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There is no option in the Bootcamp wizard to choose the Windows ISO.. Any ideas?

bootcamp

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  • Is the computer a Macbook Pro (Early 2008) by any chance? If you have a optical drive, then burn the iso to a DVD using the Disk Utility application and install using that. I assume you are installing windows 7. You probably can also install windows 8 on that machine.
    – David Anderson
    Commented Feb 6, 2015 at 16:04
  • My solution was found here apple.stackexchange.com/questions/168808/…
    – Klajd Deda
    Commented Mar 31, 2015 at 1:35

7 Answers 7

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I followed this tutor here and got success: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=hE8If6gabUI.

The "Create a Windows 7 install disk" option is hidden because your system's capabilities are limited. For instance, older Macs can not boot from external USB disks, therefore creating an installer onto a USB disk would make no sense.

Still, if you want to create an installer on an external disk regardless, all you have to do is edit Boot Camp Assistant's "Info.plist" file:

  1. Open Package content of Boot Camp Assistant app, backup Info.plist file somewhere, then open the old one with XCode.
  2. Edit file:
    • Edit section's title: PreUSBBootSupportedModels to USBSupportedModels (if it's already USBBootSupportedModels -> skip this step)
    • Add your System's model identifier(Find it by System Information app) into USBSupportedModels section.
    • Add your Boot ROM version (Find by System Information app) to DARequiredROMVersions section
    • Save.
  3. Restart BootCamp

A comment of @dusanvf:

If your Bootcamp crashes after this, write this into terminal:

sudo codesign -fs - /Applications/Utilities/Boot\ Camp\ Assistant.app/
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  • Hi @samthui7, welcome to Ask Different. Please summarize the contents of the tutorial in your response to make your answer more useful to the community. This page may be of help too: apple.stackexchange.com/help/how-to-answer. Thanks!
    – Jaime Santa Cruz
    Commented Jun 23, 2015 at 3:47
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    I can confirm that this works with a Mac Pro Early 2008. After the modifications I was offered the option to create an install disk, and I was then able to use a normal USB disk as the destination. (Note: I also added the "MacPro3,1" identifier to the "32BitSupportedModels" array as well - not sure if that mattered; and the names have changed a little, e.g. from PreUSBSupportedModels to PreUSBBootSupportedModels etc.) Unfortunately, though, the Mac Pro won't boot from a normal USB drive, either. So I guess I need to fix the DVD drive in the Mac before I can do this.
    – Thomas Tempelmann
    Commented Aug 9, 2015 at 12:48
  • @iProgram Please use appropriate Markdown formatting rather than <br>s.
    – grg ♦
    Commented Aug 9, 2015 at 14:36
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    @iProgram Use two spaces at the end of a line to create a line break in Markdown.
    – grg ♦
    Commented Aug 9, 2015 at 14:51
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    For windows 10, I have to remove my model from SupporedNonWin10Models
    – ThomasEdwin
    Commented Sep 3, 2017 at 7:01
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Here is the page which helped me to enable this option Create a Windows Install USB on OS X Yosemite.

Creating a Windows installer from OS X is actually quite simple - Boot Camp Assistant can do it for you. If you’re on a newer machine without an optical drive, you probably have an option that says “Create a Windows 7 or later version install disk”. Click that and point it to your ISO image. Done.

If you’re on an older machine (like my Hoth), you won’t find this option. Don’t Panic! Hacking Boot Camp Assistant into small bits and reassembling it will do the trick.

First of all, we’ll modify Boot Camp Assistant’s Info.plist. It’s at /Applications/Utilities/Boot Camp Assistant.app/Contents/Info.plist. Open it in your favorite text editor. (Note: this requires elevated privileges).

Note: If you are running OS X 10.11 or newer, you will be unable to edit Info.plist. Instead, copy Boot Camp Assistant.app to your desktop, and follow the instructions using the copy.

Once we’re in Info.plist, we’ll tell it which machines can create USB disks. Look for the key PreUSBBootSupportedModels. Change it to USBBootSupportedModels. Makes sense, right? Save.

Then, we’ll need to resign Boot Camp Assistant, otherwise it will refuse to run. For this, we’ll need the Xcode command line tools installed. Then it’s as easy as

sudo codesign -fs - /Applications/Utilities/Boot\ Camp\ Assistant.app

Now restart Boot Camp Assistant, and you’ll find the option you were looking for.

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  • 8
    Note that in 10.11 you cannot edit Boot Camp Assistant in place, even as root. I made a copy of the app on my desktop and was able to preform this hack on the copy.
    – alfwatt
    Commented Oct 25, 2015 at 11:34
  • This worked perfectly for me
    – Septronic
    Commented Jan 28, 2016 at 11:53
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    Just did this on 10.12.6 Sierra. Thanks for the note about copying Boot Camp Assistant to the desktop. You should edit the post to note that, if you do this, you have to swap the new location into the terminal command like so: sudo codesign -fs - /Users/YOUR_NAME_HERE/Desktop/Boot\ Camp\ Assistant.app
    – Evan Rosica
    Commented Oct 6, 2017 at 9:50
  • Tried this on High Sierra, worked like a charm... Used a copy on the desktop
    – Nelson Owalo
    Commented Sep 15, 2018 at 10:49
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If anybody is struggling with this on Mojave (10.14) it's pretty simple:

  1. Copy Boot Camp Assistant.app to your desktop (just select it inside Applications/Utilites cmd+c and cmd+v on your desktop)
  2. On your desktop, tap on the boot camp icon with ctrl + click which opens contextual menu, select show contents and open info.plist in Xcode.
  3. Remove pre from PreUSBBootSupportedModels, so only USBBootSupportedModels remains and add your model in there.
  4. Add your model also inside ExternalInstallOnlyModels
  5. Open Boot Camp from desktop and you will see the option.
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If the "Create a Windows 7 or later install disk" check box does not appear, then this usually means an USB flash drive can not be used to install Windows on your Mac. An example of this check box is shown below. Since your Mac does not show this check box, I assume you have an optical drive. You need to burn the iso image to a blank DVD using the Disk Utility application.

Now there are ways to make this check box appear so the files can be copied to the flash drive, but most likely the firmware in your Mac will not allow you to boot Windows from a flash drive. Even if you can boot to OS X using a flash drive, this does not mean you can boot to Windows using a flash drive. You may need to boot to Windows from the optical drive to install it on to your internal drive.

Steps to burn an iso to DVD: (Taken from Burn ISO in Mac OS X)

  1. Open the “Disk Utility” app, it’s located in /Applications/Utilities/
  2. Pull down the File menu and select ‘Open Disk Image’
  3. Navigate to the ISO image file that you want burned and click “OK”
  4. Insert a Blank DVD
  5. Select "Verify burned data"
  6. Click ‘Burn’ and wait until the image has finished burning to the disc

As for the drivers for Windows. You can either download them using the Boot Camp Assistant or download them from Boot Camp: System requirements for Microsoft Windows operating systems. You install the drivers after you finish installing Windows.

One final note: Do not change the partitioning using anything from Microsoft. The partitioning can only be successfully changed using OS X software. The only exception is Windows can format the BOOTCAMP partition.

Boot Camp Assistant Window

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  • I can confirm that my Mac Pro "Early 2008", which has the same issue not showing the "create an install disk" option, can boot from neither a USB flash drive nor from a regular USB drive.
    – Thomas Tempelmann
    Commented Aug 9, 2015 at 13:12
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    @Thomas: If your DVD drive is not working, you can still install Windows 7 or 8.1 using the iso file. The instruction ars given here. If you are trying to install Windows 10, let me know and I will update the instructions.
    – David Anderson
    Commented Aug 9, 2015 at 17:53
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    @ThomasTempelmann, if the option is not visible try the following gist.github.com/ChrisTollefson/3c5b02c6d664b7fb157b44b1fc168799, it worked for me
    – spacebiker
    Commented Mar 1, 2020 at 12:26
  • @spacebiker: Thanks for post your comment. I added your link to the answer. You do realize Thomas Tempelmann posted his comment ~4.5 years ago.
    – David Anderson
    Commented Mar 1, 2020 at 13:00
  • @DavidAnderson, sure I do, but there might be people like me finding for an answer to solve it and it can help others nowadays. Thanks
    – spacebiker
    Commented Mar 2, 2020 at 20:00
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This is correct. You need to have a bootable media with Windows on it to install Windows on bootcamp. When the process reboots to install Windows, the .iso will be unmounted and useless.

You can write the ISO to a flash drive (8GB or more) using disk utility and use that.

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  • I believe the question is about the fact that Apple's own docs (support.apple.com/en-us/HT201468) as well as BCA on modern Macs will offer an option to choose an .iso whereas here the option is not available, and he's trying to figure out how to make it available. And I suspect that's a behavior of older Macs (my Mac Pro 2009 does the same), and those Macs can't boot Windows off a USB flash drive, either.
    – Thomas Tempelmann
    Commented Aug 9, 2015 at 12:30
  • Correction: Mine is a Mac Pro Early 2008
    – Thomas Tempelmann
    Commented Aug 9, 2015 at 12:36
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Actually, if I recall correctly, the Bootcamp installer should make the bootable install media (8GB flash drive) itself.

If you just mount the ISO so that it shows up as a disk (double click on the ISO) that may be all you need to do. The BootCamp Assistant will then see the file as a (virtual) drive and copy the necessary files to your install media.

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  • True, and Daemon Tools lite for Mac does emulate a bit better than the built in Mac mount. It shows up as a "dvd" of sort.
    – David d C e Freitas
    Commented May 28, 2021 at 9:12
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Here as an article that describes how to get the option back http://tsentas.net/create-a-windows-7-or-later-version-install-disk-missing-on-el-capitan/

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  • Answers on Ask Different need to be more than just a link. It's okay to include a link, but please summarize or excerpt it in the answer. The idea is to make the answer stand alone.
    – nohillside ♦
    Commented Nov 7, 2015 at 8:05

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