I installed Windows 7 (Build 6801) on my MacBook “Core 2 Duo” 2.0 13″ (Black) with 3GB RAM.
To manage the boot menu for my Vista and Leopard partitions, I use rEFIt instead of Boot Camp. After I made a backup disk image of the Vista partition, I booted the Windows 7 DVD, reformatted the Vista partition and began the installation. It went a lot faster than the Vista install.
The Boot Camp drivers from the Leopard DVD installed without any problems in Windows 7 – the Apple Built-in Bluetooth, the Apple Built-in iSight, the Apple Trackpad Enabler, the Apple Keyboard, the Apple IR Receiver, the Atheros AR5008X Wireless Network Adapter, the Marvell Yukon 88E8053 PCI-E Gigabit Ethernet Controller, the SigmaTel High Definition Audio Codec and the Boot Camp Control Panel. Windows 7 installed the Mobile Intel(R) 945 Express Chipset Family (Prerelease WDDM 1.0 Driver) for the display adapter.
I used Randy’s SharpKeys 2.1.1 (a registry hack) to remap the Apple enter key (on the bottom row) to a forward delete key so I don’t have to hold down the fn key and delete for that function. I also mapped F8 to Prtscr – another Windows key that’s missing on the MacBook keyboard.
Thankfully, my two year old MacBook still feels responsive in Windows 7 (and in Vista). I’ve never had any major problems with Vista, and so far, Windows 7 seems to be an improvement.
Gordon, I tried Fusion and Parallels for a while and didn’t really have any graphics problems. Windows just ran a lot slower in a VM compared to when run natively. That’s why I’m using Boot Camp with rEFIT.
My Macbook is the “Late 2006 Core 2 Duo” MA701LL/A and it still seems reasonably fast with Windows 7 and OSX 10.5.7.
I was wondering if anyone had any troubles w/ the graphics on the macbooks. My two year old macbook seems to not be able to handle them so well and I am not sure if it is b/c I used VMware or not.
Guys, try this out http://www.olofsson.info/index.html?inputremapper.html
It returns all you apple hotkeys functionality back to life.
al, did you load the Boot Camp drivers?
I also have it installed on my mac(CD MBP to be exact) and I can’t really get the Vista Keyboard drivers to work. As it if i press fnF3 I cant get the sound to turn off or something. Any ideas?