[Guide] Install Windows 8 UEFI on Legacy BIOS with Clover (and Dual boot with Yosemite)

carlocav · January 22, 2015

Hi ,

Since windows 7 can't recognize SATA hard drive, I am trying Windows 8.1

I have install.wim more Than 4GB, So I split it with OS x split command in terminal and now I have in the usb drive 2 files install.wimaa and install.wimab

do I need to merge them?

Edit: Ok I solved the split problem simply it worked with 2 split files.

But Unfortunatly even Windows 8.1 doesn't recognize SATA drives :-(

fusion71au · January 24, 2015

@carlocav,

Have you tried "cleaning" your Windows hard drive with Diskpart.exe?
1. Boot your computer with the UEFI Windows Installer USB
2. Go to the command prompt by pressing Shift + F10 at the first GUI screen
3. Type the following commands followed be <Enter> after each line

Diskpart
list disk

Hopefully diskpart will be able to see and list your "invisible" drive eg

select disk X (where X is the disk number of the target Windows hard drive)
In this example, it’s Disk 1
Select Disk 1
Type Clean to clean any present partitions
Type Convert GPT to convert the disk to GPT partition table
Now we are going to create the EFI partition:
Type create partition EFI size=200
Type: format quick fs=fat32 label=EFI

Now we need to create the OS partition which will take the rest of the space available
Type: create partition primary
Type: format fs=ntfs quick label=Windows

4. Exit from command prompt, restart the computer and see if the UEFI Windows installer can now see your drive....
__________________________________________________________________________________________________________

If all else fails and you can only install Windows in legacy mode, a workaround is to give the legacy Windows boot loader first priority in the BIOS and chainload to Clover on the second hard drive when you need OSX.

When you want Windows, its own bootloader will boot Windows on the first hard drive
When you want OSX, you can select Clover from the Windows Boot Manager ---> chainloads to Clover on the second (GPT) hard drive and loads OSX

carlocav · January 25, 2015

Thank you

It doesn't work but disk part recognize the hard drive and I managed to follow your procedure, and even the BIOS recognize the drive. So, if Disk Part see the drive why not the Windows installation?

fusion71au · March 2, 2015

Creating Installation Media:
We will prepare a single USB drive which can be used to install Yosemite, Windows (and even Ubuntu if you fancy!).

Just wanted to share a few tips on installing Linux Mint 17.1 in UEFI mode for a triple boot .

1. Leave 30-60GB of free space for the install

2. Download the x64 linux iso version from here

3. Boot with Clover into the UEFI linux media (DVD or USB)

a. Make sure that VBoxExt4-64.efi is installed in /EFI/CLOVER/drivers64

b. If you want to install via a Linux Mint DVD, install GrubUDF-64.efi and VBoxIso9600-64.efi in /EFI/CLOVER/drivers64

Choose “Boot UEFI optical from CDROM” at the Clover Main Menu....

c. If you want to install via a UEFI USB installer, make sure it is formatted to FAT32 and copy the entire contents of the iso to it. I did this in Windows with 7zip...

Create a folder eg “linuxmint” or “ubuntu” in the /EFI folder of the USB installer and copy the grubx64.efi file to it (from /EFI/boot).

Choose “Linux Mint EFI boot menu” or “Ubuntu EFI boot menu” (depending on how you named the folder above) at the Clover Main Menu to start the installer...

4. Follow this procedure to install Mint 17. Note:

a. Format with GParted

/ Ext4 10-20GB

Home Ext4 18-36GB

Swap swap 2-4GB

b. make sure to install the GRUB bootloader into the EFI partition

5. After the installation has completed, reboot the computer with Clover...you will see 2 entries. Both will boot into linux Mint....

Boot Ubuntu EFI boot menu from EFI ---> runs grubx64.efi to launch Mint

Boot vmlinuz from xxxx (Ext 4 / partition name) ---> runs the linux kernel directly to launch Mint

Don't know why at the part of windows and yosemite installer, you format the USB as GPT ? MBR format on the USB can boot Windows UEFI installer just fine ( of course FAT32 partition ). If so then you must create another FAT32 partition for Clover ( the Test Clover Config section at the beginning ). Different method, same result

That’s a valid point since some machines with legacy BIOS won’t boot from a USB if it is GPT formatted (this doesn’t affect booting from GPT hard drives in those systems though).

In summary, to create a multi-boot Clover MBR installer USB, @avin7000’s procedure needs a few modifications:

1. In Disk Utility, create an extra 200MB FAT32 partition. In the screenshot below, I’ve named this CLOVER.

a. Choose 4 Partition Layout with 5GB FAT32 for WIN, 3GB FAT32 for LINUX, 8GB HFS+ for OSX (if using a 16GB or larger USB).

b. Under “Options”, choose MBR format, then apply changes.

c. Unmount, then format the 200MB CLOVER partition to FAT32 using terminal:

diskutil list
diskutil unmount /dev/diskXs1 (where X=disk number of USB)
sudo newfs_msdos -v CLOVER -F 32 /dev/rdiskXs1

2. Copy the Windows and Linux install files from DVD or mounted ISO into the respective FAT32 partitions. Note in the files from the Linux Mint iso, there is a hidden folder named ".disk" that needs to be copied across, so I enabled "show all files" in Finder.

a. Enable showing of hidden files in Finder by typing in terminal

 defaults write com.apple.finder AppleShowAllFiles -boolean true ; killall Finder

b. For Windows, make sure bootmgfw.efi is copied to /efi/Microsoft/boot and rename cdboot.efi to cdboot.bak

Notes: For Windows 8 and 10, copy bootx64.efi in the efi/boot folder to efi/microsoft/boot and rename it bootmgfw.efi.

For Windows 7, extract bootmgfw.efi from the "install.wim" using 7-Zip (open the iso and navigate to sources/install.wim/1/Windows/Boot/EFI/bootmgfw.efi) and copy to efi/microsoft/boot.

c. For Linux, make sure to create a folder inside the /efi folder for the bootloader eg “ubuntu” or “linuxmint” and copy grubx64.efi into it.

3. For the OSX partition, use the createinstallmedia method (ensure OS X installer app is in /Applications folder).

sudo /Applications/Install\ OS\ X\ Yosemite.app/Contents/Resources/createinstallmedia --volume /Volumes/OSX --applicationpath /Applications/Install\ OS\ X\ Yosemite.app

4. Install Clover targeting the “CLOVER” partition instead of the EFI partition.

a. I use the following custom install options...

b. Copy the config.plist, DSDT/SSDT.aml file(s) which are specific to your system into the Clover folder:

- Put config.plist in /EFI/CLOVER directory

- Put DSDT.aml in /EFI/CLOVER/ACPI/patched

- Put FakeSMC.kext and other kexts required in EFI/CLOVER/kexts/10.x (where x is your version of OSX)

5. Boot from the USB and you should see the following options at the Clover Main Menu:

“Boot Microsoft EFI boot menu from WIN” ---> boots Windows installer via bootmgfw.efi

“Boot Linux Mint EFI boot menu from LINUX” ---> boots Linux installer via grubx64.efi

“Boot OS X Install from Install OS X …” ---> boots OSX installer via boot.efi

midi-sama · March 2, 2015

thanks fusion

The only downside I noticed (for me only, maybe it doesn't happen to others) that it takes hella time to load, and when I update the kernel, Clover see all the kernels (eventho I configured it to show only the latest), and the sound breaks for me (ALC275) on linux when booting either Clover > Kernel or Clover > Grub > kernel, I donno why, but it's like that, anyway, I found a workaround, and there was an update from the linux comunity for the driver afterward, I managed to make Grub2 my main bootlaoder, and making it boot Clover (it's all UEFI, no legacy). This just some results of testing, not actually anything to help this guide

fusion71au · March 3, 2015

@midi,

Yeah, you will see multiple entries if you install new kernels without deleting the old ones.

If you remove VBoxExt4-64.efi from /EFI/CLOVER/drivers64, this will effectively hide the linux kernel entries from Clover's Main Menu but leave the grubx64.efi entry to boot into the linux installation. Alternatively, you can try hiding the grub entry in your Clover config.plist, (GUI Section) leaving the vmlinuz kernel entry(s) to boot from eg

		<key>Hide</key>
		<array>
			<string>grubx64.efi</string>
		</array>

I haven't personally noticed any slow booting/loading issues or sound problems on my legacy desktop rig (GA-P55aUD3/i5-750/ATI HD5770), triple booting UEFI Windows 10 X64, OSX Yosemite 10.2 and Linux Mint 17.1. In fact just about everything works very well OOTB with Mint 17.1 on my rig .

midi-sama · March 3, 2015

@fusion71au

Good for you As you have a desktop, you wouldn't have those laptop problems anyway, I use Grub2 as my main bootlaoder for some reasons:

- No audio issues anymore

- Booting Android (4.4 and 5.0alpha)

- Windows booting fine without the trackpad issue I find on Clover (I can't use the trackpad until windows is loaded ad logged in and I still have to wait for Syaptics drivers to load)

- I made a Clover menuentry and configured clover to timeout=0, looks like Grub2 booting OS X automatically

Hope Clover v3 fix all those!

lolwatpear · April 5, 2015

I'm using an optiplex 745 and cannot get the windows installation to boot through clover. I've tried all methods. I did this:

1. Rename cdboot.efi in WIN81/efi/microsoft/boot folder to cdboot.BAK

2. Copy bootmgfw.efi into WIN81/efi/microsoft/boot

However, I couldn't even find the bootmgfw.efi on my .iso (is it supposed to be there?), so I took it from my windows installation on my windows 8 tablet. This showed up fine:

Select "Run bootmgfw.efi" and then press <spacebar> ---> should now boot into the UEFI Windows Installer!

But all it does is boot to a black screen, or it will show a strange small error box with alternating black and yellow bars going diaganally.

I also tried the rufus method, but when booting from that drive, once again is shows the black and yellow lines in a box. I know for a fact that the .iso works fine as I've used it to install windows by itself.

EDIT: I got it to boot into the windows installation. I was confused about extracting the bootmgfw.efi from the .iso, but finally understood. The problem I have now is that It just goes straight from showing the windows icon to saying recovery, 'your computer must be repaired' or something along those lines. Does anyone know what the issue is?

EDIT 2: I formated my windows install usb to MBR. And it boots into installation. I'll try installing it to my set aside windows partition on my main HD, but I don't know if it will work. I'm just really confused at this point.

midi-sama · April 5, 2015

Imo, i run the efi files from the shell, just cd to the folder you want and type the file you want to execute (same as dos )

fusion71au · April 5, 2015

I'm using an optiplex 745 and cannot get the windows installation to boot through clover. I've tried all methods. I did this:

However, I couldn't even find the bootmgfw.efi on my .iso (is it supposed to be there?), so I took it from my windows installation on my windows 8 tablet. This showed up fine:

But all it does is boot to a black screen, or it will show a strange small error box with alternating black and yellow bars going diaganally.

I also tried the rufus method, but when booting from that drive, once again is shows the black and yellow lines in a box. I know for a fact that the .iso works fine as I've used it to install windows by itself.

EDIT: I got it to boot into the windows installation. I was confused about extracting the bootmgfw.efi from the .iso, but finally understood. The problem I have now is that It just goes straight from showing the windows icon to saying recovery, 'your computer must be repaired' or something along those lines. Does anyone know what the issue is?

EDIT 2: I formated my windows install usb to MBR. And it boots into installation. I'll try installing it to my set aside windows partition on my main HD, but I don't know if it will work. I'm just really confused at this point.

In Windows 7, you can extract bootmgfw.efi from the "install.wim" using 7-Zip (open the iso and navigate to sources/install.wim/1/Windows/Boot/EFI/bootmgfw.efi).

For Windows 8 and 10, you can extract bootx64.efi from the iso using 7-Zip (in the /efi/boot folder) ---> copy to efi/microsoft/boot folder on your UEFI Windows installer USB and rename it bootmgfw.efi.

For the actual installation on your hard disk, it is best to just leave free space on the drive and the Windows installer will automatically create the necessary partitions (including the Microsoft Reserved Partition)...there can be issues if you add a FAT partition for Windows on the hard drive using OSX Disk Utility since it automatically converts the GPT disk to hybrid MBR ---> Windows thinks it is an MBR disk (see post#359)!

lolwatpear · April 5, 2015

In Windows 7, you can extract bootmgfw.efi from the "install.wim" using 7zip (open the iso in 7 zip and navigate to sources/install.wim/1/Windows/Boot/EFI/bootmgfw.efi)

For Windows 8 and 10, you can extract bootx64.efi from the iso using 7zip (in the /efi/boot folder) ---> copy to efi/microsoft/boot folder on your UEFI Windows installer USB and rename it bootmgfw.efi.

bootx64.efi.png

For the actual installation on your hard disk, it is best to just leave free space on the drive and the Windows installer will automatically create the necessary partitions (including the Microsoft Reserved Partition)...there can be issues if you add a FAT partition for Windows on the hard drive using OSX Disk Utility since it automatically converts the GPT disk to hybrid MBR ---> Windows thinks it is an MBR disk (see post#359)!

Thank you. Yes I figured out that I need to keep it as free space and not format it as FAT before installing windows. I was initially doing this all with 2 flash drives and wanted to make into one, but I having troubling get the USB to boot with both the OSX and windows partitioned formatted as MBR. Then I followed your multi-boot clover MBR install USB post and got it all working fine on a single usb. Thanks!

tienlavan · April 7, 2015

I'm using an optiplex 745 and cannot get the windows installation to boot through clover. I've tried all methods. I did this:

However, I couldn't even find the bootmgfw.efi on my .iso (is it supposed to be there?), so I took it from my windows installation on my windows 8 tablet. This showed up fine:

But all it does is boot to a black screen, or it will show a strange small error box with alternating black and yellow bars going diaganally.

I also tried the rufus method, but when booting from that drive, once again is shows the black and yellow lines in a box. I know for a fact that the .iso works fine as I've used it to install windows by itself.

EDIT: I got it to boot into the windows installation. I was confused about extracting the bootmgfw.efi from the .iso, but finally understood. The problem I have now is that It just goes straight from showing the windows icon to saying recovery, 'your computer must be repaired' or something along those lines. Does anyone know what the issue is?

EDIT 2: I formated my windows install usb to MBR. And it boots into installation. I'll try installing it to my set aside windows partition on my main HD, but I don't know if it will work. I'm just really confused at this point.

you can copy and rename bootx64.efi in /efi/boot to /efi/microsoft/boot after You extract windows iso on USB Fat32. I usually do that.

WeWin · April 9, 2015

Hello everyone,

ive got a Problem at booting the win8/10 Installation. It always ends in the fail oxc000000e.

Ive done everything in the guide. The only thing that can i install is the win10 Installation created with Bootcamp.

Thanks in advance!

fusion71au · April 9, 2015

@WeWin,

Most likely you have a GPT disk with hybrid MBR instead of pure GPT (with protective MBR). This often happens when you use Disk Utility or Apple's Bootcamp utility to prepare a FAT partition for Windows (it always assumes you want to install legacy MBR Windows).

Check your GPT layout with GPT FDisk/"GDisk".

Instructions for restoring the protective MBR in post#359.

For the actual installation of UEFI Windows on your hard disk, it is best to just leave free space on the drive and the Windows installer will automatically create the necessary partitions (including the Microsoft Reserved Partition).

WeWin · April 10, 2015

@fusion71au

Thank you for your fast answer.

Gdisk gives me this output:

Partition table scan:
  MBR: protective
  BSD: not present
  APM: not present
  GPT: present

Found valid GPT with protective MBR; using GPT.

And with the Argument p it says:

Partition table holds up to 128 entries
First usable sector is 34, last usable sector is 250069646
Partitions will be aligned on 8-sector boundaries
Total free space is 69632437 sectors (33.2 GiB)

Number  Start (sector)    End (sector)  Size       Code  Name
   1              40          409639   200.0 MiB   EF00  EFI System Partition
   2          409640       107831519   51.2 GiB    AF00  Yosemite_I
   3       107833344       108095487   128.0 MiB   0C01  Microsoft reserved ...
   4       108095488       180439039   34.5 GiB    0700  Basic data partition

It says that i have GPT i think because i can hold up to 128 entries and ive got the MBR protective for Windows that I want.

Ive followed the guide in the first post. Let free space for windows and windows will format it himself.
But i cant boot with the original Windows installations created with the Windows 7 USB tool (windows 8/10 original ISOs from Windows)

Sorry for my english, its not my native language.

fusion71au · April 10, 2015

@WeWin,

I would recommend manually creating a UEFI Windows installer as I describe in post#29 rather than the Windows 7 USB tool.

Transfer all the Windows install files from DVD/iso image to a FAT32 (not NTFS) partition on the USB.

The results from GDisk look good - the target hard disk is pure GPT with protective MBR so the problem lies with how you created your installer (USB should be formatted FAT32, can be MBR or GPT but not hybrid MBR).

WeWin · April 10, 2015

@fusion71au,

Thanks i will test and report. Should the partition table be MBR or GPT?

I will test it with GPT and report back!

Edit:
Its not working. Im now installing it over the Bootcamp created Installer and so it works

Tetonne · May 2, 2015

Dual boot OS X 10.10.3 and Win 8.1 thanks to fusion71au !! :thumbsup_anim:

success after repairing hybrid MBR (procedure in post#359)

semson · June 11, 2015

Big thanks to avin7000 and fusion71au!

Yosemite and Windows 8.1 Update 3 are fully working here.

When installing Yosemite, I can't create two partitions but leaving 2nd partition "free". So I created two HFS+ partitions and then deleted the 2nd one, making it free to Windows installer.

polyzargone · June 11, 2015

Thanks again fusion71au, it works like a charm on an old legacy bios Dell D830 laptop. Now have a Yos/El Capitan/Win8.1/Mint 17.1 full UEFI quad boot :thumbsup_anim:

But I ran into one problem and hope you could help :

If I try to check/repair Windows c: partition using chkdsk :c /F, I'm almost certain to have a 0xC000000E error (not sure that's the correct number but it's a BOSD) when it boots the second time and when the check/repair process reaches 100%.

Only solution is to actualize Windows which is a pain in the a**ss :angry: .

My guess is that it has something to do with the fact that it's not a true UEFI setup and in some way, it fails to find the windows boot manager…

Of course, one obvious workaround is to avoid to use chkdsk on the c drive (other NTFS partitions checks/repairs fine) but that's a little bit annoying .

fusion71au · June 11, 2015

@Polyzargone,

I haven't tried running chkdsk /f on my C Drive or EFI partition but I wouldn't be surprised if Windows 8/10 tries to remove Clover's boot0 from the bootsector when you do this.

eg for Windows 10 insider previews, each major version upgrade through Windows Update (as opposed to a clean install) overwrites the bootsector so legacy Clover needs to be re-installed. Windows doesn't like it when it finds its bootloader is not in charge .

Some troubleshooting:

Is Windows hybrid boot turned on?

What does the chkdsk log say?

You can see the exact bluescreen error by running the BlueScreenView tool.

polyzargone · June 12, 2015

Thank you for that very interesting information . I'll read that carefully !

I didn't install Win10 TP yet and probably won't until the final release (at least on the D830) but as you can see on the attached picture, OS X Yos isn't on the same drive that Win 8.1 (El Capitan partition wasn't installed when I ran into that problem and disk1s8 & disk1s9 are actually Mint's ExFat4 & Swap partition).

I thought it shouldn't mess up with Clover since the bootmgfw.efi is in it's own "NO NAME" EFI partition, along with Mint's grubx64.efi. And I didn't have to reinstall Clover after that damn BOSD BTW.

But reading your post for Windows 10 insider previews install, I realize that I didn't installed Win 8.1 that way.

In short I have :

• Created an MBR Clover 2 Gb USB pen.

• Disconnected OS X SSD

• Booted on Clover USB pen

• Selected UEFI Windows installer DVD from Clover boot menu

• Proceeded of Win8 install on a blank drive

• Booted on Clover USB pen and selected "Boot Microsoft EFI from EFI" to finish install.

• Made all necessary Win8 updates and booted on USB at each reboot

• Reconnected OS X SSD and set it as first boot device in bios so Clover can boot both OS X & Win8

For the other OS, I won't give more details but you got the idea .

So maybe that not renaming bootmanagers and replacing them with Clover's one could explain why I didn't have to reinstall it ?

jacopers · June 25, 2015

So I'm confused when I'm in the windows installer it won't let me install once I click on next it shows a error

polyzargone · June 25, 2015

@jacopers

Give more details please

jacopers · June 25, 2015

So I'm booting with legacy clover with a legacy bios non UEFI and I'm trying to dual boot with yosemite and windows 10 but I had to make flash drive with Rufus then transfer the efi or what not under the troubleshooting guide but when I click on my partition I made for windows though disk utility as free space. So on windows I click the unallocated space partition and click next which then it says " windows cannot prepair the computer to boot into the next phase of installation. To install windows, restart the installation

Well why I'm at it is it possible to get clover to boot legacy windows because all I got was a white square that's why I started to try this

[Guide] Install Windows 8 UEFI on Legacy BIOS with Clover (and Dual boot with Yosemite)

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