Windows 10: Help, Windows 10 Pro not able to create install partition.

Yes that is where I had it, in my second PCIe Gen 3 X16 slot. The bios reported the device running Gen 3 X4.

Ak

 

No and the installer media will not install Windows 10 Pro onto a GPT drive.

Ak

 

There is something else you could try (I did this in one my attempts to install 10 on a MacBook although I forget why now). It is a bit more involved but it works (assuming your system will actually boot UEFI at all). Basically you just install Windows manually to a GPT formatted disk.

• Boot into another windows (or I guess WinPe would work).
• Create partitions on SSD manually with correct GUIDs using sample diskpart script from here Sample: Configure UEFI/GPT-Based Hard Drive Partitions by Using Windows PE and DiskPart. I changed the sizes to Windows 10 sizes here. Code: rem == Select correct disk for SSD here ============ select disk 2 clean convert gpt rem == Delete reserved partition if it is created == select partition 1 delete partition override rem == 1. Windows RE tools partition =============== create partition primary size=450 format quick fs=ntfs label="Windows RE tools" assign letter="T" set id="de94bba4-06d1-4d40-a16a-bfd50179d6ac" gpt attributes=0x8000000000000001 rem == 2. System partition ========================= create partition efi size=100 rem ** NOTE: For Advanced Format 4Kn drives, rem change this value to size = 260 ** format quick fs=fat32 label="System" assign letter="S" rem == 3. Microsoft Reserved (MSR) partition ======= create partition msr size=16 rem == 4. Windows partition ======================== rem == a. Create the Windows partition ========== create partition primary rem == b. Create space for the recovery image === shrink minimum=15000 rem ** NOTE: Update this size to match the size rem of the recovery image ** rem == c. Prepare the Windows partition ========= format quick fs=ntfs label="Windows" assign letter="W"[/quote]
• Expand-WindowsImage files from ISO .wim or .esd (assuming ISO is mounted at F drive and you want 10 Pro (index 1) to new C drive which is currently mounted at W. With Powershell Code: Expand-WindowsImage -ImagePath "F:\Sources\install.wim" -ApplyPath "W:" -Index 1[/quote]
• Copy boot files to EFI partition (you can change the en-US to some other locale if you want) (See BCDboot Command-Line Options) Code: C:\WINDOWS\system32>W: W:\>W:\Windows\System32\BCDBoot W:\Windows /l en-US /s S: /f UEFI[/quote]
• Shutdown and remove other drives.
• Restart should boot SSD as if from first reboot in clean install, finish install.
• Once you are booted into new OS on SSD check WinRE is correctly registered in partition 1 with reagent /info. It should be set up automatically by the installation. Code: C:\WINDOWS\system32>reagentc /info Windows Recovery Environment (Windows RE) and system reset configuration Information: Windows RE status: Enabled Windows RE location: \\?\GLOBALROOT\device\harddisk0\partition1\Recovery\WindowsRE Boot Configuration Data (BCD) identifier: 9c34aef3-9152-11e5-9c76-00155d013517 Recovery image location: Recovery image index: 0 Custom image location: Custom image index: 0 REAGENTC.EXE: Operation Successful.[/quote] If it isn't you can fix it as described here Deploy Windows RE

 

Just curious, why is it so evil to just install Windows 10 on the SSD partitioned as MBR?

 

I converted from mbr to gpt as I'm dual booting and having mbr (which I did originally) meant I had to manually keep the gpt (which OSX has to use) and mbr (which I was using for Windows) partition tables in sync. This was tiresome and pretty unreliable.

There is also the limit on the number of partitions (which could be annoying if you dual boot) and maximum size (which is probably not an issue for SSD). Allegedly booting is faster using UEFI (but I can't say I noticed and don't care if boot takes 2 seconds longer in any case).

 

Hi,

Question is, why Windows installs on that drive when it is in MBR mode but refuses to install when GPT.

Cheers, *Wink

 

I used MiniTool to convert the cloned GPT drive to MBR. I then tried booting with that MBR drive and had no luck. I unplugged all the other drives and tried the installer again. I was able to use it to delete all the partitions on that drive and Windows 10 PRO installed. I just finished with all the updates and I am now running 10586.29. I reconnected all the other drives and the system is booting fine. Now I just need to spend my weekend re-installing all my programs. :-(

Thanks for the MiniTool suggestion.
Ak