is where ErikVanD's post pointed me to what we do next.
It was said to navigate in the BootCamp 5.0.5033 folder to something of the effect of BootCamp/Drivers/Apple and run the MSI file "BootCamp" (MSI file will say Windows Installer in its description, and not necessarily MSI for anyone not too savy with Windows) **note - NOT .bootcamp (notice the period in the front) and it should work and install the new Windows 8 support for your MBP...but in my case it didn't, which is why im posting how i fixed this. Your setup may somehow be different, but mine gave me an error say it "needs elevated permissions to run, use setup.exe instead. We tried that remember! And it gave us the x64 not supported error. Oh man! Blabbing aside, this file needs to be ran as an administrator, which yeah your the only user, but Windows is funny like that. Normally youd just right click, and select run as administrator, but out the box, that option isnt there when you right click, only install, repair, open with etc. Here's the next trick, you need to add a registry file to enable running as an administrator, dont be afraid, this is an old trick, and really easy.
Open notepad in Windows, and create a new doc, call it Add_MSI_run_as_administrator.reg
Paste this following code into the new doc
Windows Registry Editor Version 5.00

HKEY_CLASSES_ROOT\Msi.Package\Shell\runas] "HasLUAShield"="" [HKEY_CLASSES_ROOT\Msi.Package\shell\runas\Command] @=hex(2):22,00,25,00,53,00,79,00,73,00,74,00,65,00,6d,00,52,00,6f,00,6f,00,74,\ 00,25,00,5c,00,53,00,79,00,73,00,74,00,65,00,6d,00,33,00,32,00,5c,00,6d,00,\ 73,00,69,00,65,00,78,00,65,00,63,00,2e,00,65,00,78,00,65,00,22,00,20,00,2f,\ 00,69,00,20,00,22,00,25,00,31,00,22,00,20,00,25,00,2a,00,00,00
Or download the file already made from my company server at http://www.theprojectdev.com/public/pub.html **i put this there as a courtesy to help others like me, its just a complete reg file, so either create your own through copy and pasting above or download it. Either way, put it on your desktop.
Now double click the new registry file, and allow/ok it to do its thing.
Once done, you can discard the file from your desktop, or keep, your choice.
Guess What!? Now we can do the impossible! Lets revisit that solution from before by going to the newest BootCamp 5.0.5033, and navigate to BootCamp/drivers/Apple and select that tricky BootCamp MSI file that wouldnt allow us to run, this time RIGHT CLICK it. Because of our new registry entry we placed, we now have an option to "Run as Administrator" Click that option.
WooHoo! We have done what coudnt be done, BootCamp will now walk you through the installer, and add all the great support for Windows 8 on your mid 09 Macbook Pro that they for some reason neglected!
After the update, you will endure yet another restart. From there, most likely using a wired mouse still, navigate to the system tray icon on the bottom right corner of the screen (little up arrow) and click it. It will pop up a little menu, showing system processes/stuff running, click the gray squared diamond (this is bootcamp) and it will bring up the newest BootCamp control panel. From here, you can nav to trackpad/touchpad and set tap to click (finally) and gestures, etc. This control panel has lots of good stuff to make a MBP user feel comfortable in Windows 8. There you go! You did it!

I really, sincerely hope this helps someone, as it really made my day to get this resolved. I want to add that all On Screen Displays will work (your volume/brightness etc) they keyboard backlighting, and so much more, it really works great. I upgraded my hard drive to 1tb, and installed 8gb of PNY RAM from best buy ($40) and it runs Windows 8, AND OSX fantastically.

My company http://www.theprojectdev.com designs and develops mobile apps (iOS and Android) and web design and development, so im a heavy user of both OS's, and this setup is just the best thing that has happened to me in a portable sense. Runs so so so fast! Enjoy everyone!

MacBook Pro, OS X Mountain Lion (10.8.2)

Posted on Mar 17, 2013 8:28 PM

Top-ranking reply

rnwjr

Level 1

0 points

Posted on Mar 18, 2013 1:14 PM

projectRelentless thank you for taking you time to do this and help all of us loyal Apple users. I was able to install Windows 8 on my MacBook (Late 2009) by following you instructions last night. Since the BC 4 drivers would not install I skipped the step and went on to BC 5 drivers. It seems to be working okay on everything. If its working is there any reason why I should go back and install the other package and then install the 5 again?

Thanks again! Much appreciated!

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187 replies

Mar 27, 2013 8:06 AM in response to Karan8488

Ok Karan8488, so lets check of bootcamp is at least installed in Windows 8 at all... Lets go to the bottom right corner of your desktop screen, click the arrow. Do you have a gray "squared" diamond? If so click it and bring up bootcamp control panel, verify all settings... Did any get your stuff working at all?

If you do not have any bootcamp installed, then that's a big part of your issue, as windows needs those drivers to support everything. Did you try to install per my tutorial the older driver set first?

Apr 11, 2013 9:57 PM in response to projectRelentless

everything works great but there's one major problem.. like what rnwjr feel it always hangs when i try to download.

i tried disabling microsoft kernel debug network adapter in device manger and it did the trick i think.. (because sometimes it hangs but not likely before disabled) and i tried the hyper v and tried the bcdedit /set disabledynamictick yes. just one thing it still freezes from time to time but bearable. let me know guys what you think help relentless 🙂 thank you

btw everything works great from the touchpad function keys everything except for the freeze ;/ hope there will be a fix for this

Karyta

Level 1

0 points

Dec 9, 2013 7:01 AM in response to piggynuts

I found this video very useful, since what was listed here didn't work for me. I think it is becuse of Mavericks.

It is modifying boot camp assistant with terminal.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=WQE2vbpYwRs

Dec 23, 2013 7:23 AM in response to lee juwon

I found a solution to my problem. Instead of opening bootcamp.msi as an administrator all you have to do is copy the setup.exe from bootcamp 4.0.4033 and and paste it in bootcamp 5.0.5033 (in the same location as the original setup.exe). This should replace it with the old one. Then go to the bootcamp.msi file that wont open as administrator and rename it to BootCamp64. Now run setup.exe and it should work normally.

Apr 4, 2013 1:45 PM in response to projectRelentless

Works with mid 2010 13 inch MacBook Pro, works flawlessly. Thank you.

For Windows 8 Gesture support try:

http://trackpad.powerplan7.com/

Thanks again!

rtheb

Level 1

140 points

Mar 27, 2013 11:07 AM in response to Karan8488

Go to Control Panel > Programs and Features

That will display all the installed Windows programs.

Find the Boot Camp Sevices and look all the way to the right under Versions.

Note the Version of Boot Camp being used.

You may have to unistall Boot Camp Services then you can download that version again if it worked or another version which Apple specified for your Mac.

It appears that is the version specified for your MacBook Pro

Boot Camp Support Software 4.0.4131

Version: 4.0.4131
Post Date: Mar 14, 2013
Download ID: DL1634
License: Update
File Size: 664.08

System Requirements

MacBook (Late 2006 through Mid 2010)
MacBook Air (Early 2008 through Late 2010)
MacBook Pro (Core 2 Duo, 2.4/2.2GHz, Early 2008 through Late 2011)
Mac Pro (Mid 2006 through Mid 2010)
iMac (Early 2006 through Mid 2011)
Windows 7

BootCamp 5.0 only supports 64-bit so don't even go there.

So you have to use Boot Camp 4.0 for 32 bit installations of Windows 8.

I have been running Windows 8 x32 on my old MacBook Core Duo running Snow Leopard since December and everything works perfectly, you just have to find the Bootcamp 4.0 drivers that install and you should be good.

Personally I would uninstall BootCamp Services in Windows and try first try BootCamp.4.0.4131

http://support.apple.com/downloads/DL1634/en_US/BootCamp4.0.4131.zip

If that won't install try BootCamp.4.0.4033

http://support.apple.com/downloads/DL1630/en_US/BootCamp4.0.4033.zip

Most reports are that 4033 does install.

Let us know.

rtheb

Level 1

140 points

Mar 28, 2013 12:17 PM in response to projectRelentless

I think project Relentless may be on to something about previous versions.

Here is a link to Bootcamp 3.0 with all the updates to get to Bootcamp 3.3

https://truck.it/p/-u7zPWKxoZ

I would try and install these starting with 3.0 and upgrading incrementally and see how it goes.

If everything starts working I would then try installing the Bootcamp 4.0 drivers for your Mac.

Hope this helps.

BTW both compressed and uncompressed files at link so use whichever you are more comfortable.

Apr 2, 2013 4:27 PM in response to mygavin

So I really apprecaited your guide, I've read the entire thread and followed every step including the nvidia stuff and getting the right drivers folders. I'm having the same issue as rnwjr and mygavin. My competer completely freezes at random, seemingly unconnected to what programs or processes are up at the time. The mouse pointer disapears after a few seconds following the freeze and the terminal is totally unresponsive. Cannot pull up task manager and am forced to hold the power button untill it shuts off.

Frezes happen at random. They have happened while simply surfing the internet, downloading things, installing things, once while just looking through the control pannel. They can happen within as little as two minutes of me starting up or up to three and four hours later. They seem to be getting more frequent. In fact, one happened while typing this. I was forced to boot into OSX where Apple proved their awesomness by auto-recovering this very post since they detected I has lost my connection. I sincerely doubt it is a RAM issue since when I look at resource monitor, even with my game running, it is never using 100% of the physcial memory. (Usually around 70-80%).

Specs:

Win 8 64bit

I have NVIDIA control pannel showing version 314.22

2.66 Core 2 Duo

4GB DDR3 RAM

Nvidia GeForce 9400M 256 MB GPU

10.8.3 OSX

Model designation 5,3

Bootcamp I used first the Win7 drivers (as you said in your fixing post) and then the new Win8 Drivers, these all installed fine. On screen brightness, sound, tap to click, so on and so forth all work with no problem. What little time I was able to spend logged into the game did show an improvement over my XP days (auto detect settings increased in a few categories and frame rate went up 10fps).

Is there somewhere in windows I can go to have it scan for all driver updates at once? I'm still finding a lot of the Win 8 UI just confounding and frustrating. I am upgrading from Win XP 32 bit which ran without any stability issues other than the very rare freeze while gaming. The only purpose for this partition is to game, which is why I upgraded to 64bit so that I could actually have access to all 4gigs of RAM.

Also, PS, you said you upgraded the RAM in your MacBook... is that hard? I was under the impression its nearly impossible to make modifications to these macbooks because of the way the internals are set up.

Thanks so much for your guide, sorry about your wife leaving you.

Edited to include bootcamp version information.

Message was edited by: FearlessSpeech

Jun 3, 2013 7:35 AM in response to projectRelentless

THANK YOU!! Like a charm... I had given up on getting Win 8 to recognise my specifically Apple keyboard, adjust brightness, the trackpad, etc etc (and access my HFS+ partition... I was about to purchase MacDrive 9 for that)... I will say that I got one or two things fixed before your trick of installing BootCamp 5 with Reg Edit/Run As Admin on teh MSI file. I had already successfully installed Win 8 because I just did it straight from within Win 7 which I already had via BootCamp. No Audio worked though (and of course no BootCamp assistant/drivers). I Individually installed manually each Apple driver in teh BootCamp 5 archive, this didn't help much but updated the iSight camera. Still no audio... then I manually installed the RealTek Audio and that gave me audio. This was before getting BootCamp 5 to work. So already Win 8 was very much useable. The Apple keyboard doesn't vary much from the PC one and MacDrive works well to access HFS+ disks. But this is much better! Thanks again.

MacBook Pro 4,1 (2008)

500GB SATA, 6GB 667, NVidia GeForce 8600GT

OS X Mountain Lion / Win 8 Pro x64 dual boot

still truckin'

Jan 15, 2014 3:29 PM in response to projectRelentless

I have been able to follow this tutorial, but when I get to installing Win8, it asks for drivers to install before I can actually install anything, and the computer will not reconize the drivers I have installed from the apple website on my USB. I am stuck with a "Windows Setup" with a selection area to select drivers to install, and on the bottom there are a browse, rescan, and next buttons (next is gray'ed out). In the install process, where there is 1. Collecting Information and 2 Installiing Windows, I am still in 1.

Running 10.9.1 on a 2009 MacBook Pro 15"

Help PLEASE,

Thanks,

Zach W

Mar 21, 2013 8:23 AM in response to rnwjr

Good good, the Ethernet driver rang a bell from when I did this windows advised update, just make sure each time it's done doing its thing that you restart, even if it doesn't ask you to

Klap

Level 1

0 points

Jun 14, 2013 4:12 PM in response to projectRelentless

Thanks so much for this man, my windows 8 setup caused bluescreens 50% of the time. Used your trick with the windows 8 bootcamp loader and im running at 100%... im in your debt.

voliob

Level 1

4 points

Jul 31, 2013 4:24 AM in response to projectRelentless

Thank you very much projectRelentless. This worked great. My iMac was 6 months out of the loop but this work around saved the day.

mygavin

Level 1

0 points

Mar 30, 2013 5:50 PM in response to projectRelentless

Hey project,

I have a mid 2009 MBP

2.53 GHz
8 GB RAM

And I was able to sucessfully install windows 8 through bootcamp by following your instructions. I was able to install both bootcamps (4.0.4033 and 5.0.5033) and all seems to be fine except that I get frequent freezes. This problem started after the 10.8.3 update and I was hoping your "trick" would help fix this. Have you experienced any freezing issues with your Windows partition?

vrl2

Level 1

0 points

Jan 20, 2015 10:20 AM in response to projectRelentless

I followed the latest version of these steps, but Windows 8.1 is stuck in a bootloop after Bootcamp’s driver installation (mid-2009 mbp - system info. below post). I'm able to install 8.1 successfully, and I'm able to install the bootcamp drivers successfully. However, right after I reboot (after the drivers are installed), startup fails: windows begins to boot, then fades to black, and then reboots in a loop. This happens with both Bootcamp 4.0.4033 and Bootcamp 5.0.5033 (no problems adding the reg. file either). Any help would be much appreciated.

Thanks again for the guide. I'm impressed that 8.1 can run on my 2009 mbp to begin with. Any assistance with driver support would be especially appreciated - thank you.

System Information:

MacBookPro5,5

Intel Core 2 Duo 2.53 GHz

Bios: MBP55.00AC.B03

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How to install Windows 8 on Mid 09 Macbook Pro (10.8.3)