windows7_rc1_boot_screenWindows 7 is the latest and greatest Windows version ever, it should be a child’s play to install? Probably, if you’re not installing it on a slightly outdated but still lovely Mac Book PRO.

So MSDN subscriber downloads finally got back on line, I downloaded the ISO and got my key. I had already cloned my harddrive to a USB disk for safety so I was ready to rock ‘n roll….? I rebooted with the dvd in my drive and quickly ran into my first problem. I was faced with a screen saying: “Select CD-ROM boot type” with the options 1 and 2. However, the keyboard was dead so I couldn’t choose either. It turned out the dvd iso had to be rebuilt in order to work with MBP. I found this great short post by Segio McFly on how to fix that problem.

With a re-built/re-burned iso (thank god for DVD-RW), I was ready to install….!? Next problem. I got as far as to the installer but when i hit the “Install” button i got a screen saying “Setup is starting…” but quickly returned to the same screen with the install-button. I couldn’t find any relevant information about this on Google so I decided to start the installation from boot camp manager in OSX instead. I  still had my Windows XP partition so I removed that and created a new partition, started the installation from OSX with the DVD in my drive and that did the trick! Installation started and it was very simple. Much less painfull than the old Windows XP installation… Next problem!

The installation froze on the “Completing installation” step. Lucky for me it was just a standard Windows random crash/freeze. I had to start all over with the installation and this time it went through without problems! Finally!!!

With Windows 7 x64 installed the next step was to get all drivers updated. My MBP is unfortunately not the latest unibody model, it’s about 3 years old. First step was to get the boot camp drivers installed. Instead of finding my OSX dvd I downloaded the boot camp drivers from here. After a reboot i downloaded the updated drivers from Apple, don’t forget to set the compatibility mode to Windows vista and to run as administrator.

With boot camp drivers installed the AMD/ATI drivers for X1600 are still missing. This is a pain in the arse. I used the guide by modtool and the drivers from driversheaven (link on the modtool site). Another reboot and the resolution is what you expect. Run the  tool to assess your computers performance. I ended up with a score of 4.3 out of 7.9, not too bad for a  3 year old laptop. This will also turn on the fancy aero features in Windows 7.

Almost done now. The only thing missing was the sound. Becuase my MBP is rather old the sound card is from Sigmatel, not realtek. I ended up finding gmy OSX DVD and installing the sigmatel drivers in the boot camp folder. It’s important to set the compatibility level to Vista and to run as administrator. Another reboot and I was done! Windows 7 RC1 is working! Now all I have to do is spend countless hours installing Office, Visual Studio, SQL Server 2008 etc, etc.

So what do I think of Windows 7 so far? It’s awesome! Hopefully Apple will release some updated bootcamp package to make the installation a bit smoother.

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