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Ok, so I was trying to do a windows 7 reinstall and it stopped working within 5 min. Now, when I try to find a partition to install it on, it cant find any. I have checked. My hard drive is wipped clean. There are no drives on it. What can I do?
Did you contact your computer vendor? You said it was a reinstall?
Technically, in Windows shell (aka, old dos black screen lingo- fdisk) you need to partition your hard drive and and then do a low level format of at least one partition to accept the operating system information being written to it. This low level formatting is where the hardware BIOS assigns the disk drive a letter. You may already know this.
My point: the Windows 7 installing media, should do this basic partitioning and formatting of the basic partition during the installing process, and at about the 5 minute point, it should then start to transfer the operating system to your newly formatted partition which your BIOS should be calling the C:/ drive. Again you may already know this.
It gets complicated when the medium you are reinstalling from is on a hidden partition on your sole and single hard drive (you're not installing from a bootable CD or DVD.) It is possible in the re-installing process to delete the re-installing hidden partition where the Microsoft OS installing software is compressed. If that is the case, you must contact your Vendor for a replacement Microsoft DVD (if your vendor user-support provides them) or go buy a boxed edition of Windows 7 out of your own pocket (being extra positive sure the box you buy includes installing media.) Sometimes, your computer has a sticker for the Windows 7 long license string of letters and numbers, so all you need is the installing DVD media.
If you are so inclined, you could always try a Linux distribution which are free for downloading, or a few dollars for a bootable installing DVD. (About 100 different distributions, I can send you a link by DM.) Way big learning curve to get your computer up and operating. Not for the faint of heart.
******************** be aware **************
The above presumes, of course, that the original problem you were trying to fix with re-installing wasn't a bad hard drive. If your hard drive is failing, and your BIOS setup doesn't recognize your system has a hard drive installed, you will get the same no C:\ drive error. Once again, you may already know this. You should boot to setup, and check the hard drive is installed and the BIOS can see it.
Good luck. Maybe someone else can offer help on this City-Data site, but you should seek out help from your computer vendor's help desk.
Technically, in Windows shell (aka, old dos black screen lingo- fdisk) you need to partition your hard drive and and then do a low level format of at least one partition to accept the operating system information being written to it. This low level formatting is where the hardware BIOS assigns the disk drive a letter. You may already know this.
First, this is not required, hasn't been since at least Win2k, second, that was not a low level format.
Ok, so I was trying to do a windows 7 reinstall and it stopped working within 5 min. Now, when I try to find a partition to install it on, it cant find any. I have checked. My hard drive is wipped clean. There are no drives on it. What can I do?
We need more info, make/model of PC, type of installation media your using, why did you feel the need for a reinstall?
It is a HP g71 329wm. 64bit I have tried windows 7, vista, xp and even ubuntu. No operating system works. It needed a reinstall because the drives were corrupt.
It is a HP g71 329wm. 64bit I have tried windows 7, vista, xp and even ubuntu. No operating system works. It needed a reinstall because the drives were corrupt.
If the drive had not mechanically failed, if it was just the mbr and no OS you tried you tried was successful to re-partition or re-format it, you might want to give Ultimate Boot CD a shot. Try running a low level format (zero write) if all else fails.
I would also recommend visiting the drive's manufacturer's web site as almost all brand name drive manufacturer has free disk tools to do almost any maintenance work on a disk.
For example: MaxBlast5 for Maxtor drives. Seagate took over Maxtor but still, if you have a Maxtor drive use MaxBlast. If you have some other brand, then visit manufacturer's web site and search for free drive tools under "support" section.
If the drive had not mechanically failed, if it was just the mbr and no OS you tried you tried was successful to re-partition or re-format it, you might want to give Ultimate Boot CD a shot. Try running a low level format (zero write) if all else fails.
I would also recommend visiting the drive's manufacturer's web site as almost all brand name drive manufacturer has free disk tools to do almost any maintenance work on a disk.
For example: MaxBlast5 for Maxtor drives. Seagate took over Maxtor but still, if you have a Maxtor drive use MaxBlast. If you have some other brand, then visit manufacturer's web site and search for free drive tools under "support" section.
Good luck.
What download should I get on the ultimate boot cd site?
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