How to Reinstall Vista on Boot Camp
Apple has committed in the past couple of years making the transition from PC to Macs easier than ever before. One such Mac application, introduced with the Leopard Operating System (OS) and still continued with Snow Leopard, uses Boot Camp to partition part of your computer to run Windows OS and software. Boot Camp is a free application that comes installed on every new Mac; however, it requires that you either boot your computer into Windows or whichever Mac OS you are currently using.
Other People Are Reading
Things You'll Need
- Mac computer with Leopard or Snow Leopard operating system
- Vista installation disc
- Mac drivers disc
- Power supply
Instructions
-
-
1
Erase your Vista partition. For a reinstall, you need to make sure that you do not have duplicate or archived files from your earlier Vista partition. If there is any important data on the Windows Vista partition, make sure that it is backed up. Simply open the Boot Camp application and select "Remove a Windows partition." Boot Camp will ask if you want to restore the disk to a single-partition OS X volume. From this point you can either choose to restore to a single partition with OS X and then go back into Boot Camp or simply leave some space on the partition for a reinstall.
-
2
Open the Boot Camp application if you chose to restore to a single-volume partition of OS X. The Boot Camp setup will walk you through the required steps in order for you to partition your hard drive for running Windows Vista. You can set up how much memory you want to partition manually as you walk through the set up options. By itself, Vista requires up to 10 GB of hard drive space.
-
-
3
Install Windows Vista. Make sure that you select the correct partition that you have allotted through the Boot Camp application. Walk through the setup step by step as instructed by the setup assistant.
-
4
Insert the Mac drivers disc in order to extract the drivers manually. Your computer should be in Windows. Hit "Apple"-"R" to launch the Run window and extract the Macintosh drivers for Vista. Before hitting the "OK" button, add "/A/v" to the line in the Run window so that the installer will extract the files needed instead of installing them.
-
5
Look in the "C:/Program Files/Macintosh Drivers" folder and install the Apple Keyboard and SigmaTel driver so that you can use features such as the "Eject" key and sound features.
-
6
Select the "Start" button and go to "Computer Properties" to open the Device Manager. Once in the Device Manager, you should be able to select the Network Controller with a question mark beside it. Select this device and click "Reinstall Driver." Manually find the driver by searching the "C:/Program Files/Macintosh Drivers for Windows" folder. Install the wireless driver so that you have wireless capabilities with Windows.
-
1
Tips & Warnings
Also think about adding antivirus protection. Macs are written in Unix code; however, Windows is still based on Linux, which is susceptible to viruses even if it is installed on a Mac.
