Question How can I put an already installed copy of windows on my mac? (BootCamp?)

[Blue_Dragon360]

I have a secondhand computer that is running Windows 7 Enterprise 32 bit. It has old hardware, and I would like to transfer the entire operating system (C: drive) to a bootable partition on my MacBook Pro (13-inch, mid 2012) to increase performance. I cannot use a fresh install of windows, because some of the programs are irretrievable (I have lost the license key, but they remain installed.) This means that I DO NOT want to install a new copy of windows 7, and I would like to copy my entire C: drive to the mac (and have it boot into windows).

Is this possible using bootcamp, or even some other software? I've been working on this for a few days now, and after doing some research I found some information about ISO files and how BootCamp supports them. Would it be possible to make an ISO file of my entire C: drive, and load that into BootCamp somehow?

Forgive me if this is obvious, I've never been very good at messing with this partition stuff.

I'm using OSX 10.9.4

 

[Ijack]

Almost certainly this is not going to work. But there are programs to recover the licence key from a valid Windows iinstallation, which would allow you to do a fresh install. This, of course, assumes that it is a retail version of Windows not an OEM one.

 

[Blue_Dragon360]

Almost certainly this is not going to work. But there are programs to recover the licence key from a valid Windows iinstallation, which would allow you to do a fresh install. This, of course, assumes that it is a retail version of Windows not an OEM one.

That's too bad. :/ I guess I'll just have to keep using the slow laptop! Also FYI, it's actually program license keys that I'm missing, not the windows key.

 

[Ijack]

Again, there are programs that allow you to retrieve licence keys from most programs.

Whether the Windows installation is Retail or OEM is still important. If it is OEM you can't reuse it on your Mac in any case.

 

[Blue_Dragon360]

Again, there are programs that allow you to retrieve licence keys from most programs.

Whether the Windows installation is Retail or OEM is still important. If it is OEM you can't reuse it on your Mac in any case.

The windows version is retail. If I do in fact end up being able to retrieve the product keys (thanks, by the way, I didn't know there were programs that did this!) I will install a fresh copy of windows 7 home premium on my Mac. Thanks for the help!

 

[JustSomeJoe]

You can't use 32-Bit Windows through Bootcamp, it only supports 64-bit; Only (supported) option is using a Virtual Machine.

 

[Ijack]

You can't use 32-Bit Windows through Bootcamp, it only supports 64-bit; Only (supported) option is using a Virtual Machine.

Not true.

A mid-2012 MacBook Pro will happily run 32-bit Windows 7 via Boot Camp.

http://support.apple.com/kb/HT5634?viewlocale=en_US