Dual-boot Sierra + Windows 10

[bartpostma]

Hi all,

Currently I am succesfully running Sierra on a Crucial MX300 525GB SSD. Pretty much everything works perfectly. However, my Windows 10 is installed on an older SSD (Kingston SSDNow V300 120GB) which has slightly slower read speeds (470 MB/s), but significantly slower write speeds (140-150 MB/s). Also the 120GB is on the small size forcing me to put files on my HDD that I would rather run from my SSD (that is mainly my Photoshop Lightroom library).

Therefore, I would like to make 2 partitions on my Crucial MX300 SSD and then use about 300GB for MacOS Sierra and 200GB for Windows 10. So far I had no luck, I made a partition on the SSD through Sierra and then ran my Windows install USB, but it gives me an error that on EFI systems, Windows can only be installed on GPT disks.

PS: not planning on spending money on a new SSD. I currently have seperate SSD's already, I just wish I could use the faster one for both OS.

I made a Windows 10 full system image backup since I do not feel like re-installing all my programs that are on there. Some programs are however installed on my exfat formatted HDD, but if I would recover this system image on a partition on the 525GB SSD it would still be able to use the programs installed on the HDD right?

I also have a Time Machine Backup from my Macbook Pro that I will recover to Sierra if it is necessary to reinstall, but that's a breeze and no issue at all.


For completeness, below my full system specs, carefully selected in November last year to be Hackintosh compatible (unfortunately before GTX 1XXX support) with the help of the buying guides over here:

- Gigabye GA-Z170X-UD3
- i7 6700k
- Asus Strix GTX970
- 16GB (2x8) Corsair Vengeance LPX DDR4 2400MHz
- Crucial MX300 (Current MacOS Sierra installation)
- Seagate ST2000DM001 (formatted exFat so I can reach it from both MacOS and Windows)
- Kingston SSDNow V300 120GB (current Windows 10 installation) --> my idea is to format this exfat
- TP-Link TL-WDN4800
- Corsair CS650M PSU

 

[P1LGRIM]

Not a Desktop Guide - Moved to Multi Booting.
The 'sticky' guides in this forum may help you.

 

[theclaw]

Hi,

Did you have any luck ?

I'm currently running Sierra and not getting any luck installing W10 with bootcamp.

 

[bartpostma]

Hi,

Did you have any luck ?

I'm currently running Sierra and not getting any luck installing W10 with bootcamp.

Can't get it to work either unfortunately.

I'll be sticking to my dual boot with 2 seperate SSDs.

 

[vulgo]

So far I had no luck, I made a partition on the SSD through Sierra and then ran my Windows install USB, but it gives me an error that on EFI systems, Windows can only be installed on GPT disks

Did you format the partition as MS-DOS?

 

[vulgo]

Hi,

Did you have any luck ?

I'm currently running Sierra and not getting any luck installing W10 with bootcamp.

Don't use bootcamp it won't work

 

[theclaw]

Don't use bootcamp it won't work

REally ?

OK, I've tried the sticked guide here, the one that says to reboot on the usb W10 and let the installer format the partition but it tells me it can't create a partition nor locate an existing one.

 

[Going Bald]

REally ?

OK, I've tried the sticked guide here, the one that says to reboot on the usb W10 and let the installer format the partition but it tells me it can't create a partition nor locate an existing one.

When you created your partition with disk utility on the Mac OS drive to install Win10 how did you format it?

 

[theclaw]

MSDOS FAT.

 

[vulgo]

MSDOS FAT.

Bootcamp is for macs only for various reasons.

Re: MS-DOS FAT. If you use that, Disk Utility creates a hybrid MBR on your GPT disk (without asking, or telling you) - Windows then sees an MBR disk and the installer won't use it for UEFI booting. If you use Disk Utility, you should allocate the partition as HFS+, then in windows installer "free space" it, then format as e.g. NTFS.