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(long story) Alright, so I have had this same exact harddrive for a while, and out of nowhere, I get a message: Microsoft Windows has stopped responding. I think, oh ****! I gotta restart it! And so I hard-restart it and now windows won't load. I get the bios, but not the OS. So I try to save my files and reinstall windows7 by using a linux usb to save my stuff, except that doesnt work. So I accept my fate, use GParted to format the partition to NTFS and then I restart and boot up from the windows install disc. And I go to install windows on the empty partition (also I guess I should mention there is another partition that's 100mb and says sytem reserved, I never touched that one) and I get this and I quote "Windows cannot be installed to this disk. The selected disk has an MBR partition table. On EFI systems, Windows can only be installed to GPT disks." and thats it. And the weird thing is, I installed win7 on that SAME harddrive before with now problems. So did my Hard drive poop out on me? Is windows just being a butt? Help pls, I NEED my computer, I am in a programming for game design class and I need my PC in order to make my end of the year project. (Oh, I guess I should also mention I am currently using a Lubuntu usb stick to type this... if that is relevant at all...) Oh, and the windows version is 7 ultimate.
Locked Question. This question was migrated from the Microsoft Support Community. You can vote on whether it's helpful, but you can't add comments or replies or follow the question.
You must delete each partition during setup:
Boot from the Windows 7 DVD
Click Install Now
Accept License Agreement
When the option is displayed to select an installation type, click (Custom Advanced)
Click Drive Options
Select the drive/s click Delete
Click New
Click Apply
Click OK
Click Format and click Next to proceed with the installation
ok so i found this link when i looked up the error code:
Yes, that is the way to do it, the fastest and easiest way to do it, as instructed in the first reply to your question. There is no need to use third party tools to install any Windows version, and you don't really need to know how any of it works, you just tell the Windows setup program to delete everything on the disk and then create a new partition for the new installation.
John
You can use your Linux tools and remove both partition types or let the Windows setup program take care of it. With basic MBR disks it's pretty simple you just need to zero out the first sector on the disk (sector 0) and that is all there is to it. With GPT disks sector 0 is reserved as a protective MBR and sector 1 is the GPT Header, the partition table follows on sector 2 and the following 32 sectors are reserved by the GPT so the first usable sector on the drive is sector 34, you need to wipe out the first 34 sectors to wipe out the GPT structure. There is also a duplicate backup GPT header and partition table at the end of the disk so you also have to wipe the last 34 sectors on the disk. Zeroing out the first hundred sectors is easy to do and sure to take care of the structures at the beginning of the disk but to zero out the last sectors you have to know the exact size of the disk and do some calculations to tell the wipe utility where to start , so now you understand why it's easier to use a disk tool which is GPT aware to remove the GPT structures. You could also zero out the whole disk but that could take quite a bit of time!
Once you zero out the GPT disk structures I recommend that you not use your Linux tools to initialize the disk and create new partitions, just leave the disk as is and let the Windows setup program initialize the disk and create and format the partitions, with the disk structures zeroed out the setup program will see the disk as new virgin one. During the initialization the Windows setup program will install the Microsoft MBR code and signature to the disk. The 100MB reserved partition will be created by the setup program when you install Windows. Also note that I always recommend that only Windows tools be used to format NTFS partitions, it is a proprietary file system and there are minor changes between different versions, it is not always clear which NTFS version is released with a particular Windows version and it is not always clear what may be different in a newer version. I would never use a third party tool to install an NTFS file system on a partition and I strongly advise others not to do so also.
Whether or not to use BIOS or UEFI boot is up to you, Windows 7 can be booted from both, unless your boot disk is bigger than 2TB you don't really need to use UEFI. If your computer is UEFI compliant you can go in the BIOS and select whether to use BIOS or UEFI boot scheme.
These may be helpful:
John
Ok, so I deleted all partitions and I was able to click the next button to start the install... then I got this: "Windows could not format a partition on disk 0. The error occured while preparing the partition selected for installation. Error code: 0x80070057" so... now what?
thank you for such a detailed response. Just one question: define zeroing out... but what I think you are saying is to delete the parition i made with gparted as well as the system partition amd then instal win7 like normal... do i have that right?
