Mac (Snow Leopard) setup - continued
Monday, January 4th, 2010Recap:
- Backed-up via Time Machine to a low-cost (£60) USB-powered 0.5TB hard drive that will be carried around with the laptop (can that drive be backed-up itself?)
- Turned off Time Machine (auto-backups) afterwards.
- Updated everything
- Several system restarts required, and re-ran the Update function until no more updates available.
- Backed-up again viaTime Machine.
Continue:
- Ran Boot Camp Assistant
- It prompted me to print its instructions. I decided to accept this.
- I connected my printer. System prompted for printer-driver download - I accepted.
- I selected the print option to format the instructions specifically for my (make of) printer.
- From Preview, the instructions occupy 14 pages. Thinking green (and clutter-avoidance) I elected instead to save it as PDF to a memory stick that I can view elsewhere.
- It prompted me to print its instructions. I decided to accept this.
- Read thru the Boot Camp instructions
- It seems I have done it right so far (update everything & backup)
- Boot Camp Assistant: Actions
- Click Continue (onwards from the printing stage).
- Partitioning:
- Select Divide Equally
- (Don’t know what sizes I need, presumably can alter proportions later if needed using e.g. via iPartition).
- Click Partition
- (Is very fast)
- Select Divide Equally
- Windows Installation
- Insert Windows disk.
- There are two options (disks): 32-bit and 64-bit. Let’s go for 64-bit. In case of any residual doubt:
- “The short answer is that you should go with Windows 7 64-bit unless you’re running a system well into its antiquity where driver support is going to become an issue. ” [http://www.techspot.com/guides/177-windows-install-32bit-64bit]
- There are two options (disks): 32-bit and 64-bit. Let’s go for 64-bit. In case of any residual doubt:
- Click Start Installation
- (Even though Boot Camp Assistant (BCA) does not mention Windows 7 as an option, onlyXP & Vista.)
- Locale info:
- Language: English; Units: UK; Keyboard: UK
- (What is “UK Extended” ?)
- Next
- Language: English; Units: UK; Keyboard: UK
- Install Now
- (Accept License)
- Installation option: Upgrade or Custom(BCA instructions don’t mention this choice)
- Default is Upgrade but this is a fresh installso choose Custom
- Warning (from instructions): “It’s important to select the correct partition when installing Windows so that you don’toverwrite Mac OS X on your computer.”
- Selected the Boot Camp partition (Disk 0 Partition 3), but…
- “Windows caannot be installed to Disk 0 Partition 3″
- …because it has not yet been formatted as NTFS (did I miss that stage?)
- Clicked Drive Options, and, with Partition 3 selected, clicked Format.
- There were no format options e.g. NTFS or other, it just did it, taking only a few seconds.
- Clicked Install, now it worked.
- Looking thru the BCA instructions, that formatting step is indeed mentioned, all is well.
- “The Windows partition is formatted using the NTFS file system”
- (installation automated processes took half an hour or so)
- Enter names for user (account) and computer (to distinguish it on a network)
- Enter a password
- Enter Product Key and accept default option to automatically activate when on-line.
- Select Use Recommended Settings (e.g. for updates policy)
- Accept TimeZone as UTC
- JoinWireless Network
- Enter key, accept Automatically Connect policy
- Selectit as Home Network (trusted)
- (Windows now began its update processes)
- First it downloaded a manifest- list of available updates
- After this it prompted to “click here for available updates”. Did so.
- It offered “11 important updates” and “2 optional updates”. I accepted them all.
- An update clash (my term) occurred - it said “Some updates were not installed” and “…try again in a few minutes”
- Waited several minutes and tried again - it worked: 10 updates successfullyinstalled, then required restart (did it).
- Default is Upgrade but this is a fresh installso choose Custom
- Insert Windows disk.
- First proper login to Windows.
- Note there had been no prompts for drivers etc.
- Mac Hardware Drivers for Windows
- Insert the Mac OS install-disk … after ejecting the Windows install-disk.
- But the”Eject Disk” button has no effect (presumably due to no driver yet)
- Workaround: Windows Explorer > DVD Drive > Eject
- Autoplay (yes/no): Windows Support > setup.exe. YES.
- Security: Allow it (Boot Camp) to make changes to computer. YES.
- Boot Camp: Accept license, allow “Apple software update for windows”
- (It took some significant time)
- Restart
- Doh - I left the Mac OS install-disk inserted; as a result I feared the machine would boot from that disk. However in practice it was Windows that came up.
- The default OS can be changed via the Boot Camp icon in system tray.
- Unable to log in - keyboard doesn’t work.
- (Yes, this is familiar Windows behaviour…)
- Doh - I left the Mac OS install-disk inserted; as a result I feared the machine would boot from that disk. However in practice it was Windows that came up.
- Restart again.
- Now it works fully. Keyboard and disk-eject too.
- Insert the Mac OS install-disk … after ejecting the Windows install-disk.
- Settling-in to Windows
- Config the system tray to always show all icons.
- Got warned that there is no antivirus as yet.
- Purchase Parallels 5, which Kapersky AntiVirus comes bundled with, and I want Parallels anyway. Cost around £60.
- x
- Install Parallels
- Purchase & download Parallels 5 desktop for mac. Is a “.dmg” file of size 222 MB.
- Restart machine in Mac mode.
- Backup (Time Machine)
- Run installer. It says the installation will occupy around 450MB of disk.
- Backup (Time Machine)
- Run Parallels. Prompts for activation (license key/code). Did so.
- (Parallels then did a “prepare for first start”)
- x
- Create new Virtual Machine onto the Boot Camp Windows 7 system.
- New Windows Installation
- Boot Camp Partition
- Windows 7, “Let other Mac users access this virtual machine”, sharing “Home folder only”. Create.
- Done.
- Now I have two new desktop items, for Parallels Virtual Machines (VMs): “My Boot Camp” and “Windows 7″.
- How come I’ve got two items, not just one? What are each of them for?
- Others are similarly confused, e.g. http://forums.macrumors.com/showthread.php?t=829128
- Looks like the answer is at http://download.parallels.com/desktop/v5/docs/en/Parallels_Desktop_Users_Guide/23414.htm,”If you install Parallels Desktop on a Mac computer with a Boot Camp Windows partition, and Parallels Desktop detects that there are no virtual machines on the computer, it automatically creates a new virtual machine for this Boot Camp partition and places it to the following location:
<Username>/Documents/Parallels/My Boot Camp“ - So I need not have created one explicitly. I guess “Windows 7″ is the one I (explicitly) created, “My BootCamp” is the one that Parallels (implicitly) created. In that case all I need to do is delete the “Windows 7″ one. Did so.
- Ran the “My Boot Camp” virtual machine for the first time. It said “Setting up forthe first time - may take some time”. In that case I regard this as part of the installation process.
- Got to the login prompt (for Windows 7) and, reasonably enough, required me to log in before it could act further. Dod do.
- (It said “Please wait while the virtual machine is being upgraded”, then after several minutes “…was successfully upgraded”)
- Now I had a Windows login prompt again. Logged in.
- The VM runs in Coherence mode by default.
- (It said “The Windows application folder is being added to the dock” and “To remove the folder, edit the Shared Applications settings in the virtual machine config)
- Installed Parallels Internet Security (Kapersky AntiVirus etc.) - it is not installed by default - you have to take action, did so as follows.
- Select the Parallels VM Launcher (window). In the Mac (top-screen) menu (when that window is selected), click:
- Virtual Machine > Install Parallels Internet Security
- (Took maybe 30 minutes to download)
- Began installing itself. As part of this, Windows Firewall was disabled (as indicated by a Windows security message), so I unplugged my router, just in case.
- At the end of installation, the VM restarted itself (successfully).
- Following restart, I plugged my router back in and told Kapersky to update.
- Following Kapersky update, a VM restart was required. Did so.
- Did another Kapersky update. Status: Up-to-date.
- Select the Parallels VM Launcher (window). In the Mac (top-screen) menu (when that window is selected), click:
- Ran a full system scan. Takes quite some time (started 18:08, finished ????). No issues detected.
- Windows security messages about “No firewall” and “Parallels Internet Security is on but reporting its status to Windows Security Centre in a format that is no longer supported”.
- The “no longer supported” message: someone said “I had to uninstall Kaspersky as well as Parallels Tools, and then reinstall Parallels Tools, to fix this problem. That seems to have worked.” http://forum.parallels.com/showthread.php?t=96492&highlight=longer+supported
- I tried simply the VM Launcher option “Reinstall Parallels Tools”, because being simple, it was worth a try. It restarted the VM.
- No effect - didn’t fix it.
- Try following another person’s advice “If Tools are already isntall, you can remove them from (Control Panel > Add/Remove Programs>) Programs & Features list, restart Windows and load them from Virtual Machine menu. “. Did so. VM Restart.
- Configure: Do not backup with Time Machine. This is very important!
- Got to the login prompt (for Windows 7) and, reasonably enough, required me to log in before it could act further. Dod do.
- x
- x