My not so smooth Apple Bootcamp experience
I finally got Windows installed in my MacbookPro and in my case, the experience was less than smooth. First, Bootcamp gave an error before I could even make a partition and I had to repair the OS X system disk which I could not do initially since to do so you have to boot the computer from the CD with the OS and I did not have it with me. Once I repaired the OS X system disk (I wonder how it got corrupted as I hardly used the computer since I got it) I prepared the partition, burned the CD with the drivers and started installing Windows. The installation itself was pretty good but I was shocked to see that the installation of XP (first time I actually saw it) still look and feel as installing Windows 3.1, I heard that Microsoft has change the look and feel of the Vista installation, it was probably time I guess. The real problems started now. The drivers were not being installed properly, I had to removed some of them and install them again (the Bluetooh one was a particularly problematic one) and after thinking I was done, Windows asked me to reboot which I accepted and then it freeze while shutting down. After waiting a while I manually had to close the computer and restart and Windows will not boot. I rebooted the OS X partition and removed the Windows installation CD which was trapped inside (no way to eject the CD manually on a Mac, I guess putting an eject button was not within their design guidelines). Btw, first time I started OS X after the installation of Windows it took forever to start and since Windows was not booting, I totally freaked out thinking that no none of the two OS partitions will boot. After that, reboot again and Windows finally started. I looked to get online but no wireless icon or connection anywhere to be seen. I checked the drivers and saw that the wireless LAN driver was not working well so I try to reinstall it but nothing. I was suggested that it could be a firmware problem so reboot again, start Mac OS X and attempted to upgrade the firmware but nothing, I already had the latest version. Reboot again, start Windows (at this point, several hours since I first started…) and started trying things till a colleague found out that actually, the Bootcamp drivers for the wireless LAN do not work on Japanese MacBook Pros since they use a different wireless LAN card that the US ones, check a thread about this issue here. I guess that I will have to get a USB wireless LAN for the time being…
Other drivers are missing but I cannot figure to which hardware they belong (the camera?) and at this point, I am not trying more things and I am just going to use it for a while to see whether it works well or not.
So not a very smooth experience but I must admit that when Windows was finally configured and I saw it start at the really high res of the MacBook Pro it was pretty cool and it feels very fast, faster than my current Sony notebook. So I hope that I do not came across more issues and I can finalize my switch to a Mac.
CD
