[Tutorial] How to Boot Camp USB 3.0 External Hard Drive
markthetech.com/how-to-boot-camp-usb-3-0-exte...
markthetech.comPosted Feb 6, 2016, 4:27 AM UTC
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markthetech.comIf anyone has an install.esd instead of an install.wim. Here is a tutorial on how to convert it. Do not try any other method. There are tools out there that "say" they can convert it. It won't. This is the only way I have found that actually works.
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Thank you for the followup!
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No problem it was fun to finally write it down
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I can only find Waik tools for win xp and 7, the only things for win 8 are labelled "ADK tools for windows 8" and "Dism for windows 8" which one do I want?
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Choose Waik tools for Windows 7 and follow the tutorial after that. You will only need the imagex.exe from that.
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Ok now it's saying the exe commands aren't recognized. I'm on win 8.1 on a vm
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You need to run imagex.exe, not exe.
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Jesus christ this is a horrible fucking guide
op did you even try following your instructions before you posted this?
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Thank you for following up.
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Has anyone done this on a SanDisk Extreme CZ80 64GB USB 3.0 Flash Drive? Will it work?
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You may run into issues partitioning it. I initially tried doing this on a flash drive (Lexar JumpDrive S75), and I wasn't able to create the partitions. Windows apparently has issues with multiple partitions on "removable" drives. I then followed instructions with an external hard drive, and everything worked.
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I ran into the same problem
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This would be good to have put into the original article, as I wasted an hour or so going and getting a 128GB USB stick and trying to get it to work.
Thanks for replying.
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I will update the article so people know it only works with external hard drives. Sorry for your wasted time.
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No worries. Thanks for the article. Glad to have added to the conversation, and helped the article be better.
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It should work just fine with the flash drive.
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I haven't been able to get a USB stick drive to partition. I get stuck after creating the active boot partition, as it doesn't seem as though the drive will allow another partition to be created.
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Did you make sure when making the active partition to make it 350mb if you do only primary it will just make one big partition. create partition primary size=350
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Yep, created the 350MB partition, first... then made it active... then tried to make a primary partition of the remainder of the drive.
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This is great. I'm excited to play with this later.
As my pc is currently a pile of parts in the rubbish bin, this should work of I install bootcamp on a different Mac like normal, and used it to create the drive, correct?
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So you are using an external usb drive as boot camp? If so then yes it will.
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Very nice tutorial! I did this exact process a while back and worked flawlessly!
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how did you get it to boot?
mine only has the standard bios option for booting, and that doesnt work
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Can this be done on an exFat external?
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no
windows has to be on NTFS
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During the process you will format it to ntfs. So if your drive is currently exFat, you can use it it will just delete everything and format it.
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One more question. I currently have just one 1 TB disk that I have partitioned and use for both storage (on exFat) and Time Machine. I find that I don't use the storage partition much. Will there be an issue if I run my Windows from a third partition from the same disk?
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When you do this tutorial you will wipe all partitions. After you install windows and boot it you can partition it how you like. I have done this. You will need to free up the space within windows though.
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Choose EFI boot when the boot options show up.
this might not work for you if you are using a 2012 or earlier macbook. I got it to work a few times on my 2012, but I usually ended up having issues with the switchable graphics later on down the road
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if you have problems with the efi boot just boost from the primary drive. It should work with both the same. I just choose efi because it seems to be faster.
edit: efi not wifi auto correct!
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theres no efi option since you did MBR instead of GPT also i got stuck at no bootable devices when trying to start windows
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I have done this countless times and I have both boot options. Bootcamp and EFI. What Mac do you have? EFI works with MBR.
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2012 15" non retina, and a 2013 imac and I even tried it on my thinkpad x201
none of them have a uefi option in the boot menu (thinkpad doesn't even support uefi) and booting into the usb just takes you to a screen saying to remove any disk or other media and try to press a key. pressing a key will either take you to no bootable devices, or your existing windows install if you had another installed
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Forgive my ignorance but basically this makes an external bootcamp usb drive? So I can theoretically delete bootcamp off my current ssd, buy a 2tb external and install bootcamp there instead?
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Yes
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awesome! 2tb bootcamp partition time!
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would recommend reading the article in detail still just to make sure it specifically meets your needs :)
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Yes it does. I tried to make it as simple as possible so just do the directions carefully and you should be able to do this successfully.
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Oh thank God. A new awesome thing of the whenever! :D
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I having a 128gb MacBook Pro did not want to buy an outrageously over priced thunderbolt drive. So after being told by everything I could find that it is not possible to boot camp an external usb drive, I wanted to share it with others so they can enjoy the perks of this setup. I hope it helps!
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If we're running this for gaming are we not slowing down the capabilities of the computer by forcing it through a bottleneck of an external drive?
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This isn't for those who want the best gaming machine possible. If you want that. Build a pc. This is for those who have maybe a small internal drive. Say a 128GB SSD like I do. I don't want to spend $180+ on a thunderbolt drive so I do this. The computer itself works fine as long as it is usb 3.0. The computer still runs the same it is just the reading/writing of the drive that would be slower than internal SATA.
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I'm missing a .dll file for the very last step
o:\windows\system32\bcdboot o:\windows /f ALL /s b:
and I can't seem to find it anywhere...
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what is the message the command gives after you run it?
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"The program can't start because api-ms-win-core-libraryloader-l1-2-1.dll is missing from your computer. Try reinstalling the program to fix this problem."
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I haven't had this happen before. I will do some research and get back to you.
Edit: try cleaning the external hard drive again and installing windows to it. Steps 9-25. It sounds like the instillation of windows from the install.wim to the external hard drive did not transfer correctly. Which version of windows are you trying to install onto the external hard drive.
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I'm using windows 8 and trying to install windows 10
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So sorry about the typo in steps 5 23 24. Auto correct changed it right before I posted it. It is now updated to imagex.exe instead of just exe. Thanks for letting me know!
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I'm not sure if anyone will see this, but for any person who's having trouble with the imagex.exe info command, you may have to tell your computer to focus only on C:/ first (it's probably focused on system32). You can do this by entering the command:
cd C:/
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this is the biggest problem I had when first doing this because I didn't know anything about the command line. What do you think is the best way to word this so I can update my tutorial?
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Right between step 23 and 24 tell them to put that command in so that they can make sure they are focused on the right file path or something like that.
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I will do that. Thank you so much!
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how to upgrade? windows update gives me errors (the disk don't support UEFI firmware)
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Your going to have to give me more than that. What do you mean by upgrade? what errors specifically. You cannot upgrade from win 7/8/8.1 to 10 If those are already installed.
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sorry but i am bad with english, i have an old version of win10(not very old but for now it's old) on the external hard drive and yesterday i have downloaded via windows update the 1511 version of windows but when i try to instal there is an error that say "impossible to install windows because the drive have a different layout and don't support UEFI firmware" or somethingsimilar(i have translated from my language)
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Oh no problem now i understand. So just to clarify, you go to Start menu-settings-Update & Security-windows update. then it gives the error when trying to install this update?
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Has anyone tried playing Overwatch on this setup?
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it shouldn't have a problem playing Overwatch. I don't own Overwatch myself but as long as your Mac is usb 3.0 and has the specs for overwatch you should be fine.
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Okay thanks !
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Thanks for writing the tutorial! I encountered a few issues while trying to follow it:
install.wimin the Windows 10 ISO I downloaded. There's aninstall.esdin the sources folder, which is 2.5 GB, but I'm not sure if that's the same file.my wak tools has it. here is a re upload of what I got
I also do not have the install.wim option, but i'll try to follow the guide using the install.esd (possibly renaming it to install.wim)
I found this that can aparantly convert .esd files to .wim files. I'll give it a shot and tell you how it goes.nvm don't use this. I have no idea how i works and it genuinely seems like a virus just looking at the uihttp://www.intowindows.com/how-to-easily-convert-install-esd-to-install-wim/
follow what JW0914 said
I have a way to convert it. I will make a tutorial later today.
update: here it is.
Cool I got it converted
but where the hell do I get exe? every time I try to do it it says command not found
yes I used waik tools and yes I only checked for win 8.1
am i supposed to click for win 7? because that's what im running
oh you run imagex.exe not just exe. OP did you even try to follow your guide before you posted it?
tell me the step number so I can fix it
update: autocorrect changed it to just exe so sorry. It is changed now.
No the install.esd file is an encrypted version of the install.wim. It will not work. I have a tool to convert it and will put up a tutorial on how to use it. Could you tell me if you downloaded your iOS from the link I gave in the tutorial?
update: here is a tutorial on how to convert it.
I downloaded the Windows 10 ISO by using the MediaCreationTool from the page you linked in the tutorial.
The tutorial on converting
install.esdtoinstall.wimworked. Thanks! I followed the rest of the instructions, and everything looks like it's working.good I'm glad it all worked for you!