I'm on a 2011 MacBook Pro trying to install Windows 8.1 from a USB. I tried creating bootable FAT32 and NTFS USBs from my Windows ISO with Rufus, but still I don't see anything in Startup Disk in Windows or OS X:
Update 1:
Attempted to write ISO to USB with Disk Utility in OS X, but it wouldn't let me select the ISO (see JeremyKun's comment).
Update 2:
Managed to write the ISO to USB with dd in OS X, but still I don't see it in Startup Disk.
Did you try to use Startup Manager?
Use these steps to choose a startup disk with Startup Manager:
- Turn on or restart your Mac.
- Immediately press and hold the Option key. After a few seconds, the Startup Manager appears. If you don't see the volume you want to use, wait a few moments for Startup Manager to finish scanning connected drives.
- Use your mouse or trackpad, or left and right arrow keys to select the volume you want to use.
- Double-click or press the Return key to start up your Mac from the volume you selected.
If you have an optical drive connected to your computer, you can insert an installation disc to see it in Startup Manager. You can also attach FireWire or USB external hard drives that contain an operating system to add to the list of startup volumes. Startup Manager automatically adds bootable volumes as you connect them.
2011 MacBook Pros do not support booting FAT/NTFS formatted drives from USB. This is due to a bug in the firmware. They had to fix this bug on newer Macs when they ditched the optical drive making USB the only way to install Windows, but they never backported the fix to older Macs that still had optical drives.
The only solution to this would be to either install Windows from DVD, or download and install rEFIt (no longer being developed) or rEFInd (rEFIt's replacement). Those programs take over the normal boot process on a Mac and will show you the option to boot from USB sticks (but you still won't see them in the Startup Disk control panel, however).
