It's Okay to be a Bit of a Mess...
I thought I’d take a few minutes and give you all a peak behind the curtain. Usually when I write articles here I share with you what I did, how I did it, and the end result. It’s usually a pretty straightforward process when you read it and that’s how it should be. Clear. Concise. To the point. But when it comes to the actual work being done it’s not usually that simple.
One of the articles I have in the works is how I got macOS 12.6.1 Monterey running on my unsupported 2012 MacBook Pro. When you read it, it will certainly seem like I knew exactly what I was doing and it was an easy task. Likewise, the next stage for that laptop is to dual boot it with Windows 10 so that it can be my portable retro gaming rig as well. The article for that bit will also be straightforward and to the point, but I want to be transparent with you all. Sometimes I’m a scatterbrained mess.
The Monterey install took forever to install. Everything about that process took a long time. It took a decent amount of time to download the 12.6 GB installer from Apple, it took me multiple times reading through the Open Core documentation before I was comfortable trying the process — and even then I was nervous I was going to screw the whole thing up!
In setting up Windows on this MacBook Pro I decided to use Apple’s built in Boot Camp Assistant. Doing so creates a USB installer, downloads the Windows drivers for the Mac, then partitions and installs Windows. It’s supposed to be a very simple procedure. Well not with me apparently. Here’s the run down.
First off, the Windows 10 download failed several times, then it worked but macOS was unable to mount the drive once it was made bootable.
Then, I decided to use Disk Utility to make my own partition and to use one of my Windows installation disks to do the process manually. That failed because the Windows 10 installer said that Windows couldn’t be installed on my fresh partition because the drive was formatted with the wrong kind of partition table — something that I couldn’t change because of macOS.
Back in Monterey I undid the partition and tried Boot Camp again. Same problem. This time I just unplugged the Windows installer USB stick and plugged it back in and it mounted just fine. I should have tried that in step one and saved myself a lot of time and irritation…
Once Boot Camp finished partitioning the drive I was rebooted back into Windows and it still wouldn’t let me install it because of the partition table, and I was starting to get frustrated since I’d tried to get this done for several hours at this point. I started thinking maybe I should just install it in a virtual machine and take the technical hit there.
On a whim I decided to try one last thing. I dug out an old Windows 7 SP1 DVD and threw it in, booted into it, and went to install. Well for whatever reason Windows 7 installed flawlessly and without any errors. No clue why…
Once the OS was installed, I used my Windows 10 installer USB to upgrade from 7 to 10 and shortly thereafter I was on the Windows 10 22H2 desktop. I installed the drivers I’d downloaded using Boot Camp Assistant and everything started working as it should, but then I went to change my desktop to use the dark mode, but I couldn’t.
Even though I had a valid Activation Key, I somehow ended up with a version of Windows 10 that required an organization’s activation server which I clearly didn’t have. After all of that, I wouldn’t be able to use Windows the way I wanted because I’d installed the wrong version…
So I dug out a different Windows 10 install DVD (Windows 10 Home) and started fresh. This time, because there was already a Windows 10 installation in place the install went off without a hitch. And soon I landed on the desktop for Windows 10, version… 1607. That’s a 6-year-old version of Windows.
And that’s where I am now. Waiting for hours upon hours of updates to download and install.
Why do I share all of this? Because, I suppose I want to make sure my readers see that I — and many other content creators on all of these different platforms — don’t always have it all together. In fact, most of the time I’m just winging it! Sometimes it works and sometimes it doesn’t, but I figure it out and share the process once I’ve got it sorted. So if you’re working on a project or a task and things don’t go the way you want them to and you find yourself getting frustrated, just remember that we’re all a bit of a mess sometimes and that’s okay. We’re all right here with you. Keep up the hard work, and share the results with us when you’re ready.