Boot Camp - Day 1

OK so the other day I downloaded Boot Camp. I wanted to make sure I read all the documentation before going ahead. Good thing that I did!

So I ran Boot Camp on MacOSX and printed the instructions out as Boot Camp told me to do repeatedly (So did Walt Mossberg in his article). Actually, I sent the document to my PC so that I did not have to print it out. And yes you should have it in front of you when you are attempting this.

Firstly it told me I did not have the latest firmware... so I went to the Apple website and found it here. (this is not OSX 10.4.6 which is the OS which I already had)

I burned the Drivers disk which everyone should! This essentially has all the drivers for the Intel Mac hardware for Windows XP. Once you have Windows running, the first thing you should do is pop in this disk. I am getting ahead of myself.

So Boot Camp ran fine and partititioned my Intel Mac drive with a Windows Partition (10GB) and then I couldn't find my Windows XP SP2 disk! Damn.

After looking around, I manage to find the disk! So I am all set. I continue with Boot Camp which then restarts my computer. For some reason which I am still trying to figure out, I have a very long boot up time (this is before Boot Camp) so I waited for a while before I saw the Blue installation screen ... Yikes!!! ( I will write about the boot up experience in another post).

I went through the instructions that was given as I followed Window's own installation - do stick to Apple's instructions! Name your partition C: drive. I also choose FAT over NTFS as apparently FAT is more compatible with MAC OSX:
===
NTFS— Provide better reliability and security.
If you format the partition using the NTFS file system, you will not be able to write or save files to the Windows volume from Mac OS X.

FAT—Provides better compatibility.
Allows you to read and write files on the Windows volume from Mac OS X. This option is a available only if the Windows partition you created in Step 2 is 32 GB or smaller.
===

So I go through the normal Windows installation and everything is fine until it asks for my Windows installion key (you know the 25 alphanumeric set of codes that you need to put in?). Where the heck did I put that? Stuck on my old PC somewhere? Fiddle -- fiddle -- search -- search. FOUND! an hour later!!

Ok.. so I stick that in and 15 minutes later... it was done. I had Windows XP running on my Mac INTEL!!!!!!!!! I feel cool.

But then, it is a blank XP install... there is nothing on it except the basics IE, Accessories, etc. I have to dig up all my Windows programs and install them all again. Sigh...

Anyhow, I finished up by downloading Google Toolbar, MSN Messenger, MS Intellitype and Intellipoint for my wireless keyboard (see other post) - Windows version this time. I now realize that I need to install everything on both OSes. Sigh...

Ok.. just to check I rebooted to see if I messed up my OSX. It booted into Windows by default.. Yikes!!! OK.. Reboot again and hold down the Option key (or ALT key in my case). so I had to hold it down for about 4 minutes because I was still having my long boot up time problem..... But everything seemed fine. Mac OSX was working normally....

All in all.. It was not that bad. I guess I could have been more organized. But there is still more work to do now to install my Windows stuff back up. (or at least the programs that I want but could not get on Mac). More on this stuff another time.

More detailed info and instructions on Boot Camp here at WinSuperSite!