Windows 7 keeps rebooting over and over after fresh install

Hello all,

for the past few day I have been trying to reinstall my gf's computer ( ThinkPad Edge E530 -- 15" Small-Business Laptop from Lenovo | Lenovo (US) ) because it was filled with bloatware and was performing very poorly considering its specs. So I decided to do a clean install of windows 7 using the guide here on sevenforums and found a lot of very useful threads about what to do.

But after fresh install which went just fine the laptop just keeps rebooting over and over again. There are several things I think I might have done wrong but as a relative PC amateur (I did several W7 reinstallations before and encountered no problems) it takes me hours to explore each option and it might all be useless anyway so I would rather ask you guys for an advice.

1. I have a shady version of Windows. I have the OEM licence but the laptop only ships with the recovery medium which install all the useless bloatware which had me do the reinstall in the first place. The reason is that I wanted to install a Czech version of Windows but there is not such an option for download in the sevenforums guide so I searched on Czech sharing sites to find a supposedly working version.

2. During the reinstall I deleted all the partitions to create one big unallocated space but it also contained SYSTEM_DRV partition which I found out (before) that it contains files that help the system boot but also that it is not necessary when doing a clean reinstall. There was not much to be found and I might have screwed myself royaly because of this.

3. I found several resources about Windows 7 installation on UEFI (didn't even know what it was day ago) which is somehow different from the classical BIOS installation but the guides never specified it HAS to be done that way, it only seemed optional so I figured it's some advanced stuff. Is this something I should explore or it just doesn't matter?

4. It might just be a generic error which seems to happen to people from time to time. But there are always so many different solutions and it's all very confusing to sieve through.

There is an authorized Lenovo service nearby but it would cost money for them to get me the bloated version of Windows I don't want/that's why recovery wasn't an option in the first place either.

Do you have any idea about what to do? I will answer all questions and thank you so much for answering, I am rather desperate at the moment.

Gotter

New info: I did a UEFI install and I used the legit English version and it somehow works. I will try to install the Czech version again this time using the UEFI guide and will post back about how it went for people who maybe went through the same troubles as me. It's not exactly what I wanted but it's a start.

Did you read all the comments on the Czech download to make sure it was pristine with nothing added? Compare its size to the same version in English or another regional language.

If you want to install UEFI then you need to boot the installer as a UEFI Device. If you don't want UEFI then you can Bypass UEFI to Install WIn7.

If you delete all partitions in either case and start fresh then unless something is added or you handle the setup badly you still have the ability to do a perfect install similar to compiled in Clean Reinstall - Factory OEM Windows 7. You'll get and keep a perfect install to the exact extent you stick with the tools, methods and optimizations in that tutorial.

You were right gregrocker, it was the faulty version of Czech windows that caused the problem, when I followed the guide step by step, it worked flawlessly.