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This will be used to install Windows and the appropriate drivers on your Mac.Īpple recommends backing up your files before partitioning or installing Windows. You’ll also need a USB drive at least 8 GB in size. You’ll need the installation media in ISO file or DVD form.
#Apple boot camp control panel for free
You can download Windows installation media for free if you already have a product key, but you’ll need to purchase a copy of Windows if you don’t.
#Apple boot camp control panel full version
Windows doesn’t come with Mac OS X, so you’ll need a full version of Windows - not an upgrade version - to install it on your Mac. Check Apple’s detailed system requirements for more information. This applies to Macs made in the last several years - if you have an older Mac from 2009 or earlier, you won’t be able to install Windows 8. You’ll need a non-Enterprise, 64-bit copy of Windows 8.1, Windows 8, or Windows 7 for this. You can even use Parallels to load your Boot Camp partition as a virtual machine while you are in OS X, giving you the best of both worlds. In the long run, the price is well worth it. The integration with OS X is amazingly well done, and the speed blows away Virtualbox. Note: we don’t often recommend paid software, but in the case of Parallels Desktop, it’s something we use at How-To Geek every single day for testing software and running Windows. The vast majority of the time you don’t actually need to use Boot Camp, and you’d be better off using a virtual machine. If all you need to do is run a few Windows applications on your Mac, and those applications aren’t games or something that requires a lot of resources, you might consider using a virtual machine like Parallels (there’s a free trial), VMware Fusion, or VirtualBox to run that software instead. In addition, to actually use Windows, you’ll need to reboot, and if you want to use OS X again, you’ll need to reboot yet again. The benefit of Boot Camp, of course, is that you’re running Windows directly on the hardware, so it’ll be a lot faster than a virtual machine. Since storage on a Mac is fairly expensive, it’s something you should really think about. When you use Boot Camp to install Windows on your Mac, you’ll need to re-partition your drive, which is going to take up quite a bit of your available drive space.

#Apple boot camp control panel how to
Do You Actually Need to Use Boot Camp?īefore we proceed with the details on how to install Windows in Boot Camp, you should first stop and think about whether or not that is the best choice for your needs, because there are also a couple of drawbacks to consider. Both operating systems will be installed, but you can only use one at a time. You’ll know what to expect if you’ve ever installed Linux alongside Windows. Macs come with Mac OS X, but you can easily install Windows on them with Apple’s built-in Boot Camp feature.īoot Camp installs Windows in a dual-boot configuration. Thanks to the switch from PowerPC to Intel many years ago, a Mac is just another PC.


How to Install Windows on a Mac With Boot Camp
