Windows 10 Boot Camp install won't let me install on BOOTCAMP partition on Mac Pro with SSD drive

Most definitely, i was able to install Windows successfully, without any issues. The audio driver Realtek install got stuck on the install with BCA but i fixed it just by reinstalling it manually. To save some headache in the future, is there any good tips or suggestions on drives and or programs or a list of recommendations?.

Please create a backup of OSX, Windows and create a Windows System Restore point. Windows Updates should be manual to avoid incorrect drivers begin pushed to the Mac. You should periodically scan for updates and apply them selectively based on your specific needs.

I am having the same issue the OP described, however I have a late 2015 27" Retina iMac with 1TB SSD, not the fusion drive, running OSX El Capitan 10.11.3 and BCA 6.0.1(522). I've disconnected all external drives and I still get the same error as seen in the video linked earlier in the thread. I only have disk0. BCA installs OSXRESERVE on partition 4 and BOOTCAMP on partition 5. When the Windows installer asks me to select the drive to install on, I select partition 5 and the error message says that Windows 10 cannot be installed on the drive because it is not formatted NTFS. Formatting the partition using the Windows installer doesn't help either as I receive another error that the selected drive cannot be used.

I miss the days of "It just works".

Please disconnect all external storage, run the following two procedures,

Resetting the System Management Controller (SMC) on your Mac - Apple Support

How to Reset NVRAM on your Mac - Apple Support

and then run BCA and try the installation again.

What is the exact error message (a screen shot/photo would really help)?

OK! So I followed those instructions earlier in the day and the issue remained. However, when I did it, I still had an external drive connected. This time, with the drive disconnected, it fixed the issue. I still had to select "Format" on the BC partition within the Windows installer, but instead of receiving a second error, the installation started!

Now I'm just wondering what the SMC and NVRAM had to do with it?

Thanks Loner T!

Depending on the error message, the NVRAM contains variables used by Bootcamp which control the installation of Windows across several reboots as needed by Windows. If these are not set, removing the storage will fix the issue, but if they are set, you will need to do both, remove the external storage and run NVRAM reset. SMC reset will rebuild the hardware database which will help with drivers installation after the base Windows installation.

This was the piece I was missing. Loner T got me started with his general information about disk structure and volumes and in particular his instructions on how to rebuild my 3TB Fusion drive, but I still couldn't get Windows 10 installed. I tried many things, even downgrading to Yosemite, but it still wouldn't work. Reset the PRAM and boom! Everything is great now. Thanks to both of you!

THe PRAM reset can be done at any time, but in my case if I was doing it without the drive being 1 partition it wouldn't do a thing and the same error would come back again and again.

Making the drive 1 partition again using the bootcamp assistant then resetting the PRAM and rerunning the bootcamp assistant to partition the drive and launch the installer worked every time. It even did last week when I reinstalled Win8. I had forgotten what the "magic trick" was. I had to Google for my nickname and Bootcamp lol

Hi Loner T, Have a similar issue here whereby the installation of Bootcamp was unsuccessful.

Having booted mac to OS X and attempting to remove the Bootcamp partition, the option was not there.

Booted the Mac into local recovery and there were four partitions present, Mac OS X, Bootcamp, 1.16GB partition and a 16BG partition.

Ran first aid on the Mac HD and Erased the Bootcamp Drive Partition - 16GB partition diappeared once the Boot Camp partition was removed.

The drive was set back to Mac HD (one partition)

Checked with diskutil cmd to see if LVG is okay -> no LVG found

Tried /sbin/fsck -fy -> getting: volume is mounted with write access. Rerun with -l to freeze volume

Rebooted the mac and now the Mac Pro has a flashing question mark and will not boot.

Single user mode is not working either.

Any suggestions most welcome.

Can you boot into Internet Recovery and post the output of

gpt -vv -r show /dev/disk0

You can also use the Safari in Recovery Console to post a screen shot.

Hi Loner T and thanks for the help.

The output from the cmd is as follows:

Not sure what this cmd actually means?

How many disk drives are connected in your Mac Pro?

You will need to unfreeze the volume. Fsck should be run in Internet Recovery, otherwise, the Recovery HD being mounted will interfere with fsck.

Hopefully you've fixed this by now, but this is happening because you're loading the ISO from an external drive.

I had this issue and it drove me totally crazy, but it turns out that newer models can install windows with the ISO just loaded from the boot drive's downloads folder. In hindsight I don't know why I thought I had to be using an external HD, or something other than the boot drive, but I did.

Once I ran Bootcamp and had the ISO in my regular Downloads folder, it worked fine. Within Windows setup I had to select the BOOTCAMP partition and format it using the wizard in the setup interface (takes like 15s), but after that it finished installing and it works like a dream.

Apple should TOTALLY update the Bootcamp instructions to make it clear that you shouldn't use anything external in the process unless you have to via prompt. Would have saved me weeks of hassle and a decent chunk of money I spent on now (to be returned) El Capitan-compatible audio hardware.

It is documented - Boot Camp: "We couldn't create a new partition or locate an existing one" alert during Windows 8 install - Apple Support .

Disconnect all Thunderbolt and USB storage devices, except for the USB media which contains the Windows ISO installer.

the issue happen is due to others storage device like memory card or other usb drive still plugged in to your mac, please only connect the installation stick to yr mac and perform the installation again