Unsolved
This post is more than 5 years old
6 Posts
0
13753
Cannot install Windows 10 Optiplex 7040 SFF
I just bought a new 7040 SFF. Did not notice that it came with Win 7 on the (only) PCIe 256GB SSD on the system.
What I did was I put my old data Seagate HDD (SATA) into the spare 3.5" bay, pop the Dell supplied Win 10 DVD in and restart, chose reset PC thinking it will be onto the SSD.
How stupid I was, it installed Win 10 onto that 1.5TB Seagate drive.
So then I removed the Seagate drive. The system then restart back to Win 7 on SSD drive.
I shut down, pop Win 10 DVD in, change BIOS to UEFI this time. Restart the PC to DVD boot.
But it cannot install Win 10 this time (onto the SSD)
If I choose Recover from a Drive. It says Unable to reset your PC. The system drive cannot be found
If I choose Rest this PC. It says: Unable to reset your PC. A required drive partition is missing
I went on online chat support but the guy didnt have a clue so technician will come with a new DVD and a new SSD (which I dont think was the problem as Win 7 runs just fine).
But I hope I can get some advice here and sort it out before anyone comes which will take at least 2 days.
I came across this article but still not solved. I disable all SATA sockets, except the DVD drive as it must be on in order to read the DVD!
Saltgrass
3 Apprentice
3 Apprentice
•
4.3K Posts
0
November 30th, 2016 06:00
A question comes up as to why a new system would come with Win 7. I assume since Dell sent the Win 10 Install media the system is approved to run it.
As you have noticed, Win 7 was probably not installed as UEFI, although it could have been. If you are trying to install as UEFI on a MBR configured drive, you need to remove all prior partitions during the install so the drive can be changed to GPT for the UEFI install.
A question might come up regarding activation but if the system is UEFI it probably has the License in the bios or if you have the Windows 7 license you can use it during a clean install, if necessary. First try without putting in a license when it asks for one.
Any messages you get during the install might help.
Edit: Other things to mention. If you do a clean install you will loose some of the OEM utilities unless you can reinstall them.
UEFI requires an x64 OS. If your install media is 32 bit it won't boot as the UEFI configuration.
speedstep
9 Legend
9 Legend
•
47K Posts
0
November 30th, 2016 10:00
Windows 7 cannot install over the top of a windows 10 Partition. It also cannot remove a windows 10 partition. You would have to use Diskpart to remove all partitions and then you would have to integrate the NVME drivers and AHCI drivers into the BOOT.WIM and INSTALL.WIM or it will fail to "see" any drives to install on. Advanced Format Drives REQUIRE AHCI aka F6 drivers. SSD's and NVME drives are Advanced format AHCI drives with 4k SECTORS not 512e sectors.
WINDOWS 10 ALSO requires F6 drivers
http://www.dell.com/support/home/us/en/19/Drivers/DriversDetails?driverId=28J5R&fileId=3514149966&osCode=W764&productCode=optiplex-7040-desktop&languageCode=EN&categoryId=SA
How to install Windows 7 on OptiPlex 7040
rdunnill
6 Professor
6 Professor
•
8.8K Posts
0
November 30th, 2016 20:00
I think the OP wants to install Windows 10, not Windows 7
I put an 850 1tb in my 9010 SFF and it did not need F6 drivers. Heck, the Win10 install on it had been created for an Asus P8P67-M Pro, and it still booted and activated.
speedstep
9 Legend
9 Legend
•
47K Posts
1
December 1st, 2016 05:00
The chipset in a 9010 Sandy Bridge INTEL 7 series is years behind the 7040 Intel® 100 Series/C230 Series Chipset Family SATA AHCI and other Skylake Chipset systems. You cant compare the two. There is NO ATA mode for sata operation in the 7040. These F6 drivers are not native to windows 7 or 8 or 10. AHCI advanced format drives REQUIRE F6 drivers.
Windows will not "see" the drive without the INTEL RST 15.2.0.1020 F6 drivers Mass Storage Drivers for WIN7 WIN8 WIN10
https://downloadcenter.intel.com/download/26361/
Update:
Version: 15.5.0.1051 (Latest) Date: 4/13/2017
https://downloadcenter.intel.com/download/26730/
Installs the Intel® Rapid Storage Technology (Intel® RST) driver version 15.5.0.1051 with Intel® Optane™ Memory support.
Contains the standalone Intel Optane Memory pack.
This driver supports RAID 0, 1, 5, and 10. The driver should be installed after the operating system has been installed. F6 and RAID BIOS configurations need to be performed prior to installation of this driver for proper operation. This driver supports NVMe devices.
Platforms supported
Intel® 200 Series Chipset Family SATA AHCI/RAID Controller
7th Generation Intel® Core™ Processor Family Platform I/O SATA AHCI/RAID Controller
Intel® 100 Series/C230 Series Chipset Family SATA AHCI/RAID Controller
6th Generation Intel® Core™ Processor Family Platform I/O SATA AHCI/RAID Controller
Platforms supported for Intel Optane Memory:
Intel® 200 Series Chipset Family SATA AHCI/RAID Controller - Q270, Z270, H270, Q250, B250
7th generation Intel® Core™ Processor Family Platform I/O SATA AHCI/RAID Controller- Premium U
Intel® 100 Series/C230 Series Chipset Family SATA AHCI/RAID Controller - HM175, QM175, CM238
For Intel Platforms not supported above, visit the RAID version 14.8.0.
Which file to choose?
For RST and Optane
SetupRST.exe - Provides multiple language files.
Optional: One of the following F6 Driver Diskettes (depending on your operating system):
f6flpy-x86.zip - For 32-bit versions of the operating system
f6flpy-x64.zip - For 64-bit versions of the operating system
For only Optane
SetupOptaneMemory.exe - Provides multiple language files.
Saltgrass
3 Apprentice
3 Apprentice
•
4.3K Posts
0
December 1st, 2016 05:00
I agree, if the install is done using UEFI, the drivers for the M.2 should be available. But it does depend on whether the Bios is capable.
I don't have a Dell system with a M.2 PCIe drive option but I do have an ASUS motherboard and it originally would not do NVMe drivers but about a year ago the Bios was upgraded. I am waiting on my Samsung 960 Pro, which now won't be available until Jan., so I can test it.
There is a driver available for the Samsung drives, which needs to be loaded after the install and will place a Controller for the drive on the system.
BobLe
6 Posts
0
December 1st, 2016 15:00
I solved my problem, sort of.
And I am surprised at how little people (including tech support and people on this forum) know about the issue with Windows 10 and NVME SSD
What I did was:
- I downloaded Windows 10 from Microsoft (Win 10 Media Creation Tool), load them on to a USB3 thumbdrive
- Boot the PC with Dell DVD, then use command prompt to run Diskpart to CLEAN the SSD and CONVERT GPT
- Reboot the PC with the USB thumbdrive. Windows 10 installed smoothly onto the NVMe SSD. I didn't have to load ANY DRIVER. Win10 USB recognized the SSD straight away.
A side note: this LiteOn PCIe SSD is a TRUE MONSTER in speed, together with the i7 6700 and 32GB RAM, Win 10 installation took just 10 minutes and few seconds until I get to a usable desktop!
- I then use the supplied Dell resource DVD to install all the included drivers and job done
Now back to the old issue. After I have a smoothly running Win 10 installed onto the SSD system drive, I gave the DELL Win 10 DVD another chance - I boot from that DVD and tried to "Reset the PC" and "Recover from a drive" with the target disc/OS is the Win 10 installed before - the DELL DVD still gave the same error message.
rdunnill
6 Professor
6 Professor
•
8.8K Posts
0
December 1st, 2016 22:00
I haven't tried an NVMe SSD, but it makes sense that the latest Win10 installer is more compatible with them.
For some reason, some SSDs are not compatible with older versions of Windows 10. Once, I had to image an SSD to a hard drive, upgrade the hard drive image, and then image it back to the SSD, because the upgrade would not boot on the SSD.
speedstep
9 Legend
9 Legend
•
47K Posts
0
December 2nd, 2016 03:00
They added more drivers than Windows 10 1511 currently has.
In future posting its not enough to say "windows 10" without saying the exact build.
Windows 10 1607 has had tons of updates since august.
November 9, 2016—KB3200970 (OS Build 14393.448)
November 8, 2016—KB3200970 (OS Build 14393.447)
October 27, 2016—KB3197954 (OS Build 14393.351)
October 11, 2016—KB3194798 (OS Build 14393.321)
September 29, 2016 — KB3194496 (OS Builds 14393.222)
September 20, 2016 — KB3193494 (OS Builds 14393.187 and 14393.189)
September 13, 2016 — KB3189866 (OS Builds 14393.187 and 14393.189)
August 31, 2016 — KB3176938 (OS Build 14393.105)
August 23, 2016 — KB3176934 (OS Build 14393.82)
August 9, 2016 — KB3176495 (OS Build 14393.51)
August 2, 2016 — KB3176929 (OS Build 14393.10)
Microsoft is aware of a booting detection problem and released a UEFI update to address it. Microsoft has changed the detection logic in the update to prevent additional customers from being affected.
Applies to
Disable automatic Windows updates.(Home users are out of luck)
To install the November 2016 Rollup or Security Update MS16-140 after updating the UEFI code, customers will need to download the updates manually directly from Microsoft instead of using windows Update.
Do not install the Microsoft Windows Server 2016, 2012R2 or 2012 November update before applying fixed UEFI firmware as specified.
Replacing the system board will not fix the issue.
This also means that sometimes updates or upgrades will fail with a blinking cursor and will be unable to be repaired but rather will require a clean install.
rdunnill
6 Professor
6 Professor
•
8.8K Posts
0
May 8th, 2017 19:00
I got Windows 10 Pro 1607 onto my 7040 in a 'roundabout' fashion.
Last year, I had upgraded a homebuilt 1150 4590 to 1511. Last night I upgraded the install to 1607 and then cloned the install to a 2.5 hard drive which I installed into my 7040 SFF. It booted, and installed most of the drivers, and the Windows desktop was up, I installed Dell System Detect and installed the rest.
With the drivers properly installed, I booted to Pen Drive Linux (Ubuntu) and imaged the hard drive install to the Samsung 960 EVO 1tb NVME device. Afterwards, I disabled the 2.5 hard drive in the BIOS and rebooted. Windows 10 automatically corrected the boot settings and now the 7040 SFF is up and running on its new NVME, with Windows 10.