I have an E6520 Dell laptop that I have had to replace the SSD hardrive. I'm trying to install Windows 7 Pro from DVD. It goes through the initial boot and I can select the set-up button, but it comes back and says I don't have a CD installed. Do I need to get drivers? How would I install them without an OS?
Hello mate well personally I would get a friend or relative to download the driver for what you wnat onto a stick and install it from that.
Having said that is could just be a bad optical drive - see if it is recognised in the BIOS.
Thanks. I think I will have to resort to that. The BIOS does recognize it. I do have an external Dell DVD drive and a port to plug it into, but do you know how I can get that as a recognized drive to boot from in the BIOS?
Does other bootable DVD's work in your DVD player. This information should let us know if your home made DVD is made correctly.
I have only use Microsoft DVD's to install Windows and I don't remember seeing a
(set-up button).
This is a Tutorial by Brink that will guide you through a Clean Install. Take a good slow read through it.
Clean Install Windows 7
These are just some thoughts of mine.
ICIT2LOL knows more about laptops than I do, so I'm sure he will have some more ideas.
I have never owned one.
Hum well if it is recognised in the BIOS you should be able to choose it as the first boot, and in any case if the hard drive is blank (unallocated) and there are no USB sticks in the machine should automatically look for a boot source and the DVD being the only one there it should boot from it and begin the install.
Now the Windows as you replied to Layback Bear was from Microsoft via where because I wasn't aware that they were still selling it.
Plus as layback has said does the optical drive work with any other boot source disk? for example you could try this if you have access to another machine.
BOOTABLE UBUNTU
Make a bootable Ubuntu disk Get Ubuntu | Download | Ubuntu
Set the BIOS to boot from the optical when the machine boots it will show you a screen with TRY or INSTALL > select TRY not INSTALL
When it is finished - it takes very little time you will get a screen like in the pic .
But do not click on install just TRY it will boot into it's own environment and the machine need not even have a hard drive in it so don't worry that it will affect that.
Now if this boots then it is the Windows media you have being wrong in some way because I must admit I have never seen a "set up button" either. If it does not boot then the optical drive is either bad or may need reseating/replacing and by the way the machine has an internal optical drive?
You can try a bootable USB flash drive for the Windows install.
- Create an ISO of the Windows DVD
- Insert a flash drive (probably min 16GB)
- Download and run Rufus
- Set the pull down to ISO Image
- Click the icon and browse to the ISO file you created
- Set the the pull down for either an MBR boot (for traditional BIOS) or UEFI if you need to create a secure boot (Leave the File system and Cluster size at whatever Rufus assigns as default values)
- Make sure the drive letter is set to the flash driver you want to write. Click Start
- Now use it to boot your machine and do the install. To boot from USB, use the HP boot menu (Should be hit F10 on the HP flash screen to get the boot menu). Select USB boot
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