XP on my mac?

gw_pro · Mar 2, 2008

Hi, I need to put windows xp onto my mac, i have a genuine copy of xp sp2 from college burnt onto a cd (msdn) but once I partion the hard drive it won't read the disk.

Anyone have any adivice to how to get it loaded up? Will it have to be an original copy?

Advice would be apprectiated, cheers george

Kash · Mar 2, 2008

Silly question, but did you burn the image file as is (as in when you open the disc in OS X all you see is one file) or did you use a program to burn the image file onto disc?

mac2maverick · Mar 2, 2008

Maybe another silly question but did you print out bootcamp instructions and follow them carefully?

gw_pro · Mar 2, 2008

this may be a silly question, but will it let me use sp1 and then like update it online or something? I didnt burn the disk so i'm unsure on the first question, and secondly, no i didn't but the partition was fine, it just wouldnt read my disk?

Kash · Mar 2, 2008

Unfortunately, you need SP2 to install Windows XP via Boot Camp. If you have a SP1 disc, that could be your problem.

gw_pro · Mar 2, 2008

The copied disk is sp2 but i have an original with sp1 so i was just wondering...

also will my xp disk from my pc run this mac? or will it just work on that machine?

Kash · Mar 2, 2008

If you have a branded PC, such as Dell or HP, then no, the XP disc from that won't work.

Let's check the copied disc you have. Pop in the disc and open it in OS X. Let us know what files/folders you see.

SammySlim · Mar 3, 2008

And you will need a product code even if it can read the disc. If you need to buy a copy of XP, an OEM copy is much less expensive than a full retail copy and it works fine for Boot Camp, Parallels or Fusion.

Cheers

mknabster · Mar 5, 2008

Kash said:
If you have a branded PC, such as Dell or HP, then no, the XP disc from that won't work.

Let's check the copied disc you have. Pop in the disc and open it in OS X. Let us know what files/folders you see.

Actually a branded disc from a Dell machine will work. I have a Dell XP disc and it works everytime i use it. I did have to get a SP2 disc to work with bootcamp fully, but my SP1 did install with it, i just couldn't run the Bootcamp installer to install the drivers on the XP side.