BootCamp problem with Apricorn Velocity Solo x2

[snarfquest]

So I bought a Apricorn Velocity Solo x2 and simply moved my 512gb SSD OSX boot drive to it and booted up. That worked great.

I've got Windows 7 64bit install on another harddrive (internal bay 4) and when I try to boot from it my system hangs with a black screen. If I move my SSD OSX drive back to bay 0 Windows boots fine.

This is OSX 10.8.4.

Black screen with no error messages are so fun to trouble-shoot. Any ideas?

 

[flowrider]

I don't use windoze at all, but I do have a Solo x2 with a Samsung SSD (as my boot drive) and I also have other boot drives (10.8.4 & 10.7.5) on other HDDs installed internally & externally. I have no issues booting from the other drives.

Lou

 

[SadChief]

I don't use windoze at all, but I do have a Solo x2 with a Samsung SSD (as my boot drive) and I also have other boot drives (10.8.4 & 10.7.5) on other HDDs installed internally & externally. I have no issues booting from the other drives.

Lou

The issue is with Windows, not with any Mac OS X version.
I have the exact problem as the OP with my Mac Pro and just tried everything I could or imagined - to no avail.
I didn't manage to find any solution as for now. Hope it'd surface somewhere one day

 

[flowrider]

OK, just guessing here, but have either of you tried restarting and holding down the option key? This invokes Start-Up Manager and gives you a choice of startup volumes.

Lou

 

[666sheep]

https://forums.macrumors.com/threads/1506012/

 

[tomvos]

It does not work—at least for my setup:

• Bay1: 1 TB HD with the 0.35 TB Bootcamp partition (disk2s3 NTFS)
• Bay2: 0.5 TB HD
• Bay3: 1 TB HD
• Bay4: 1.5 TB HD
  
• PCIe Slot 3: Apricorn Velocity Solo X2 with OS X 10.8.4, my normal boot drive

On my Mac Pro 5.1 I can get into the startup manager by pressing the OPTION key. From there I see the BOOTCAMP partition as well as the Windows 8 DVD (normal and EFI). I can select Windows DVD or BOOTCAMP but the display freezes immediately (no black screen, just frozen, even the mouse pointer is stuck) and the system does not boot into windows.

I tried removing several disks and narrowed the issue down the the bootable Mac OS X SSD. I can put the empty Apricorn Velocity Solo X2 into the Mac Pro and have all drive bays plugged in. The system starts and I can OPTION boot either Windows or Windows 8 DVD just fine.

But as soon as I plug the SSD into the Apricorn Velocity X2, I can no longer boot into windows. It works up the the startup manager, but from there on a boot into windows is not possible.

I would appreciate a decent workaround (or a firmware update) to mitigate this issue. But then, I only want Windows as a boot-loader for games, so this is only a minor issue for me.

 

[costabunny]

Could this be due to the drive numbers changing?

Without the pcie card in check the disk numbers in terminal 'diskutil list' if that command returns a different disk number for the windows drive when the ssd is on the pcie, then its the windows boot manager that needs its entry fixing perhaps?

Just a wild guess.

 

[flowrider]

Yes, I can see this happening. Event though I don't use windoze, when I was trying to update the firmware of my Samsung SSD, it involved using a DOS CD with an ISO file on it. It would freeze when I selected the CD, as described above. To do the software update I needed to remove the card from the Solo x2 and, and use the SATA connector in the optical drive bay. My post describing the procedure:

How to Update Samsung SSD Firmware With an Apricorn Velocity x2 Card:

You can't do it with the Solo x2 Card as the interface between the drive and the MOBO.

1. Go Here for Update instructions and Firmware Update:

http://www.samsung.com/global/business/semiconductor/samsungssd/downloads.html

Scroll to the bottom for the Mac files.

2. Attach the SSD drive to an SATA interface connected directly to the MOBO. If the card is mounted to the Solo x2, when you restart and you use the Samsung Firmware Update CD you created, it will not recognize the disk and will never start. I used the SATA cable for the second DVD drive.

3. Complete as per instructions on the PDF.

4. Remove the drive from the MOBO SATA interface and Replace on the Solo x2.

Note: The Samsung instructions say that when the firmware updates, it will destroy the information on the SSD, but I found this not be true. All the information was still intact and I'm using it now as the StartUpDisc.

Hope this helps someone. It took me four days to figure it out.

Lou

Lou

 

[xcodeSyn]

I found similar issues of PCIe cards blocking Windows installation or boot, if not exactly the same, also occurred to OWC Mercury Accelsior as discussed here. What's the connection here? Both devices use Marvell's chipset although they may not use the same one. Apparently both OWC and Apricorn were aware of the bugs, and OWC even acknowledged that it only happened in Mac Pro with Windows, not with OS X and not in standard PC systems. It's been over a year since the OWC's post, not sure this issue would be resolved quickly.

 

[snarfquest]

OK, just guessing here, but have either of you tried restarting and holding down the option key? This invokes Start-Up Manager and gives you a choice of startup volumes.

Lou

Yes. No dice on that. :-(

----------

Ahh thanks for the link 666Sheep.

Seems I've joined everybody else with the same issue. I guess for now my SSD drive stay in bay 1. Oh well.

 

[Bloodklot]

So I bought a Apricorn Velocity Solo x2 and simply moved my 512gb SSD OSX boot drive to it and booted up. That worked great.

I've got Windows 7 64bit install on another harddrive (internal bay 4) and when I try to boot from it my system hangs with a black screen. If I move my SSD OSX drive back to bay 0 Windows boots fine.

This is OSX 10.8.4.

Black screen with no error messages are so fun to trouble-shoot. Any ideas?

This reply is a little late but are you starting windows from restart on the mac side? or from complete shut down? From my experience and others, Velocity doesn't like to start from restart on the OSX side. You have to shut down completely, then start the computer and hold down option to select windows. Otherwise you get that black screen.

 

[flowrider]

OK, just guessing here, but have either of you tried restarting and holding down the option key? This invokes Start-Up Manager and gives you a choice of startup volumes.

Lou

This reply is a little late but are you starting windows from restart on the mac side? or from complete shut down? From my experience and others, Velocity doesn't like to start from restart on the OSX side. You have to shut down completely, then start the computer and hold down option to select windows. Otherwise you get that black screen.

What did you say that was different

Lou

 

[zarf2007]

What did you say that was different

Lou

Different to what you said. You need to shutdown (not restart) then power on again holding option then choose windows. I have this card with SSD for osx and also bootcamp to windows 7 on a separate SSD, it freezes if I just restart.

 

[snarfquest]

These problems have gone away for me since going to Mavericks and the newer Bootcamp.

 

[NOTNlCE]

These problems have gone away for me since going to Mavericks and the newer Bootcamp.

Really? Interesting. Still running Windows 7? My solution was to use Windows 8.1, I think it handles the AHCI controller of the Solo better than 7. Might have to switch back to 7 if it's functional again.

 

[jenzjen]

Really? Interesting. Still running Windows 7? My solution was to use Windows 8.1, I think it handles the AHCI controller of the Solo better than 7. Might have to switch back to 7 if it's functional again.

Ran it on W7 with mountain lion with no issues

 

[snarfquest]

I've never tried Windows 8 and well... honestly never plan to.

W7 is the last version of Windows I plan to tolerate. That said I haven't even booted my bootcamp partition in 2+ months.

 

[XLxY]

I think I solved the problem on boot camp booting in to Windows 7(I just tested Win7)


I use SAMAUNG 850 pro SSD 512 GB in bay 2 and WD green 2TB HD in bay 1 before finish the OS X 10.11.3 installation.

1.Manual partition the SSD and the HD at the beginning of OS X 10.11.3 installation (each of them divide a half). **I also make a Fusion drive first.

2.After finished OS X 10.11.3, put the ssd into Velocity Solo x2 and leave the Win7 dvd in the cd drive

3.Bootup Mac and Go to system preference >startup disk. Choose the Win7 dvd to startup disk and start windows installation. Follow the step then choose the ssd partition which manual partition at the beginning that be the windows install location.

4.Once finished Win7 installation, install Bootcamp drive in your windows.

5.Mac Pro will restart automatically, u will see that after boot into Velocity Solo x2 BIOS, windows will load into a black screen white letter and scanning for recognies the ssd location.

Done!

I can option bootup and choose the startup disk too. Hope it can help and sorry for my bad english

 

[haralds]

So I bought a Apricorn Velocity Solo x2 and simply moved my 512gb SSD OSX boot drive to it and booted up. That worked great.

I've got Windows 7 64bit install on another harddrive (internal bay 4) and when I try to boot from it my system hangs with a black screen. If I move my SSD OSX drive back to bay 0 Windows boots fine.

This is OSX 10.8.4.

Black screen with no error messages are so fun to trouble-shoot. Any ideas?

You need to boot up Windows from a main system board SATA location with the new card installed so it can configure the driver for that card. reboot once after install to make sure, it boots ok (it will ask for that. Then shut down and move the drive to the card.

 

[Squuiid]

Can someone correct me if I am wrong?
This is what I've gathered so far from reading a lot of posts.

The Apricorn Velocity Solo x2:
1. Will cause a boot delay.
2. If using it for Windows on a Mac, you need to install Windows in a SATA bay 1st, install drivers, then transfer SSD to the Velocity Solo.
3. It displays a BIOS on boot up.
4. It causes reboots from OS X to hang.

I currently don't own one but want to move my Windows SSD from bay 3 (SATA2) to a SATA3 PCIe card for AHCI mode. Need some of these Qs answered first though I think.
Thanks.

 

[XLxY]

Can someone correct me if I am wrong?
This is what I've gathered so far from reading a lot of posts.

The Apricorn Velocity Solo x2:
1. Will cause a boot delay.
2. If using it for Windows on a Mac, you need to install Windows in a SATA bay 1st, install drivers, then transfer SSD to the Velocity Solo.
3. It displays a BIOS on boot up.
4. It causes reboots from OS X to hang.

I currently don't own one but want to move my Windows SSD from bay 3 (SATA2) to a SATA3 PCIe card for AHCI mode. Need some of these Qs answered first though I think.
Thanks.

When ssd in PCIe slot then boot into windows but it reboot again after the windows logo comes up? Right?

I think u can boot it into OS X first then install windows again. Follow my step 3 of my upper comment