Can't install Windows 10 from USB

[Roseluck]

Hey everyone, you are my last hope.

 

I recently bought myself a new NVM SSD for my build and I want to install windows 10 on it.

The problem is, that I can't.

 

Here are my specs:

AMD Ryzen 5 1600

MSI B350 PC MATE

16GB DDR4 Memory

GTX1070

 

I created a bootable USB stick with Win10 on it, but i can't boot from it no matter what I try. When it tries to boot of it, it will either give me a bunch of fizzly white lines and freeze or the Windows logo flashes for a second, only for it to vanish again and the screen begins flickering.

I used both the Microsoft Tool and Rufus to create the USB stick and I tried using different USB ports. I tried FAT32 and NFST as the drive format. I tried UEFI and Legacy boot. I tried resetting my CMOS. I tried using different RAM. Nothing ever works.

The weird thing is, I can boot into my drive with Win10 on it just fine and I get no error messages at all. 

The USB I used has a capacity of 64GB, but I dont have any other USB sticks that can fit the windows installation, nor do I have a Windows 10 DVD or diskdrive.

 

I am totally at my wits end, I have tried everything I could think of for the last 8 hours.

 

If you have any ideas on how to install windows, I would really appreciate it.

[shark103]

Hi,

 

First thing did you disconnect old drive with win10 before attempting to install new OS on new drive ?

 

Have you tried:

1. Using USB 2.0, sometimes 3.0/3.1 can cause issues with bootable usb drives

2. any linux live distro to check if anything starts from that usb stick / port

[Roseluck]

4 minutes ago, shark103 said:

Hi,

 

First thing did you disconnect old drive with win10 before attempting to install new OS on new drive ?

 

Have you tried:

1. Using USB 2.0, sometimes 3.0/3.1 can cause issues with bootable usb drives

2. any linux live distro to check if anything starts from that usb stick / port

I disconnected my old drive before trying to install the new OS on my new drive. 

 

I tried using my USB 2.0 ports, it made no difference.

Can you recommend me a linux distro would make sense to use?

 

Right now I am trying to create a Win10 DVD using the .iso, but it got stuck on 99% and won't continue. Microsoft does everything in their power to make it as hard as possible to install windows...

[shark103]

1 minute ago, Roseluck said:

I disconnected my old drive before trying to install the new OS on my new drive. 

 

I tried using my USB 2.0 ports, it made no difference.

Can you recommend me a linux distro would make sense to use?

 

Right now I am trying to create a Win10 DVD using the .iso, but it got stuck on 99% and won't continue. Microsoft does everything in their power to make it as hard as possible to install windows...

You could try xubuntu / lubuntu / Puppy Linux

 

Additional things:

1. Is the new drive correctly identified in bios ?

2. Is win10 installer launching without new drive connected or the same issue is present ?

[Roseluck]

1 minute ago, shark103 said:

You could try xubuntu / lubuntu / Puppy Linux

 

Additional things:

1. Is the new drive correctly identified in bios ?

2. Is win10 installer launching without new drive connected or the same issue is present ?

The drive is correctly identified in my bios. I haven't tried removing it, because I would also need to remove my GPU for it. Since I never even got the USB drive to boot, I didn't bother with the m.2 drive so far. How big is the chance, that just the presence of a m.2 drive prohibits me from booting from USB?

 

To continue my tale, I tried cancelling the burn process of the .iso on a disk, because it was stuck. This caused both explorer.exe and taskmanager to fail and I had suffocate my PC in order to restart it. I can't believe how many troubles I have to go through, just to install windows... 

 

If I can't burn win10 to dvd, I'll try a linux distro to see if my USB drive is at fault.

[shark103]

10 minutes ago, Roseluck said:

The drive is correctly identified in my bios. I haven't tried removing it, because I would also need to remove my GPU for it. Since I never even got the USB drive to boot, I didn't bother with the m.2 drive so far. How big is the chance, that just the presence of a m.2 drive prohibits me from booting from USB?

 

To continue my tale, I tried cancelling the burn process of the .iso on a disk, because it was stuck. This caused both explorer.exe and taskmanager to fail and I had suffocate my PC in order to restart it. I can't believe how many troubles I have to go through, just to install windows... 

 

If I can't burn win10 to dvd, I'll try a linux distro to see if my USB drive is at fault.

btw Is the new drive visible on the old win10 install ?

 

ps. did you check that usb stick with any tool for errors ?

[Roseluck]

5 minutes ago, shark103 said:

btw Is the new drive visible on the old win10 install ?

 

ps. did you check that usb stick with any tool for errors ?

I can see the m.2 drive in my device manager, but I can't allocate disk space to it using the disk manager.

 

By the way, I used FreeIso to burn the dvd and ran into the exact same problem as before. It got stuck on 100% and the RPM kept increasing until the drive made concerning noises. 

[shark103]

Just now, Roseluck said:

I can see the m.2 drive in my device manager, but I can't allocate disk space to it using the disk manager.

 

By the way, I used FreeIso to burn the dvd and ran into the exact same problem as before. It got stuck on 100% and the RPM kept increasing until the drive made concerning noises. 

Looks like a problem with drive or bios problem (maybe something like bandwidth setting). Newest bios or some old version ? Does you mobo manual have any annotations about m.2 <> sata collisions (like if you use m.2 those sata ports will be disabled etc).

 

Stuck iso burning might be burner fault, dvd disk fault but if we add that to usb stick installer not working this could be a faulty iso image.

[Roseluck]

Just now, shark103 said:

btw Is the new drive visible on the old win10 install ?

 

ps. did you check that usb stick with any tool for errors ?

Okay, I was able to boot into lubuntu from a different USB stick with no issue. Sadly, I have no 8gb USB stick that I could use for the Win10 installation, if my 64GB one is the culprit. I also can't burn a dvd for unknown reasons. So my only option is to buy a new USB drive I guess? 

[Roseluck]

Just now, shark103 said:

Looks like a problem with drive or bios problem (maybe something like bandwidth setting). Newest bios or some old version ? Does you mobo manual have any annotations about m.2 <> sata collisions (like if you use m.2 those sata ports will be disabled etc).

 

Stuck iso burning might be burner fault, dvd disk fault but if we add that to usb stick installer not working this could be a faulty iso image.

I will update my BIOS to the newest version now, maybe that will do the trick.

The manual makes no mention of SATA limitations while using the M.2 drive.

[shark103]

4 minutes ago, Roseluck said:

Okay, I was able to boot into lubuntu from a different USB stick with no issue. Sadly, I have no 8gb USB stick that I could use for the Win10 installation, if my 64GB one is the culprit. I also can't burn a dvd for unknown reasons. So my only option is to buy a new USB drive I guess? 

Using different usb stick for lubuntu is pointless to be honest. While suggesting live linux distro i did it so that you would test that 64gb stick. If that test will pass then in my opinion your windows iso image is at fault.

[Roseluck]

Just now, shark103 said:

Using different usb stick for lubuntu is pointless to be honest. While suggesting live linux distro i did it so that you would test that 64gb stick

it did tell me, that my motherboard CAN boot from usb (which was my main fear). so it wasn't a complete waste, but you are right.

[shark103]

1 minute ago, Roseluck said:

it did tell me, that my motherboard CAN boot from usb (which was my main fear). so it wasn't a complete waste, but you are right.

One more thing do you need/want a fresh install of windows ? Maybe migration to new drive ?

[Roseluck]

Just now, shark103 said:

One more thing do you need/want a fresh install of windows ? Maybe migration to new drive ?

I want a fresh installation of Windows, because my current one is old and breaking apart. I prefer the clean slate over migration. 

[Roseluck]

Just now, shark103 said:

One more thing do you need/want a fresh install of windows ? Maybe migration to new drive ?

Okay, I updated my BIOS and I will call it a day. I will buy a new USB drive tomorrow and try my luck again. I hope that will work....

Thank you so so much for your help thank you thank you!!! 

 

[shark103]

Just now, Roseluck said:

Okay, I updated my BIOS and I will call it a day. I will buy a new USB drive tomorrow and try my luck again. I hope that will work....

Thank you so so much for your help thank you thank you!!! 

 

Your welcome, hope that you will be able to install it soon (if anything comes up again - ping me here)

 

A small path for testing that 64gb if you will go with it, test with linux live distro

• pass (linux distro launches) -  redownload windows iso (use microsoft tool for creating bootable drive, for both creation and booting use usb 2.0 port) and test that 
  • Same thing again - disconnect m.2 drive and relaunch installer
    • installer launches normally = m.2 drive faulty or some weird bios setting like bandwidth
    • installer not launches = usb stick damaged 
  • Installer launches , installed OS , success and end of topic
• not passed (live distro not bootable)  - usb stick on it's last legs probably and new one will be needed (would use this one for any not backed up data.

If on new usb stick same thing happens please check above points also.