Installing Windows 7 on Late 2013 iMac w/ Fusion Drive

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Level 1

8 points

Installing Windows 7 on Late 2013 iMac w/ Fusion Drive

Sorry in advance for the long post, but I have tried to exhaust all possibilities, and bring as much knowledge about our environment to the table to avoid confusion.

Here's our goal: Install Mac & Windows on a Late 2013 iMac with a 1TB Fusion Drive

Install our Mac Image with Deepfreeze on Partition 1

Install our Windows 7 x64 Image with DeepFreeze on Partition 2

Here's why our goal cannot work out of the box:

Deepfreeze for Mac, is not supported on a Fusion Drive. Now before anyone says "just don't use deepfreeze"...we are using it, and that is that.

In order to get our existing image to work on the iMac, we had to split the Fusion Drive.

Splitting Up the Fusion Drive

We booted into Recovery, Opened up terminal, retrieved the LvGUID, deleted it, and split up the SSD from the HD.

So now, we have a 128GB SSD, and 1TB HD showing up under Diskutilitiy.

We then partitioned the 1TB HD, into two, 500GB Partitions. One for Mac OSX 10.9.4, and the other for Windows.

The 128GB SSD is going to be used for scratch space, temp, etc. And is irrelevant at this time.

Deploying our Mac Image

After splitting the Fusion Drive, we netbooted and installed a "NetRestore" of our image. Worked completely fine, no issues. DeepFreeze Works fine, the 128GB SSD shows up just fine, and the other 500GB Windows Partition shows up fine. All drives / partitions can be written to with no problem.

Deploying our Windows Image

Deployed our Windows Partition image as we have done in the past, by booting into a windows PE Disk. (We have other various 2009, 2010, and 2011 iMacs across campus, with NO FUSION DRIVES installed, and dual boot them successfully using the same procedure. Minus the splitting of the fusion drive part of course) After the Windows image is deployed to the windows partition, we then boot it up to a Windows 7 Install disk to fix the MBR, Bootrec, and BCD options to allow it to boot properly. Here's where we run into issues: Upon getting the Windows 7 Install screen, the USB Keyboard and Mouse, DO NOT WORK.

Here's the options we've tried to get them to work properly

1. Tried another known working Mac USB Keyboard & Mouse = Failed

2. Tried a known working Windows Keyboard & Mouse = Failed

3. Plugged Just a known working Mac Keyboard into each USB Port to see if recognized = Failed

4. Plugged Just a known working Windows Keyboard into each USB Port to see if recognized = Failed

5. Plugged Just a known working Mac Mouse into each USB Port to see if recognized = Failed

6. Plugged Just a known working Windows Mouse into each USB Port to see if recognized = Failed

7. A Windows 8.1 Recovery USB will boot and the USB Mouse & Keyboard are recognized and installed! (YAY!!) However, we cannot repair a Windows 7 install with Windows 8.1..

BootCamp Drivers & Support Media

Downloaded the Current BootCamp Support drivers to enable the USB and other various drivers to be loaded during setup (Placed the $WinPEDriver$ and AutoUnattend.xml, and BootCamp folder on the Root of a USB, and modified a Windows7 Installation disk and placed on the root as well) The drivers do not load. Have also placed on a brand new USB2, and USB3 flash drive formatted at FAT32, to see if that made a difference, which it did not. The BootCamp USB made within Mac, it loads saying "Now booting into Boot Camp Assistant Created USB Drive..." or something like that (Don't remember the exact Message)

Side Note:

Restored Fusion Drive to its original State, and booted from the BootCamp USB drive, still no usb Mouse & Keyboard Support.

iMac, OS X Mavericks (10.9.4)

Posted on Sep 8, 2014 8:47 AM

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Answer 1

TheCWB Author

Level 1

8 points

Jun 23, 2015 7:30 AM in response to TheCWB

Found a workaround for this:

Hybrid Imaging procedures (Mac & Windows OS on iMac)

1) Delete all partitions, and image Mac (We used NetRestore to image)

2) Finish setup of the Mac side, and add a second partition.

2a) Format Partition 2 as msdos fat

3) Install refit (The bootpicker we use to decide which OS to boot upon turning on the iMac)

4) Boot to Windows 8.1 Recovery USB

4a) Image a sysprepped, generalized partition of our Windows image, to the 2nd partition of mac

5) Open up command prompt after Image finishes

6) Run "diskpart", and we must make the windows partition active

6a) diskutil list disk (to list the disks on the computer)

6b) select disk 0 (0 was the drive on our imac, it will also show your usb, so make sure you select the right number)

6c) list part (will list the partitions on that disk)

6d) select part 2 (happened to be our partition that we imaged windows onto)

6e) active (marks the partition active)

7)exit diskpart

8) bootrec commands for command prompt to get windows to recognize the partition correctly

8a) bootrec /fixmbr

8b) bootrec /fixboot

8c) bootrec /rebuildbcd

9) exit and then continue to boot to windows partition

10) go grab a drink, because you're done 😀

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Answer 2

Loner T

Level 9

59,471 points

Jun 23, 2015 7:44 AM in response to TheCWB

Let me suggest an alternative.

1. Split the SSD into two parts and the HDD into two parts.

2. Create a Fusion drive between SSD and HDD part 1 slices. You now have a Fusion drive as OSX intended to be used.

3. Install W8+ on second part of SSD (Windows OS Only) using EFI boot which is much faster than CSM-BIOS Hybrid MBR.

4. Create a second Windows drive on HDD Part 2 as exFat or NTFS as you need.

5. Now you have a shared space for documents on HDD Part 2 and you get SSD boot speeds for both OSX and Windows.

6. This is how I run all my MacMini machines. Since you are using Late2013 Macs, they are UEFI compliant, so the disks can stay pure GPT-only disks, which allows resizing of partitions using diskpart or diskutil.

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Answer 3

TheCWB Author

Level 1

8 points

Jun 23, 2015 10:19 AM in response to Loner T

Unfortunately, that wont work for us. We have to use Windows 7, and not Windows 8 as this is being deployed at a company, and not personal machines.

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Answer 4

Loner T

Level 9

59,471 points

Jun 23, 2015 10:56 AM in response to TheCWB

W8+ was an example. I run the same configuration on W7. Let me know if you want the disk layout.

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Answer 5

Loner T

Level 9

59,471 points

Jun 23, 2015 12:12 PM in response to TheCWB

This a Mavericks/W7 MacMini disk layout on a 256G SSD/1TB HDD.

sudo gpt -vv -r show /dev/disk0

Password:

gpt show: /dev/disk0: mediasize=256060514304; sectorsize=512; blocks=500118192

gpt show: /dev/disk0: Suspicious MBR at sector 0

gpt show: /dev/disk0: Pri GPT at sector 1

gpt show: /dev/disk0: Sec GPT at sector 500118191

start size index contents

0 1 MBR

1 1 Pri GPT header

2 32 Pri GPT table

34 6

40 409600 1 GPT part - C12A7328-F81F-11D2-BA4B-00A0C93EC93B

409640 250059096 2 GPT part - 53746F72-6167-11AA-AA11-00306543ECAC

250468736 262144 3 GPT part - 426F6F74-0000-11AA-AA11-00306543ECAC

250730880 1664

250732544 249384960 4 GPT part - EBD0A0A2-B9E5-4433-87C0-68B6B72699C7

500117504 655

500118159 32 Sec GPT table

500118191 1 Sec GPT header

sudo gpt -vv -r show /dev/disk1

gpt show: /dev/disk1: mediasize=1000204886016; sectorsize=512; blocks=1953525168

gpt show: /dev/disk1: PMBR at sector 0

gpt show: /dev/disk1: Pri GPT at sector 1

gpt show: /dev/disk1: Sec GPT at sector 1953525167

start size index contents

0 1 PMBR

1 1 Pri GPT header

2 32 Pri GPT table

34 6

40 409600 1 GPT part - C12A7328-F81F-11D2-BA4B-00A0C93EC93B

409640 1951845952 2 GPT part - 53746F72-6167-11AA-AA11-00306543ECAC

1952255592 1269536 3 GPT part - 426F6F74-0000-11AA-AA11-00306543ECAC

1953525128 7

1953525135 32 Sec GPT table

1953525167 1 Sec GPT header

diskutil list

/dev/disk0

#: TYPE NAME SIZE IDENTIFIER

0: GUID_partition_scheme *256.1 GB disk0

1: EFI EFI 209.7 MB disk0s1

2: Apple_CoreStorage 128.0 GB disk0s2

3: Apple_Boot Boot OS X 134.2 MB disk0s3

4: Microsoft Basic Data BOOTCAMP 127.7 GB disk0s4

/dev/disk1

#: TYPE NAME SIZE IDENTIFIER

0: GUID_partition_scheme *1.0 TB disk1

1: EFI EFI 209.7 MB disk1s1

2: Apple_CoreStorage 999.3 GB disk1s2

3: Apple_Boot Boot OS X 650.0 MB disk1s3

/dev/disk2

#: TYPE NAME SIZE IDENTIFIER

0: Apple_HFS OSX-FusionHD *1.1 TB disk2

diskutil cs list

CoreStorage logical volume groups (1 found)

|

+-- Logical Volume Group DF140929-90E7-48E1-AC3D-C9C75BA88D1D

=========================================================

Name: OSX-FusionHD

Status: Online

Size: 1127375384576 B (1.1 TB)

Free Space: 69632 B (69.6 KB)

|

+-< Physical Volume C856A74C-EB57-4D1F-8223-0A22215218ED

| ----------------------------------------------------

| Index: 0

| Disk: disk0s2

| Status: Online

| Size: 128030257152 B (128.0 GB)

|

+-< Physical Volume 80D91A14-CCC9-47B1-B071-B9ADFF23924F

| ----------------------------------------------------

| Index: 1

| Disk: disk1s2

| Status: Online

| Size: 999345127424 B (999.3 GB)

|

+-> Logical Volume Family 019D610F-21AC-4B54-AB0A-6D5F90D520A7

----------------------------------------------------------

Encryption Status: Unlocked

Encryption Type: None

Conversion Status: NoConversion

Conversion Direction: -none-

Has Encrypted Extents: No

Fully Secure: No

Passphrase Required: No

|

+-> Logical Volume D9DC0F70-38C7-4AE6-BAC4-CFBE0F8D4F68

---------------------------------------------------

Disk: disk2

Status: Online

Size (Total): 1118844862464 B (1.1 TB)

Conversion Progress: -none-

Revertible: No

LV Name: OSX-FusionHD

Volume Name: OSX-FusionHD

Content Hint: Apple_HFS

sudo fdisk /dev/disk0

Password:

Disk: /dev/disk0 geometry: 31130/255/63 [500118192 sectors]

Signature: 0xAA55

Starting Ending

#: id cyl hd sec - cyl hd sec [ start - size]

------------------------------------------------------------------------

1: EE 0 0 2 - 25 127 14 [ 1 - 409639] <Unknown ID>

2: AC 25 127 15 - 1023 244 14 [ 409640 - 250059096] <Unknown ID>

3: AB 1023 244 15 - 1023 70 15 [ 250468736 - 262144] Darwin Boot

*4: 07 1023 96 42 - 1023 223 5 [ 250732544 - 249384960] HPFS/QNX/AUX

sudo fdisk /dev/disk1

Disk: /dev/disk1 geometry: 121601/255/63 [1953525168 sectors]

Signature: 0xAA55

Starting Ending

#: id cyl hd sec - cyl hd sec [ start - size]

------------------------------------------------------------------------

1: EE 1023 254 63 - 1023 254 63 [ 1 - 1953525167] <Unknown ID>

2: 00 0 0 0 - 0 0 0 [ 0 - 0] unused

3: 00 0 0 0 - 0 0 0 [ 0 - 0] unused

4: 00 0 0 0 - 0 0 0 [ 0 - 0] unused

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Answer 6

TheCWB Author

Level 1

8 points

Jun 23, 2015 12:50 PM in response to Loner T

Also, we cannot use the FusionDrive, as deepfreeze does not work with it. The corestorage volume has to be deleted. We got it working using our above method, just wanted to post the results on how to do it.

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