Clean install of Windows 7

Brumboy

Brumboy

Brumboy

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Basically yesterday and today I've had problems with my computer. It was something to do with the graphics card driver/aero/directx. I've tried multiple things to fix it but nothing worked. So my last resort is to do a clean install of windows 7.

I click custom (advanced) then it goes to the screen with the hard drive. I've got 1 partition called "Disk 0 Unallocated Space - Total Size 1862.9MB - Free Space 1862.9MB". Then nothing in the "type" column.

However when I highlight this drive there is no option to click next. All I have is refresh, load driver and drive options (advanced) and new. I click the "windows cannot be installed on this disk" and it says "Windows cannot be installed on this disk. The selected disk has an MBR partition table. On EFI systems, Windows can only be installed to GPT disks".

How on earth can I install Windows 7? This is so stressful!!!!!! On friday everything was working perfectly and now everything gone completely wrong lol
 
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Can someone please help? I'm stuck here with a completely useless computer at the moment. I cannot even install Windows 7. I cannot create partitions or do anything else at the moment it's just stuck at the install menu.

There must be a way around this surely?
 
Are you sure it is Mb in which case windows 7 will not install in 1.8Gb. You need to reformat the disk and remove existing disk partitions. An Ubuntu live DVD or memory stick would enable you to do this easily or a bootable partition manager. Alternatively hook it up to a mates PC and do it through disc manager in windows.

andy.
 
nkata said:
Are you sure it is Mb in which case windows 7 will not install in 1.8Gb. You need to reformat the disk and remove existing disk partitions. An Ubuntu live DVD or memory stick would enable you to do this easily or a bootable partition manager. Alternatively hook it up to a mates PC and do it through disc manager in windows.

andy.
Click to expand...

Yeah its definitely in mb. I've tried to create a 500gb partition but it won't let me. How can I completely reformat the drive? Is Ubuntu free and can I even install it?

A bootable partition manager would be good can you recommend any?

I do have a spare quad core windows 7 pc but I don't have a a usb to usb cable.
 
Rossuk89 said:
How do I access that though? I can only go into the windows 7 installation. There is no os installed. Just one partition which I can't install anything too. Do I access that through the bios?
Click to expand...

No, not through bios.
Boot the pc up with the win7 disk in. After you input your language settings etc, it opens a window that gives you the option of installing windows or repairing your computer.
Choose the repair option. Then on the next window select the top option "use recovery tools..."
The next window gives a list of tools to try and repair your pc.
Choose "Command Prompt"
Once that has opened, type in DISKPART.
From there you should be able to sort out your hard drive issues.
Use google to bone up on diskpart, it aint that hard to use, but i'm not so well versed in it that i could help you much further to be honest.
Also use the diskpart /? switch to get help on it from the dos screen.

Hope it helps. :)
 
Rossuk89 said:
Yeah its definitely in mb. I've tried to create a 500gb partition but it won't let me. How can I completely reformat the drive? Is Ubuntu free and can I even install it?
Click to expand...

Ubuntu is free and runs an operating system from the DVD drive


A bootable partition manager would be good can you recommend any?
Click to expand...

Acronis, gparted (free).


I do have a spare quad core windows 7 pc but I don't have a a usb to usb cable.
Click to expand...

Connect your drive directly to the internal SATA ports on the other PC
 
Banzai_Joe said:
No, not through bios.
Boot the pc up with the win7 disk in. After you input your language settings etc, it opens a window that gives you the option of installing windows or repairing your computer.
Choose the repair option. Then on the next window select the top option "use recovery tools..."
The next window gives a list of tools to try and repair your pc.
Choose "Command Prompt"
Once that has opened, type in DISKPART.
From there you should be able to sort out your hard drive issues.
Use google to bone up on diskpart, it aint that hard to use, but i'm not so well versed in it that i could help you much further to be honest.
Also use the diskpart /? switch to get help on it from the dos screen.

Hope it helps. :)
Click to expand...

It says the recovery disk I have isn't compatible with the windows version I have :confused:
 
I'm at the GParted desktop screen and it's got options to create partitions.

I want to create Partition 1 with 400GB for the OS/games/programs and Partition 2 for my data/media/video ect.

I go to create a partition but what file system do I use? the default is ext2 but there's also fat32 ect
 
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Rossuk89 said:
It says the recovery disk I have isn't compatible with the windows version I have :confused:
Click to expand...

Weird!!!
I tried a win7 disk on an XP laptop before i posted to make sure i knew what i was talking about and it was fine.

As for your other question you may get away with formatting in fat32, then converting to NTFS when you install windows 7
 
Banzai_Joe said:
As for your other question you may get away with formatting in fat32, then converting to NTFS when you install windows 7
Click to expand...

So I've create 2 partitions and both of them fat32. How do I convert to NTFS and what does that do?

Sorry for being stupid, I don't really have much knowledge on this stuff!

Oh now Windows is installing on the 400GB partition yes!!! Omg finally haha. This was stressing me out but hopefully this solves everything.

If this fails and then it must be a hardware problem.

Thanks everyone for the help, I'll post if I encounter any problems!
 
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You're not being stupid mate, don't be concerned about that. We all start somewhere.
Once you're partitions are created correctly, windows wil probably just reformat in NTFS when you choose which partition to install it onto.
Once windows is installed you can convert the other partition(s) to NTFS, actually in windows itself.
NTFS has been the file format of choice since XP.
If you're really interested to know just google fat32 v ntfs.
 
I've installed Windows 7 and everything seems fine so far. Installing all the drivers and windows updates right now, hopefully it goes smoothly. I'm trying to remember all the programs I had before, I should have noted that down before reformatting my computer argh!
 
Banzai_Joe said:
You're not being stupid mate, don't be concerned about that. We all start somewhere.
Once you're partitions are created correctly, windows wil probably just reformat in NTFS when you choose which partition to install it onto.
Once windows is installed you can convert the other partition(s) to NTFS, actually in windows itself.
NTFS has been the file format of choice since XP.
If you're really interested to know just google fat32 v ntfs.
Click to expand...

Cheers! I've done fat32, hopefully that doesn't mean anything bad!
 
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