"New" Installation to Seagate 250GB Drive Fails after Install Steps

I am currently trying to install Windows 7 64-Bit onto a "new" (refurbished) drive I got for a decent price online. I was forced to use YUMI and create a USB Boot Drive which was working great after my Windows 7 DVD kept giving me the following error: "device driver missing"...

I booted into my original version of Windows 7... the reason we want to install on a new drive is because the current drive has been a bit shotty. You can see the images uploaded the versions of the hard drives (both Seagate Barracuda).

Old/Original Drive: ST3200827AS
New Drive: ST250DM000-1BD141 (Seagate 250GB) ... Picture of Drive Included

After booting up, it recognized the drive.. installed it.

So I shutdown, unhooked the original/old drive, left the new drive plugged in (even swapped to SATA 1 on an attempt), either way, the USB Loader/Installer located the drive, started to install perfectly, rebooted during the end of the install process, after 100% complete, I kept getting an error saying "Windows Cannot be Installed Onto This Hardware"... I'm sorry, I thought I took a picture of the error and had the error description verbatim... either way, it would say reboot to finish install, and it was like a continuous loop if I tried re-installing, it would get as far as the Windows Loading screen and just reboot the PC on me.

So as for now, I just hooked the original/older hard drive back up and everything is fine, and currently using the new(er) hard drive as just a secondary drive.... I was really hoping to install Windows 7 64 onto this drive.

Maybe there is something about this model of the Seagate Barracuda 250GB 7200RPM drive that I am not aware of, but I have never had issues like this.

I uploaded an image of the Bios version for the motherboard, it's an Intel D945GNT (99% sure what I read off the board). I downloaded the Intel firmware/driver updater, and nothing was found.

I apologize if I have overlooked something on the forums, I am curious to whether this drive is a MBR or GPT as I saw in another post. I would believe it is MBR (or whatever the most popular is). I am not trying to partition, I simply want to install Windows on a new drive, something I have done dozens of times, whether it was to install Windows 7 for someone who had Windows Vista or XP, or whatever... I formatted the drive in the Windows Installation Initial Setup. So I am just curious as to how it can recognize, install, and then give me some nonsense about not being able to install Windows because of some "hardware" issue, when the only different hardware is the hard drive, which obviously works fine as a secondary drive if needed... but not what I want

I hope someone can lend some assistance, it would be greatly appreciated, thanks!

Welcome to the forum. I am not clear the message you post refers to dvd driver thats needed what have you set the drive as in the bios ide mode or other? Why cant you use a dvd to do the install?

I couldn't use the DVD to install because of what it was stating above in image #1. It's not my system, I know it's a DVD drive, that's all.. I've got no idea if it has had any issues in the past or not. The USB Boot Installer method was working fine... until it finishes and tries to boot up, that is when I get the error that says "Windows cannot be installed to this hardware".... after the fact it's installed, then every time the PC boots, shows the Windows Logo cycling, it just reboots.

The only thing I could quite possibly be missing out on is that this is a 32 bit only board, where my idiocy could have come in to play and not noticed that the user's computer was running a 32 bit version of Windows. He has several computers, this is the newest of them all, a lot of them are old and still on XP. I wasn't the original tech to setup the computers in this office.

I'll know when I go back tomorrow, worse case scenario I order another cheap HD and try to install on that if I cannot get it onto this one, I will also try and install a 32 bit version of Win 7. The YUMI bootup thingie is pretty neat, it totally should and could get the job done... but maybe there is just something in regards to this HD I don't know about... but I've always been able to install operating systems without such odd issues.

I can post back tomorrow with what happens. The drive is a SATA drive, it is recognized as a SATA device in Windows as well as the bios, and I did not see any options to change it to IDE in the bios, nor would I switch it to IDE.

I'll literally poop my pants laughing if this is a 32 bit version system, but generally in the past the Installer tells you ASAP that you cannot install 64 on the system. Either way the drive can always be used as a backup, or I can try to install Windows onto it on a completely different system. Meh, one of many reasons I hate anything made by Intel... I personally stick to anything non-intel, mostly ASUS, Foxconn, and AMD chips.. because they've NEVER given me issues.

Okay so attempt #2 today, and I should have posted the original Error message verbatim as it read "Windows Setup Could Not configure Windows to run on this computer's Hardware." (Picture Included).


A Quick Google Search gave me a video from some guy who had the same issue, noticed he was using YUMI to USB Boot/Install as well. (Link Here). His steps are provided below, as when the error pops up.....


1. Hit SHIFT + F10 : Opens up Command Prompt
2. Changes Directories...... "cd.." basically back to his "C:"
Until he eventually cd..'s to "C:\windows\system32\oobe"
3. Once in the above directory, just type "msoobe" hit ENTER.

After that, the Windows 7 Installation Continues, and finishes... and boots you into your new installation.

I apologize for not searching this on google prior to the post, thankfully someone had the same issue and resolved it. I hope that this post can maybe document and assist others in the future.

If anyone knows more about the "msoobe" and "\oobe" directory then this post probably seems silly to them, but I had no idea regarding this. As for the PC I installed to, it now has two Windows 7 Installations, one on the old hard drive, and one on the new hard drive... we just hooked up the old hard drive for now since it has all the programs like QuickBooks, etc... and until timing is better I won't be able to finish really setting up the new Windows Installation on the "New(er)" hard drive... but I am glad that the drive works, I am glad that we were able to Install Windows 7 onto it, and now the fun part awaits where we will re-install all the office/work software that the company uses... until then.... thanks for having me, and I apologize again for any inconvenience. I always feel the more that is documented properly out there, questions, errors, are worthless unless the Resolution/Answer is attached... which is why I came back on. Cheers all :)

Is it a Sony Vaio? They sometimes have firmware that will only allow you to install on a disk that's an identical size to the former disk (been there, got the t shirt). And won't accept advanced format disks either. Although it;s unlikely to be Advanced format if it's a refurbished disk.

With the Sony Vaio - it would only accept recovery disks if the drive was the exact same size. It would accept a clean install of Windows but then it overheated drastically. I ended up buying a drive identical size and then I could install anything on it.

If it's not a Sony Vaio - ignore this lol.

@hazel123.... no it wasn't a Sony Vaio, it's some older Intel Board/Chipset. Luckily the lines of code above and the SHIFT + F10 which opens up Command Prompt with that error shown above, and it just bumps past the error and finishes the install, no issues... at least this time. I did have a weird error on another system, but after a 2nd installation attempt it worked fine. Now the fun part of getting users/clients to use their new hard drive/fresh OS since everyone feels like they'll lose their whole computer lives... not knowing they can re-install QuickBooks and MS Office or whatever few programs they use. As for personal stuff, it's all backed up on an external thumb drive, as are the QB backups...