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I am trying to turn on Hardware Virtualization for my new MacBook Pro for Windows 8.1 setup using Boot Camp.

I have searched online and I know that we can not just go to the BIOS like windows and change settings. Unfortunately, most of the solution I have come across are for Parallels or VMs.

Can anyone kindly let me know how to enable Hardware Virtualization on MBP for Windows 8.1 installed using Boot Camp?

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Or perhaps you have Hyper-V installed :( see here: superuser.com/questions/866962/… – Tod Thomson Oct 1 '15 at 5:35
up vote 3 down vote accepted

There is no hardware virtualization to turn on or off like on Wintel PCs.

That switch and many other BIOS switches are there because (at least in part) the hardware manufacturers don't make the hardware AND software, like Apple does.

It is always on in any Mac that has a processor that supports virtualization. Pretty much any Mac in the last several years does so you are good to go with this one.

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Oh ok. Thanks. My only concern was that Visual Studio told me that the hardware virtualization was off. – Ahsan Feb 9 '14 at 5:40
1  
Under task manager, there should be an field telling you if virtualization is enabled. It's in full task manager, under processor tab... – TiernanO Feb 9 '14 at 15:47
3  
Wrong answer. There is no hardware virtualization to turn on or off like on Wintel PCs. is flat out wrong. Silicon features can be disabled via BIOS or UEFI - which is what's happening in Apple's broken bootcamp mode. – DeepSpace101 Apr 13 at 16:58

It sounds like you're running into the same issue I did, where after booting into Windows the VT-x shows as 'Disabled' in Task Manager.

Not sure how or why, but after going into

  • OS X
  • System Preferences
  • Target Disk
  • Select the BOOTCAMP disk as the startup disk

Everything was well after that and I could happily use Hyper-V, even from a cold boot.

If I cold booted using the Options-key, and then selecting Windows, VT-x was disabled in Task Manager.

Go figure. Could some Mac genius out there explain this one?

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do you meant Startup or Target Disk mode in the startup panel – ina Dec 5 '14 at 0:38
2  
Mac "genius" will tell you you're using an unintended software with their hardware. Honest (something Apple should search for definition) answer would be - firmware bug which apple can't properly fix since 2008 (forums.macrumors.com/showthread.php?t=821551). – Sean Feldman Dec 30 '14 at 16:09
    
It was the Startup Disk for me. – Jason Aug 23 at 23:39
    
Thanks for your answer, I wasted nearly two hours before I found your answer. – Smartkid yesterday

It seems that if you boot directly to Windows it doesn't work, but if you boot to OS X and switch to Windows, it works. Or you can boot to Windows, change to OS X and go back to Windows again.

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This worked for me. 1. boot into OS X and I ran docker run hello-world to ensure docker was working correctly. It was 2. Restart and hold the option key to bring up the option to book into Windows 3. Select Windows. I ran docker run hello-world to ensure docker was working correctly. It was. – cramhead Sep 20 at 17:49

I tried with and without holding alt key down, from Mac OS to Windows and the other way.

The Hyper-V installation begins and asks for a reboot, and during starting up of windows then 2nd step of the installation failed and rolled back.

Today I bought thunderbolt to Ethernet adapter, plugged it, installed Hyper-V and after reboot I could use it. Even when I unplug the adapter.

So it seams Hyper-V need some sort of Ethernet Adapter installed.

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The 'thunderbolt to ethernet adapter' trick for getting hyper-v to work does NOT work with an 2015 iMac + Windows 10. – Kyle Jul 6 at 17:04

After I installed rEFInd to triple boot my MF839 Macbook (Win10, Ubuntu, OSX), to enable Virtualization on Windows 10, first I boot to OSX, then when it's login screen appear, I hit the restart button so the mac restart again then I choose Windows 10 from rEFInd.

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Which mac were you using? – Kyle Jul 6 at 17:05

I had tried all the various boot / reboot combinations and nothing worked until I added the Thunderbolt to Ethernet adaptor. The next time I started up the Windows Boot Camp partition I could enable Hyper V.

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None of the other methods worked for me, especially since my Windows 10 was Bitlocker encrypted i.e. it doesn't show up in Startup Disks to chose to reboot to. The steps below work though

  1. Power off

    Not just a hard reboot; fully powered off; as in 'count to 10 when off' off

  2. Power on and Boot to OS X desktop

    This process loads virtualization properly. In my case, I had to hold option and select OS X, enter my FileVault password (my OS X is encrypted) and then wait to boot into OS X desktop.

  3. Reboot to Windows

    Soft reboot via the Apple menu i.e. top left Apple icon => restart. During bootup select Windows/Bootcamp (via the option key). My Windows was Bitlocker encrypted, so I entered the disk password, booted to Windows, entered Windows password, landed on Windows 10 desktop. This time Hyper-V was present and functional!

I'm putting this here for future reference but I hope Apple actually fixes their Bootcamp boot process. It's been broken for 8 years now and the above hackery is ridiculous for a $3000 machine and when Bootcamp is an officially supported Mac feature.

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protected by Tetsujin May 21 at 15:01

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