Windows 7 on MBP

I was reading another thread which suggested that Windows 7 would not run that well on a MBP. Why is that? Thanks.

 

because its deisgned for os x and not windows and apple and microsoft are competitors and thus apple writes bad drivers for windows.

 

I often wonder if they do it out of incompetence or out of genius, because Windows just about works well enough to be usable, but also just badly enough to successfully negatively reinforce Windows' inferiority on the type of guy who wouldn't know better.

It's hard to pin down.

 

And it gives people like you, excellent fodder to moan about!

 

Oh no, I expect it to work badly by now.

It's just the number of people who insist it works that surprises me. My current dilemma is figuring out how best to sit on the fence between 'works' and 'doesn't work'.

 

Why does Apple have to write drivers for Windows, considering that Apple hardware is the same as PC hardware?

 

For various reasons, I would be interested in a MBP if it could do a good job in Windows 7 (my work OS), but not if it can't. Too much of a hassle. Personally, I think Apple would make more money if it made its stuff more compatible. Another example is the IPhone. Works okay with PCs, but not great, so I did not buy one.....

 

On my SR MBP, before apple officially released win7 & 64bit drivers, you could use the drivers from each components website, and it worked.
Personally, I havn't had too many issues running windows on my MBP, I dont run it off battery when im in it (only go in to play games), so I guess battery life doesn't affect me. And I did have issues installing windows 7, but that was because macs use EFI, not sure if later models remedied my issues.
Other then that, my windows experience on the mac has been fine, I cant think of anything major.

 

So I've been on it (on mains power, with an ACD) for most of today and you know - *if* the hardware was more stably engineered, and *if* the drivers were a little better, it could be a really great W7 machine.

Sure, the (matte, without the benefit of the lipstick-on-a-pig glass layer) screen is somewhat second-rate for a notebook of this class and the unibody construction makes it extraordinarily fragile in the end...

...but I mean, you know, there's a dearth of pretty/sleek, portable yet functional machines at the big-arse notebook end. There's the 12-year-old's dreams like the Alienwares and the (the horror) Toshiba Qosmios, the oppressively boring W700, the worthy but starchy Elitebooks and a whole host of also-rans such as the HP DV's - and well, the Covet is there, and may punch somewhere near the MBP end in terms of (a more industrial) style, but a config worth getting this machine for is beyond the wallets of even many who'd look at buying an MBP.

As I said elsewhere, ironically W7 looks great on a Mac. The setup I'm running on here is all-Apple - The MBP, Mighty Mouse, Apple keyboard, Apple Cinema Display - and the cosmetics of W7 really looks at home here. It would be really good to be able to use - and to recommend it without qualms - alongside these other machines as a viable W7 host.

I just can't quite though. Couldn't with XP, and couldn't with Vista. Hasn't yet changed with W7. There's still a significant compromise compared to a 'real' PC of the same calibre / price if you want to get a decent percentage of what it should have on paper out of the machine. So how much do you want to compromise? is the question at hand. A question I'm asking myself at the moment.

 

batt life is what's holding me back... I guess apple doesn't want my business?

drivers I'm sure i could get to work with some fighting... but battery life is too important and for the most part impossible to improve.

oh well, if I post this enough maybe someone at apple will read it and listen.

cheers!

 

You're right, not if running Windows is your main goal of buying the machine, which it shouldn't be since it's NOT advertised as a Windows computer. It's a Mac OS X computer that allows for Windows to be installed, it's not to turn it into a Windows machine. You're not a true Mac user if being able to install Windows is the deciding factor. It's not a priority anyway for Apple to create the best drivers so Windows users can be happy. They sold millions of Macs year after year before Intel.

 

One thing: Because Apple doesn't have BIOS Compatibility.
BIOS contains the ACPI (How System behave with regard to device and control) and Hardware definition (Device ID for Microsoft Drivers).
My guess is therefore a lot of device doesn't work.
Another thing you can try is instead of Boot Camp drivers, try installing from OEM.
Eg. Synaptic Drivers, Realtek High Def Audio Driver, Nforce Driver, Nvidia Driver, Atheros Wireless Driver.
However I do not know this will work, moreover this still doesn't account for the lack of ACPI.
But you can still try to fix it by using the ACPI of Dell Studio XPS 13 which contains the closest device combination to a Macbook.
Use Microsoft ACPI Compiler to overload the DSDT of Dell Studio XPS 13 ACPI.
Can try but may not work.

 

Isnt it illegal to try running Windows on a Mac anyway?

I know its violating the EULA when its tried the other way around..

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=khPx1dEIPnA

Look at the mobo...that is not an Apple mobo.
Clearly, Intel is breaking Apples Licensing agreement by running OSX on non-apple hardware. XD

 

1) is not illegal 2) is but Apple won't chase down someone(not company) who owns a valid license.

 

Windows 7 runs great on my UMBP. I need both OSX and Windows, so it works for me. I have used a lot of laptops (Sony, Dell etc) and the Macbook Pro is by far the best laptop I have ever had. Bar none. Is it perfect? No. Are their some compromises running Windows on Mac hardware? Yep. But the issues are minor and correctable.

I looked long and hard at other laptops before I purchased my second MBP. I wanted a powerful, good looking laptop that had great battery life and did not weigh a ton. I also needed at least a 15" screen for my development. The closest I found was a Latitude Z600. But it was a bit too slow for my work. Besides, I was able to purchase a 15" UMBP and a 24" Apple display for the same price as the z600.

I do my music, web browsing and video on the mac side, and my .net development on the windows 7 side. I can browse the internet in the evening on battery power, so I can use it untethered to a plug. During the day I hook it up to a Apple 24" display using Windows 7 for my programming.

Issues running Windows 7 on my UMBP
1) Bad audio driver. This is fixed through a manual driver update.
2) Apple Bluetooth mouse and keyboard pairing problem. Fixed by deleting and reinstalling generic drivers.
3) Not all of the multi-touch stuff works. Only one touch tap and two finger scrolling works.
4) Sensitive multi-touch tapping.
5) Bootcamp and parallels does not play together well yet in Windows 7. At least for me. I just use bootcamp. No parallels right now.
6) Battery life is less on the Windows side.

 

I do agree that if your main purpose is to install windows, a mac is not the way to go. I did however need to point out the absurd fanboy nature of your comment.

OH NOES, not good enough for the cult of Steve. Not a true believer in the macintosh creed.

*note to others, I think macs are fine. They build some impressive hardware, and the OS is fine, I don't hate macs, I just hate fanboys and thought this comment was funny*

 

I often wonder if MS does the same sort of things, MSN messenger for Mac is like 10 years behind MSN messenger for windows.

 

I disagree. This is slightly off-topic, since we're not talking about laptops, but my aunt wanted a new all-in-one computer with a gorgeous display to run Windows 7 EXCLUSIVELY, and you know what? I recommended her an iMac 21.5". And it works perfectly in Windows 7. And she LOVES it. And she loves the aesthetics (which is a big deal to many of us).

So there! I also know people who use their MacBook Air and Mac mini exclusively for Windows. Am I one of those people? No way! But it's not that unusual.

 

Why don't you keep the conversation civil rather than calling me names and sending direct insults. I come from years of owning Macs and back then being able to install Windows natively wasn't an option for most Macs. That was fine for me anyway, I bought a Mac to run the Mac OS. Almost everyday on this forum there's a new post of "Hey, I just bought my first Mac today and I need to know how to install Windows 7" Then their post goes on about how annoyed they are the battery life and drivers on Windows isn't as good as OS X, yada yada yada. What do they expect? It's a Macintosh. From my perspective many people on this forum seem more interested in in running Windows on their brand new Mac and it would be a dealbreaker if the Mac couldn't run it.

 

1)It is advertised as a "You can turn your Mac into a PC"
2)Define a true Mac user? Some sort of cult thing? You are buying a piece hardware not some brand or cult membership...
3)Yes it is not a priority but then if it can't run Windows Properly why advertise as "You can turn your Macbook into a PC"
4)Billions of PC are sold year after year...Come on get real a)Quote some proper statistic.
Lastly just ask those Mac users who have a PowerPC Processor how is Snow Leopard, while Windows 7 do backward hardware support Apple don't.
They want you to buy...

Seriously I don't want to argue useless stuff...
If you have a software/hardware issue state it.
If you have nothing constructive then don't comment, since the user ALREADY bought it, and comments that don't troubleshoot don't help.

 

Running Windows 7 on a Mac could be equated to running Windows 7 on a budget Windows machine, although in some ways the budget machine may run better. If the Mac is the most expensive machine you've bought to date, sure - you may never notice a difference. But a sidegrade? A totally different story.

I wasn't aware that it was subtle in any way for Microsoft. They are usually pretty cards-on-the-table in terms of their intentions - which usually gets them into a lot of trouble, unlike the usually nuanced, socially very aware, sneakily snide nature of Apple.

 

Really???? You're honestly going to try use this as a point of contention to backup your point of view??

Not really a fair comparison considering that Apple went to a completely different chip architecture where as PC's have been running on the x86 platform since near conception. Let's see PC makers shift to a new processor and see how long Windows continues to support the old.

 

much as I don't like supporting apple, apple has donve a better job at this. will windows 7 run on a pc from the power pc area? not well if it even installs.

ok, I still dissagree with this notion that you should look for a pc to run windows...

let me explain my position.
currently there is only 3 manufactures I CAN buy from in canada that don't have the extra large enter keys and the left shift key replaced with the backslach key. it's impossible to type on a keyboard like that and I refuse to buy a computer with a useless keyboard. These three companies are, Dell, Apple, and Lenovo. my experience with Lenovo hasn't been great. The Dells don't have decent battery life and are really expensive. so you can see I'm under a fair bit of pressure to find something that will work before 16:9 takes over. even Thinkpads are now using them

for the record who even thought of spliting the left shift key in half and put the backslash there should be shot \this \is \a \sentance \that \i \would \type \on \one \of \those \keyboards, With Cap On The Start Of Every Word

 

I must disagree. My I have had many "high end" expensive windows laptops (Sony SZ, Dell Latitude D600) and my UMBP runs Windows 7 very well in comparison. I know what a budget laptop runs like, and he MBP is far far superior. I say again, it is the bets laptop that I have ever owned Running any operating system.

 

Since when did Microsoft support PowerPC since Xp?
It is not one of their partners (Microsoft Partners doesn't have PPC offerings).
Microsoft support OS via percentage of usage.
They still support Xp because there are people using it.
I am pretty sure there are quite a number of PPC users on Apple.
Apple could have at least offer a SL upgrade without features that are not supported as a form of good will.

 

Erm please list your specs.
Once high end computers are now low end...
Both Comps you listed are generation old system...
It is like saying that sport shoe makes people run faster than conventional brands by asking a old man to wear the conventional shoe and a young man to wear the sport shoe...
Compare Apple to Apple or in this case computers produced in the same year...

 

no you missed the point, go find a mid range laptop from 2003, one with an Intel cpu, and try and put windows vista on IT. when vista was out, apple was still supporting Power pc. but was microsoft supporting the equivelent hardware? for the pc side? no they weren't. on vista's launch there were new budget machines that were haveing trouble getting vista up and running...

good will? so here is SL, but we are going to take all the improvements out from L, and sell it to you again? thats a quick way to disapoint people. it's better for apple just to say, your machines are ancient. we can no longer support them.

 

Actually it is fully support except for Aero features which limits older Intel Graphics Adapters.
Laggy issue can be due to a number of reasons like OEM bloatware.

 

I was refering to some high end computers that I have owned in the past. As far as current specs are concerned, I will posr some screen shoits of Windows 7 on my MBP and some performance numbers.

It does takes more than good specs to make a "high end" laptop. Build quality, keyboard, the case materials (cheal plastic vs a nice strong metal), screen brightness and quality. Cheap computers feel cheap. High end computers feel good and solid.

Are you tring to tell me that the MBP is a cheap computer? I don't think so. It is geat looking, very well build, fast laptop. What windows laptop is better?

 

or maybe the hardware is old? 1.8Ghz Pentium 4's with 512mb or ram will struggle big time with vista...

Edit: actually most machines then only had 256MB... Office 2007 takes more memory than that... let alone vista

 

Ironic you say this after your earlier comparison faux pas.

 

Companies should employ beautiful people because they look beautiful, smart people who are not as good looking should get the sack...
Come on beside aesthetics, the main purpose of a computer is for executing programs...hello white elephant anybody?
I apologise if you purchase a Macbook and the only thing you do is to stare at it everyday.

I admit true to some extent anyway that is not main point it is a additional note. Main point is when Apple says Macs can run like PCs however it is not totally true since there are lots of issues power users tend to notice.

In this case it is the RAM I have done Windows 7 installs on Pentium 4 PC works pretty well with 1-2GB.

 

True to some extent? Please, just admit you're wrong.

Apple does not guarantee that you will have an equivalent Windows experience. They don't even officially support Windows on a Mac which should indicate right there, that what you get is what you get. Your argument is completely without a leg to stand on and you're grasping.

 

I mean true with regards to the PPC issue that Apple didn't release SL for.

If they don't support they shouldn't even put up will run like PC on their site, and they don't put out "don't support in bold" on their site(not even in the FAQ), obviously a deliberate false advertising.
It took certain users so long to even accept the obvious Windows incompatibility hence I shall not continue to argue with people who blindly choose to argue. Nevertheless I will still offer suggestion to iron out incompatibilities to other users more open to ideas.

 

your last statement I disagree with... apple may not garrenty full windows support, but they advertise like they do. So expecting decent driver support I wouldn't say is completely unreasonable. remeber all those ads saying 'a macbook, runs vista better then most pc's'? or 'I'm a mac and a pc and your just a pc' ads? I agree apple shouldn't have ( I wish they did do better at it though) to support windows, but when they advertise that they do it's misleading.

oh, I think we can just give up on the power pc thing... who cares? it's old tec.

 

It's been posted before right from Apples website that they do not officially support Windows. They only provide drivers to install Windows in Boot Camp.

Oddly enough, that's how most of your posts come across.

 

Please point me to some advertising where Apple states they provide a full Windows experience.

 

look- in the end, if you want to run windows on your mac, be prepared with:

1) a power outlet
2) a mouse

forget advertising, support, fanboys from both camps... if you aren't prepared for that, get a different notebook to run windows.

if you happen to want to play games in windows, you should be good to go because you will need both of those things anyway.

if you are a casual user and just want to run normal applications, do web stuff (browsing, email), etc... then you will be making a serious sacrifice on the mac.

also, if your main motivation is gaming, you will still be making a sacrifice on the mac, since you can get better gaming hardware for your dollar.

just get a mac if your intentions are 1) to use os x

and 2) to use windows by a power outlet with an external mouse.

done.

 

Firstly, show me exactly where Apple advertises the words "Turn your Mac into a PC"?
Not at all surprised based on some of your posts that wouldn't understand what my signature is saying exactly.

My post useless? Yeah, you coming up with stuff out of your head such Apple advertising "Turn your Mac into a PC".
What Apple does advertise is that you can install Windows in case you need to run a Windows application "once in a while", period. Notice they don't advertise the auto ambient light control for the screen or all the multi-touch gestures that are in OS X, nor do they mention about the incredibly long 7 hour battery life in while running Windows. The drivers are not anywhere in Windows as good as they are in Mac OS X so you're not truly "Turning your Mac into a PC".

In terms of what I refer to as a true Mac user? Well I mentioned it already and apparently you decided to ignore the explanation so I'll repeat it just for you. . More people buying Macs TODAY that are coming from the Windows world, especially the geeks, come right here on this forum and whine they can't get the same user experience in Windows as they can on Mac OS X. Hmm, I wonder why?, as if they are completely shocked. Nowhere on Apple's website mentions that your Mac and Windows experience will be the same. Then they go on all day about what games they are playing with certain frame rates, then they go on about installing multi-versions of Windows, then some of them ask about installing Windows and removing the Mac OS completely as they have no use for it.
Apple offers Macs the ability to run Windows to help bridge gaps for those people with one or two Windows apps that won't make it to the Mac but many of the Windows lovers on this forum get pissy because they want to run their entire collection of Windows apps and have no interest in using OS X. At this point they are buying a Mac just to run Windows and of course for looks and that's just plain ridiculous.

 

please note that they advertise LIKE they provide full drivers support. I know there is a couple of them out there, but i could only find one.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=oxGD0RN48EY

 

Last post to Mac Fanatics
http://www.apple.com/getamac/faq/

 

Windows runs fine for me, I have not had a BSoD yet, Or any other stability problems. Yes it get's hot, and the battery may not last as long, But Windows runs fine.

 

Notice the qualifier " as if your Mac were a PC" which basically says you can use your Mac like it's a Windows machine, even though it really isn't. If something isn't the genuine article, you shouldn't expect the experience to be the same.

I can take a kitchen knife and use it "as if your knife were a screwdriver" but I shouldn't expect it to be quite as easy to use as the proper tool would be.

Yes you can run Windows on a Mac, but for all intents and purposes, if you want to run Windows right, you'll do it on a proper Windows machine. Period.

If you're buying a Mac so you can run Windows on it, you're buying it for the wrong reason.

 

I tried to install windows 7 professional x64 bit on my early 09 mac pro and it was a nightmare. everything installed fine except the drivers. bootcamp driver disk doesnt work with x64 bit. the only thing that was working was internet.

so I did some googling and found out you could copy the bootcamp install folder to hard drive and patch the install with some files. turns out the link to these files is broken. so that didnt work.

Then I read you had to get the 64 bit driver files from a torrent which I did. you were to install this first then install the vista 64 driver update from appple.This partially worked. after install I still had no sound, no mouse options, no hotkeys, no camera and it broke the cd rom which worked before but doesnt now. it just wouldnt eject anymore. it did give me the bootcamp option to boot enter windows or osx so i thought success until i tried to use it. it kept booting back into windows regardless of what option you chose.

there was also a listing under the device manager that no co processor was found. ive seen this before and its related to video drivers. i was able to install forceware drivers which cured the coprocessor problem. but still had no sound.

so i went to a different site to manually download windows 7 x64 bit sound drivers which they had. after a successful install the sound still didnt work.

at this point I just gave up. maybe I will try 32 bit install. I heard its really smooth and easy compared to the 64 bit.

 

Thank you Kris, well said.

 

Arguing semantics is a glorious waste of time and a beautiful representation of just how boring our lives and in turn we as human beings really are.

With that said, An operating system is an operating system, a computer is a computer. And it doesn't matter if it's a mac running windows or a pc running osx, because regardless of the set up, modern technology has made it so that everyone with a computer can argue, insult, and look at pornography equally well and with great ease.

 

Nice to see some logic on this thread.
I was going to ask how many people on here have even ever touched a boot-123 disk, used grub to partition off a dual boot efi / mbr, or even attemped the installation at all. I came to this thread maybe seeking some info on an upgrade to my dual boot solution since mine's a little old, and somehow I find an entire thread debating if what I'm actually successfully doing no problem is even possible, LOL.

[edit] and yes, 3 year old computers of either type can run either os no problem.... so I suspect it's probably easier now...

 

Hey Guys,

So after having a macbook since September, and honestly trying to get used to OS X, I'm back on Windows. There are many reasons for me, including half-assed version of office, no cut/paste etc, but that's not the subject of my post.

I wanted to comment on Windows 7 not working on Macbooks. It works just fine. I did some extensive testing both on heat, battery life and system stability and what I found is that it gets 5-10 degrees warmer, battery looses 10-15% ( my Winbook runs for up to 3.5h with no modifications to brightness etc), but system is stable, snappy and fully operational. Especially after 3.1 bootcamp update, touchpad has been repaired, magic mouse and keyboard connect no problem. Overall very pleasant experience with 5.2 index score.

Macbook is a hardware platform fully capable of supporting Windows 7 as a primary operating system


Sent via Winbook ( Macbook converted to Win7 over a week ago.. ))

 

Nice to hear. This does make me more confident, however my price range will only allow for an older macbook non-pro.

Btw, cut and paste exists, but I think you have to enable it in the terminal.

 

Yeah, plenty of people in this thread didn't understand that.