Help installing ... Windows 11

SPARC · 2025-09-28T18:30:03+0100

Not a problem I thought I would ever have ...

I don't have any Windows os systems in my house. I run Mint and Fedora. I'm brand new to Linux and so far it's been fine although I'm still learning a lot and have a lot to learn.
My mum has an issue with her laptop and since it was on W10 I thought I would update it to W11. The laptop is failing to boot so I've managed to grab some of the files she wanted to keep before I wipe and fresh install.

Problem is ...

How the f do I get this W11 iso onto a bootable USB drive?

So far I've tried Fedora Media Writer - This looked like it worked just fine but I can't boot from it. Then I tried BalenaEtcher - This gives me a warning before flashing that the media does not contain a partition table and sure enough it's not bootable. Then I tried Ventoy which was fun because I learned how to extract a tar.gz and run a .sh file from terminal. This was promising. Popped the iso onto the USB drive and it booted. Selected wimboot and bam, here we go. Woohoo! Success ... NOT!

Why? I can't get passed this screen.

The only other thing which I can think of is running Rufus via Lutris but I don't even know if that will work.

I also tried Virtualbox with the same iso but I can't get the USB drive to attach to the VM. My thinking was to use Rufus in a VM but even though I Installed the Virtualbox extension pack it doesn't list my USB drive. The W11 iso installed just fine which is anoying.

Anyone got other ideas?

I'm starting to think I'm missing something really obvious but since I'm pretty green with Linux I have no idea. I'm going to keep reading and trying. If I had a windows machine it would be rufus and done.

aaronyuri · 2025-09-28T18:38:19+0100

Is the laptop's SATA configuration set to RAID? Check that. You likely don't have the RAID driver in the default Win 11 ISO.

SPARC · 2025-09-28T18:53:08+0100

aaronyuri said:
Is the laptop's SATA configuration set to RAID? Check that. You likely don't have the RAID driver in the default Win 11 ISO.

Set to AHCI

SPARC · 2025-09-28T21:14:23+0100

So I got Rufus almost working via Wine. It doesn't recognise any usb drives I plug in though.

It's changed days boys, I'm so far finding it impossible to install Windows. :cry:

Giving up for tonight because I'm out of ideas.

hornetstinger · 2025-09-28T21:34:47+0100

Disable secure boot?
CSM mode?

I think some BIOS have option to protect the HD or something like that

Earth[Tera].bin · 2025-09-28T22:05:39+0100

IRS, intel rapid storage drivers maybe ? .. download them and pop them on a usb stick and browse to the files , or see if you can disable it in the bios. IRS or VMD controller etc.

Funnily enough I've had this before too, usually when I've created a Windows disc via rpi-imager or even dropping the iso into Ventoy.

I usually have a Windows VM I fail back on to create the iso using Rufus.

Manbatius · 2025-09-28T22:40:57+0100

As above, this is to do with the type of drive installing too, possibly need the right storage driver. Difficult to say without knowing drive.

Oh chatgpt says "you may need to download the storage driver from your motherboard manufacturer"

It is an odd one mind, I've done loads of windows installs over the years and not seen this.

deviation · 2025-09-28T22:46:17+0100

Whenever I've had this happen before, it's been because the USB installer is setup for the wrong HDD/SSD partition, i.e. MBR/GUID, and you sods law end up having the USB setup to the opposite
I've had this exact issue with MBR/GUID with both Windows and Linux.
Rufus, gives you the option to make the USB installer either MBR/GUID, via a dropdown.

I have had Linux based USB flash driver installers, cause problems like this before, so I've always caved and done it in Windows natively on another machine.

aaronyuri · 2025-09-29T00:28:27+0100

deviation said:
Whenever I've had this happen before, it's been because the USB installer is setup for the wrong HDD/SSD partition, i.e. MBR/GUID, and you sods law end up having the USB setup to the opposite
I've had this exact issue with MBR/GUID with both Windows and Linux.
Rufus, gives you the option to make the USB installer either MBR/GUID, via a dropdown.

I have had Linux based USB flash driver installers, cause problems like this before, so I've always caved and done it in Windows natively on another machine.

The partition table shouldn't affect the visibility of the drive, though. You should at least see the drive and be able to delete the existing partition(s) as GPT and MBR can coexist just fine.

@op you can enter command prompt using Shift-F10 during Windows setup, then run diskpart and list disk to see if any drives are detected. If the list is blank, then you're short of a driver. You can find the driver required and slipstream it into the install, manually copy it to the USB, or connect another external device and install it that way.

deviation · 2025-09-29T07:39:31+0100

aaronyuri said:
The partition table shouldn't affect the visibility of the drive, though. You should at least see the drive and be able to delete the existing partition(s) as GPT and MBR can coexist just fine.

It definitely can, this was a known issue when putting Windows onto older Macs. The minute you used a MBR USB installer, Windows would find the HDD/SSD. But never with GUID, despite Macs using EFI/GUID long before Windows.

Also FWIW, on Windows PC's, I've had the same issue when using a MBR installer of Linux on a GUID partitioned drive, it's caused the exact same issue when installing, it cannot see the drive. Yet I change it to GUID in Rufus, and redo the USB installer, and it works everytime

SPARC · 2025-09-29T11:15:20+0100

aaronyuri said:
The partition table shouldn't affect the visibility of the drive, though. You should at least see the drive and be able to delete the existing partition(s) as GPT and MBR can coexist just fine.

@op you can enter command prompt using Shift-F10 during Windows setup, then run diskpart and list disk to see if any drives are detected. If the list is blank, then you're short of a driver. You can find the driver required and slipstream it into the install, manually copy it to the USB, or connect another external device and install it that way.

Thanks lads. I'm back at it again with Ventoy since it got me the furthest.

I've done shift-F10 diskpart and list disk which is showing me Disk 0 online 238GB and Disk 1 online 58GB (this is obv my USB drive)

So it can see the drives.

Is there no Rufus alternative for Linux becuase I heavily suspect it's just like @deviation has said.

If there is no alternative then I'm going to have to speak to one of our IT staff at work tomorrow and ask if I can borrow their machine to use Rufus. I'm sure if I explain what I'm doing they will understand. They all seem like a nice bunch of guys anyway.

Imagine in 2025 we still don't have a live Windows we can run and install.

What a pain in the arse!

SPARC · 2025-09-29T11:17:06+0100

Also, I'm sorry to have dirtied the Linux area with my Windows chat but it's because I don't have Windows that this has happened.

SPARC · 2025-09-29T11:55:51+0100

hornetstinger said:
Disable secure boot?
CSM mode?

I think some BIOS have option to protect the HD or something like that

Secure Boot is disabled
CSM disabled
Fast boot was enabled. I disabled it to test and I still end up on that install driver screen

deviation · 2025-09-29T12:02:03+0100

SPARC said:
Thanks lads. I'm back at it again with Ventoy since it got me the furthest.

I've done shift-F10 diskpart and list disk which is showing me Disk 0 online 238GB and Disk 1 online 58GB (this is obv my USB drive)

So it can see the drives.

Is there no Rufus alternative for Linux becuase I heavily suspect it's just like @deviation has said.

If there is no alternative then I'm going to have to speak to one of our IT staff at work tomorrow and ask if I can borrow their machine to use Rufus. I'm sure if I explain what I'm doing they will understand. They all seem like a nice bunch of guys anyway.

Imagine in 2025 we still don't have a live Windows we can run and install.

What a pain in the arse!

Yep, did you by any chance use BalenaEtcher? As that caused me the same exact issue, regardless of me using it on Windows, Mac or Linux - it was rubbish for making Windows installers, and often cocked up Linux too and caused the aforementioned issue!
Many hours were wasted because of that app!

Yeah, just bite the bullet and borrow someones Windows PC and use Rufus, it never fails, and will grant you some bonus options just before you start making the USB

such as removing the requirement for TPM/Secureboot/Online account, etc etc

So it's worth it.
I just keep a USB drive spare with a Rufus Windows installer in a draw

It's worth buying any cheap USB stick to save yourself future hassle!

SPARC · 2025-09-29T12:16:54+0100

Yup, BalenaEtcher, Fedora Media Writer and the one which comes with Mint, Image writer I think it's called.
At least BalenaEtcher said to me "This probably wont work" so I give it that.
Ventoy at least got me as far as the screen above.

deviation · 2025-09-29T16:06:08+0100

SPARC said:
Yup, BalenaEtcher, Fedora Media Writer and the one which comes with Mint, Image writer I think it's called.
At least BalenaEtcher said to me "This probably wont work" so I give it that.
Ventoy at least got me as far as the screen above.

I knew it!
Yeah FMW gave me the same issues, as did Mint's! The TLDR is, all 3 claim that they can do it, but infact cant.