- Joined
- Sep 25, 2012
- Messages
- 1,319
- Motherboard
- Asus Z270 Maximus IX HERO
- CPU
- i7-7700K
- Graphics
- GTX 1080 Ti
- Mac
- Mobile Phone
Last Fall I got tired of waiting for Apple to update the MacPro (so I could retire my 5 year old 8-Core Mac 3,1) and decided to try my hand at building a CustoMac. With the help of this fabulous website I managed to build a working machine based on items recommended here :http://tonymacx86.blogspot.com/search/label/CustoMac
And the guide shown here: http://www.tonymacx86.com/mountain-...nderbolt-updated-10-8-2-multibeast-5-2-a.html
(Actually, if I remember correctly this guide had an older version that has since been "updated").
My build was not without hiccups but due to the excellent info and people found in this forum I was able to get almost everything working, great! However I needed Parallels to work and had been hung up using a new Windows 8 install.
This is my guide to possibly help others to get their Parallels working...
__________________________________
My setup (besides what is shown in the signature) has OSX 10.8.2 on a 3TB Seagate ST3000DM001-9YN166 HD. I had a Kingston 128G SSD with Win7 that I had used with Apple's BootCamp on my old MacPro so I decided to double boot between OSX and Windows.
I installed the Win7 SSD (ps I spent $50 on a pair of KingWinKF-253-BK Hot Swap Racks to make changing drives easier - see:http://kingwin.com/products/cate/mobile/racks/kf_253_bk.asp ) and booted up to Chimera and chose the "System Reserved" partition and after chugging for a few minutes the system booted right up! Color me impressed.
Windows 7 desktop appeared and all was right with the world... well mostly right. I had to install new drivers for almost everything from Chipset to video.
I then decided to check Parallels so I rebooted to OSX and fired up my little friend and low and behold it worked! I had to reactivate Windows but that went through quickly and all was right in the world again!
Since I am never satisfied to leave well enough alone I decided to put Windows 8 on my new Crucial 256GB SSD (M4-CT256M4SSD2) and go for broke. I downloaded the Release Preview (this was before the final release) and performed a clean install on the blank clean SSD. Imagine my surprise when the computer booted beautifully to Win8! Happiness is a beautiful thing again^2. I went on to use Win8 to play Battlefield 3 and allowed it to D/L 30 GB of D/L content not present on the Windows 7 drive...hmmm probably not a good idea, as we will see later.
Then I ran Parallels and my joy left me...
Back in OSX I ran Parallels and tried to create a BootCamp VM and I was told rudely that I could not install it from the Win8 SSD since I had not blessed the Parallels God with the proper partitioning scheme that would satisfy it's lust for power! Actually I got the dreaded "PRL_ERR_DISK_GPT_MBR_NOT_EQUAL" error. With that notice I did an iSearch and located the description on both this forum and Parallels forum but neither had a great and easy solution.
I was told things like "just run gptsync from the rEFIt USB stick and viola! Troubles solved!
Not 
:... rEFIt is for a "real" Mac and will not boot on a Hackintosh. There was no Mac version for use within terminal ( at least I could not find one with a valid D/L link). So I decided to boot into Ubuntu (yes - I have a working Linux HD as well) but ran into mouse troubles with my new R.A.T. 5 mouse and Ubuntu... frustrating until I managed to dig around the various dead computers I have nearby and located a USB Mouse (cheapo and dirty-o) and was able to attempt a gptsync under linux................ didn't happen. Grrr.
So in order to try things randomly I decided to safely backup my Win8 drive so I could reformat it "properly" and went to Best Buy and picked up a 1TB External HD. I bought a Toshiba model HDTC610XS3B1. It said it was compatible with Mac and PC and it came with backup software (PC) called BackUp Now EZ and I picked it up around $80 bucks. Only after I opened it did I realize that it also came with a Mac driver for writing to NTFS drives! Score! Tuxera NTFS which sells for $33.31 USD by itself! Sweetness...
Back to my story. I booted up to Win8 (natively) and installed and ran the EZ software to make a complete system backup (since I had over 30 GB of Battlefield 3 DLC that I didn't wish to re-download) and then I rebooted back into my trusty OSX and used DiskUtil to repartition the SSD into a BootCamp style of partition. I saw "style" since Boot Camp Assistant won't run on a Hackintosh. I set the partition to FAT32 using MBR and then rebooted to the EZ software from the External Drive and attempted to reload my Win8 System from the backup I had just made.... you would think it would work but NOOOOOoooooo. The EZ software complained bitterly telling me there was not enough space on the SSD to reload the image I had just made.... Muy Sadness...
This story is getting long so instead of telling you everything that went wrong I'll tell you what I did to get it working again. Ok? I thought that you would.
_______________________________
I ended up having to follow a very exact process to get the correct partitioning scheme and to get the EZ backup to work and save me from missing too many days of playing Battlefield 3. Here goes:
1) The partition is peculiar. You must use DiskUtil within OSX to partition the blank Win8 SSD into two partitions. One will contain the "system reserved" partition and the other will contain Window 8 proper. This screen shot shows that partition one was set to around 200 MB (not GB) I named it disk0s1 since I could name it whatever I wanted... It is NOT a MacOS Extended format I don't know why that screen shot shows it so - it was formatted as FAT32 by DiskUtil but later changed to NTFS by Windows.
The second screenshot shows the second partition (what was left in the drive - size-wise) as 255 GB and was formatted by DiskUtil as FAT32 and, you guessed it, later formatted to NTFS by Windows.
2) Reboot using the Windows CD (either 7 or 8 will work) but when you get to the install screen choose "Repair" and you will have the option to format your HD (or SSD in my case) by running Terminal and type "format C:" at the prompt. Then do the same for the D partition as well - "format D:" - be careful! In my case I had removed ALL OTHER DRIVES in my machine so that there would only be the correct drive to reformat! Don't say I didn't warn you. Sorry - no screen shots for that part.
If you are performing a clean install then by all means let it install but in my case I was not (remember my system backup?)
_____________________________
This should have been enough if all I wanted was to get Parallels running on Win8 but remember that System Backup I had? When I tried to reload it it would complain so the only way I could get my Win8 SSD drive to boot was to use the System Backup that I had ALSO made earlier just because I don't ever trust fresh new software. I had hedged my bet in case the EZ software farted on me and had used the built-in Win8 tools to create another complete system backup. This is the system that I reloaded when I rebooted to the Window CD and called for a system repair. I was able to get Windows 8 running again.
But sadly - the Windows 8 System Retore also REPARTITIONED MY SSD! ARGGGGG! Yuck poo. I had to start all over again Mucho Sadness.
So I decided that my only hope (besides Obi Won Kanobe) was to get that EZ software to work by bute force! Yeah Baby! More Power Scotty! Woo Hoo........ hmmmm ..... By George I think I've got it!
Since the EZ software was complaining about the size of the backup I decided to make sure that the backup was smaller. This screen shot shows the Win8 Computer Management screen. To get there - right click on "My Computer" and choose "Manage". Then click on "Disk Management from the left pane. You should see this screen:
It shows the two partitions that Windows needs - one small partition for the EFI boot process and one larger one with Windows proper. I selected the larger partiton and RIGHT clicked and chose "Shrink Partition" from the menu. This screenshot shows the options that my SSD had. I accepted the amount that was highlighted and let Windows shrink the partition.
I restarted the EZ Backup ( or "Backup Now EZ" whatever) software and this time when I chose the system backup it gave me a much smaller size backup file! Joy in Mudville!
Once again, I repartitioned my drive as noted in the earlier screenshots and rebooted into the EZ External HD Backup and this time it successfully reloaded my system! again!
I crossed my fingers and rebooted into Win8 and lo and behold everything came right up! Woo Hoo! But hold on now. Remember the whole reason I did this was to use Parallels? The proof is in the pudding, or in this case the reboot. Up came OSX and Parallels.... then I created a new VM and when it asked I told it to give me a new one from my Win8 "BootCamp" drive and it worked! Yeah! Dancing Around My Computer! High Fives!
I think that the Windows Activation is a little screwed up but I'm sure I'll eventually get it going but I'm happy and I thought I would share it with you guys!
________________________________________
Yes you can get a clean Windows 8 install working through Parallels, just make sure to partition it correctly.
Bob
And the guide shown here: http://www.tonymacx86.com/mountain-...nderbolt-updated-10-8-2-multibeast-5-2-a.html
(Actually, if I remember correctly this guide had an older version that has since been "updated").
My build was not without hiccups but due to the excellent info and people found in this forum I was able to get almost everything working, great! However I needed Parallels to work and had been hung up using a new Windows 8 install.
This is my guide to possibly help others to get their Parallels working...
__________________________________
My setup (besides what is shown in the signature) has OSX 10.8.2 on a 3TB Seagate ST3000DM001-9YN166 HD. I had a Kingston 128G SSD with Win7 that I had used with Apple's BootCamp on my old MacPro so I decided to double boot between OSX and Windows.
I installed the Win7 SSD (ps I spent $50 on a pair of KingWinKF-253-BK Hot Swap Racks to make changing drives easier - see:http://kingwin.com/products/cate/mobile/racks/kf_253_bk.asp ) and booted up to Chimera and chose the "System Reserved" partition and after chugging for a few minutes the system booted right up! Color me impressed.
Windows 7 desktop appeared and all was right with the world... well mostly right. I had to install new drivers for almost everything from Chipset to video.
I then decided to check Parallels so I rebooted to OSX and fired up my little friend and low and behold it worked! I had to reactivate Windows but that went through quickly and all was right in the world
again!Since I am never satisfied to leave well enough alone I decided to put Windows 8 on my new Crucial 256GB SSD (M4-CT256M4SSD2) and go for broke. I downloaded the Release Preview (this was before the final release) and performed a clean install on the blank clean SSD. Imagine my surprise when the computer booted beautifully to Win8! Happiness is a beautiful thing
again^2. I went on to use Win8 to play Battlefield 3 and allowed it to D/L 30 GB of D/L content not present on the Windows 7 drive...hmmm probably not a good idea, as we will see later.Then I ran Parallels and my joy left me...
Back in OSX I ran Parallels and tried to create a BootCamp VM and I was told rudely that I could not install it from the Win8 SSD since I had not blessed the Parallels God with the proper partitioning scheme that would satisfy it's lust for power! Actually I got the dreaded "PRL_ERR_DISK_GPT_MBR_NOT_EQUAL" error. With that notice I did an iSearch and located the description on both this forum and Parallels forum but neither had a great and easy solution.
I was told things like "just run gptsync from the rEFIt USB stick and viola! Troubles solved!
Not :... rEFIt is for a "real" Mac and will not boot on a Hackintosh. There was no Mac version for use within terminal ( at least I could not find one with a valid D/L link). So I decided to boot into Ubuntu (yes - I have a working Linux HD as well) but ran into mouse troubles with my new R.A.T. 5 mouse and Ubuntu... frustrating until I managed to dig around the various dead computers I have nearby and located a USB Mouse (cheapo and dirty-o) and was able to attempt a gptsync under linux................ didn't happen. Grrr.So in order to try things randomly I decided to safely backup my Win8 drive so I could reformat it "properly" and went to Best Buy and picked up a 1TB External HD. I bought a Toshiba model HDTC610XS3B1. It said it was compatible with Mac and PC and it came with backup software (PC) called BackUp Now EZ and I picked it up around $80 bucks. Only after I opened it did I realize that it also came with a Mac driver for writing to NTFS drives! Score! Tuxera NTFS which sells for $33.31 USD by itself! Sweetness...
Back to my story. I booted up to Win8 (natively) and installed and ran the EZ software to make a complete system backup (since I had over 30 GB of Battlefield 3 DLC that I didn't wish to re-download) and then I rebooted back into my trusty OSX and used DiskUtil to repartition the SSD into a BootCamp style of partition. I saw "style" since Boot Camp Assistant won't run on a Hackintosh. I set the partition to FAT32 using MBR and then rebooted to the EZ software from the External Drive and attempted to reload my Win8 System from the backup I had just made.... you would think it would work but NOOOOOoooooo. The EZ software complained bitterly telling me there was not enough space on the SSD to reload the image I had just made....
Muy Sadness...This story is getting long so instead of telling you everything that went wrong I'll tell you what I did to get it working again. Ok? I thought that you would.
_______________________________
I ended up having to follow a very exact process to get the correct partitioning scheme and to get the EZ backup to work and save me from missing too many days of playing Battlefield 3. Here goes:
1) The partition is peculiar. You must use DiskUtil within OSX to partition the blank Win8 SSD into two partitions. One will contain the "system reserved" partition and the other will contain Window 8 proper. This screen shot shows that partition one was set to around 200 MB (not GB) I named it disk0s1 since I could name it whatever I wanted...
It is NOT a MacOS Extended format I don't know why that screen shot shows it so - it was formatted as FAT32 by DiskUtil but later changed to NTFS by Windows.The second screenshot shows the second partition (what was left in the drive - size-wise) as 255 GB and was formatted by DiskUtil as FAT32 and, you guessed it, later formatted to NTFS by Windows.
2) Reboot using the Windows CD (either 7 or 8 will work) but when you get to the install screen choose "Repair" and you will have the option to format your HD (or SSD in my case) by running Terminal and type "format C:" at the prompt. Then do the same for the D partition as well - "format D:" - be careful! In my case I had removed ALL OTHER DRIVES in my machine so that there would only be the correct drive to reformat! Don't say I didn't warn you. Sorry - no screen shots for that part.
If you are performing a clean install then by all means let it install but in my case I was not (remember my system backup?)
_____________________________
This should have been enough if all I wanted was to get Parallels running on Win8 but remember that System Backup I had? When I tried to reload it it would complain so the only way I could get my Win8 SSD drive to boot was to use the System Backup that I had ALSO made earlier just because I don't ever trust fresh new software. I had hedged my bet in case the EZ software farted on me and had used the built-in Win8 tools to create another complete system backup. This is the system that I reloaded when I rebooted to the Window CD and called for a system repair. I was able to get Windows 8 running again.
But sadly - the Windows 8 System Retore also REPARTITIONED MY SSD! ARGGGGG! Yuck poo. I had to start all over again
Mucho Sadness.So I decided that my only hope (besides Obi Won Kanobe) was to get that EZ software to work by bute force! Yeah Baby! More Power Scotty! Woo Hoo........ hmmmm ..... By George I think I've got it!
Since the EZ software was complaining about the size of the backup I decided to make sure that the backup was smaller. This screen shot shows the Win8 Computer Management screen. To get there - right click on "My Computer" and choose "Manage". Then click on "Disk Management from the left pane. You should see this screen:
It shows the two partitions that Windows needs - one small partition for the EFI boot process and one larger one with Windows proper. I selected the larger partiton and RIGHT clicked and chose "Shrink Partition" from the menu. This screenshot shows the options that my SSD had. I accepted the amount that was highlighted and let Windows shrink the partition.
I restarted the EZ Backup ( or "Backup Now EZ" whatever) software and this time when I chose the system backup it gave me a much smaller size backup file! Joy in Mudville!
Once again, I repartitioned my drive as noted in the earlier screenshots and rebooted into the EZ External HD Backup and this time it successfully reloaded my system!
again!I crossed my fingers and rebooted into Win8 and lo and behold everything came right up! Woo Hoo! But hold on now. Remember the whole reason I did this was to use Parallels? The proof is in the pudding, or in this case the reboot. Up came OSX and Parallels.... then I created a new VM and when it asked I told it to give me a new one from my Win8 "BootCamp" drive and it worked! Yeah! Dancing Around My Computer! High Fives!
I think that the Windows Activation is a little screwed up but I'm sure I'll eventually get it going but I'm happy and I thought I would share it with you guys!
________________________________________
Yes you can get a clean Windows 8 install working through Parallels, just make sure to partition it correctly.
Bob
