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I just started this blog to let you know how to install Windows 10 on our beloved MacBook Air Late 2010 (beloved.... well.... except the missing keyboard illumination....)

I have the 13" model with the 2.13GHz CPU and 4GB RAM. :-)

Summary: Windows 10 runs smoothly, all drivers installed and devices working, including brightness and volume control.

Installation

Connect an optical drive to your MacBook, I used an old internal DVD Writer with an USB to IDE/ATA-converter-cable. Launch Boot Camp Assistant with a Windows *7* DVD in the drive. You do not need to download the "latest Windows support software", you can do that manually afterwards. Once the Windows partition is created and your MacBook reboots, quickly power down the MacBook by holding the power key. Insert the Windows 10 DVD and turn back on the MacBook. Windows 10 setup should start and you can install Windows 10 on your BootCamp partition.

Things to fix

Of course Windows 10 detects almost all of the devices, but there are things to fix.

Missing drivers for Bluetooth, iSight, Coprocessor and SM-Bus-Controller
Audio driver is installed but speakers do not work, surprisingly headphones work
Volume/Brightness and BootCamp stuff
GeForce 320M-drivers will be installed by Windows Update but with the current version 341.74 the min/max/close-icons in the window-title-bars are missing (only on Apps, not on native Windows applications)

BootCamp drivers

Download BootCamp 4
Download BootCamp 5

First install BootCamp *5* drivers, for this you need a file manager like Total Commander, run Total Commander as administrator and within Total Commander run \Drivers\Apple\BootCamp.msi. The normal setup won't work, even in compatibility mode. BootCamp 5 brings back speakers working, volume control and Boot Camp stuff (Touchpad, Fn-keys and start volume settings). It also installs GeForce drivers version 306.37 which fixes the missing min/max/close-icons. However Windows Update automatically reinstalls version 341.74, and Windows 10 has this "nice" feature that you cannot uncheck and hide a particular update. But a few days ago Microsoft had mercy... reinstall version 306.37 (\Drivers\NVidia\NVidiaGraphics64) or download version 332.21 from NVidia. Using Windows 8.1 I figured this out to be the best version, older or newer ones caused crashes and/or brightness not working. Now download KB3073930, with this you can hide the NVidia version 341.74 update.

Now maybe you complain that brightness control is still not working? Yep, keys and OSD works, but nothing happens. Create a "brightness.reg" file with this content:


Windows Registry Editor Version 5.00

[HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\SYSTEM\ControlSet001\Control\Class\{4d36e968-e325-11ce-bfc1-08002be10318}\0000]

"EnableBrightnessControl"=dword:00000001

install it and reboot. Although now we have the Microsoft OSD for brightness, but that's a little flaw.

Now install from BootCamp *4* the Bluetooth-driver (\Drivers\Apple\x64\AppleBluetoothBroadcomInstaller64.exe). Then open device manager and you should see two last devices with missing driver. Double click on "Coprocessor", "Update Driver", "Browse my computer...", browse to BootCamp *4* \Drivers\NVidia. The same for the "SM-Bus-Controller".

That's it. Feel free to comment :-)

Windows 10 1909 and newer drivers

I'm too lazy to retest and rewrite the whole procedure with the latest Windows 10 1909, but here are the important points I encountered in the last years after some Windows 10 Build updates.

Since Windows 10 1511 the problem with the missing min/max/close-icons in the window-title-bars is gone. This means you can use the latest GeForce-drivers without messing around with preventing Windows from updating your drivers. So version 342.01, which will be installed automatically, works just fine. You just have to reinstall the brightness.reg.

Since Windows 10 1903, you may encounter a bluescreen instantly after logon. It's the bootcamp driver that crashes. Reboot in Safe Mode, rename c:\Windows\System32\drivers\MacHALDriver.sys, reboot normal. Download BootCamp 6 using Brigadier, run it with

brigadier.exe --model MacBookAir7,2

it will download BootCamp 6 into a folder, use Total Commander again to run \BootCamp\Drivers\Apple\BootCamp.msi with admin rights - problem solved! :-)

With Windows 10 1909 everything still works fine.

Windows 10 20H2 / 21H1 / 21H2 / 22H2...

While the update to version 2004 never showed up, now suddenly 20H2 was available. No risk no fun, it went flawlessly, again I just needed to reinstall the brightness.reg. The same for the followed versions.

Windows 11 Upgrade? YES!

How to upgrade your MacBook Air Late 2010 from Windows 10 to Windows 11

I stumbled over a trick to install Windows 11 on older PCs. Get the Windows 10 and the Windows 11 installation files (the .iso). Extract all the Windows 10 files to a folder. Delete \sources\install.esd and add \sources\install.wim from Windows 11 instead. Basically you now have the Windows 10 setup with the image file from Windows 11. Copy this folder to a USB stick or directly to your MacBook SSD. Disable WiFi! Launch the setup and install it. Final reboot after installation takes very long. Install brightness.reg again. :-) Enable WiFi, let it update. Works great so far with Windows 11 22H2, May 2023 Updates installed (Build 22621.1702). Not slower, I think even more free RAM (1,8 from 3.7GB).