Windows 7 USB Instillation Problems

Keggers2

So I recently spec'd and ordered a PC with the help of the good folks over at the PC Building and Upgrading forum. All of the parts arrived and the actual process of putting it together went entirely smoothly even though it was my first time.

I was given a (legitimate) copy of Windows by a techy friend of mine who had one spare on a USB stick but my computer simply will not recognise it as a bootable drive. We've reformatted the USB and fiddled around in the BIOS with the boot order and what have you, but we just can't get it to work.

Is there something obvious that I might be missing?

The motherboard is an MSI Z87 G43 (for BIOS reference)

solomafioso

Keggers2 wrote: »

I was given a (legitimate) copy of Windows by a techy friend of mine who had one spare on a USB

You could test by creating another bootable usb. EG, ubuntu or another linux distro. Just to rule out that it's the actual port that's at fault and not the usb key itself.

Keggers2

I'm NOT convinced that it's the port or usb key though because the computer does recognise it in so far as it's on the list of selectable boot drives

*NOT convinced it's the port, big ol typo there

solomafioso

Keggers2 wrote: »

I'm convinced that it's the port or usb key though because the computer does recognise it in so far as it's on the list of selectable boot drives

How was the usb created (Xboot)? Have you tested it on another machine? Just to rule out that it's actually the usb and not your ports (before opening up the case!).

yoyo

Try using a non-USB 3.0 port if your pc has one, if not disable USB 3.0 support in the bios and see if it helps. Failing that the USB key may not be bootable, and will need to be re-prepared with something like Rufus

Nick

SickBoy

Have you tried booting with that key on another machine to make sure it works?

It might be worth recreating the key using the official Microsoft USB Tool located here along with the version of Windows 7 you want to install from the following list.


Windows 7 Home Premium 32Bit: http://msft.digitalrivercontent.net/win/X17-58996.iso
Windows 7 Home Premium 64Bit: http://msft.digitalrivercontent.net/win/X17-58997.iso

Windows 7 Professional 32Bit: http://msft.digitalrivercontent.net/win/X17-59183.iso
Windows 7 Professional 64Bit: http://msft.digitalrivercontent.net/win/X17-59186.iso

Windows 7 Ultimate 32Bit: http://msft.digitalrivercontent.net/win/X17-59463.iso
Windows 7 Ultimate 64Bit: http://msft.digitalrivercontent.net/win/X17-59465.iso

Keggers2

Thanks for all the suggestions everyone, so as it turns out, the problem was actually with the fact that the guy who formatted the USB originally set it to FAT32. We just reformatted to NTFS here and now we're up and running!

Thanks again guys!