Inspiron 15R SE 7520 Windows 8 Reinstallation

Hello,

I recently upgraded to Windows 10 from Windows 8.1. I attempted to reset my computer, so that I had a fresh install of Windows 10. Long story short, my computer ended up in an endless reboot sequence followed by the error: INACCESSABLE_BOOT_DEVICE. After hours of searching online and troubleshooting (I am not the most technologically savvy person, mind you) I gave up and decided to call Dell tech support. Dell tech support did some very basic troubleshooting, then gave me a re-installation disk of Windows 8 and kicked me to the curb with no further support (unless I paid a 'low' one-time free of $129.99 :thumb. I now have the installation CD, but fixing my PC is not that simple. I am attempting to re-install Windows 8, but I have a number of partitions and for all of them I get the message "Windows cannot be installed to this disk. The selected disk is of the GPT partition style" or something similar. I have read a few other people on these forums with the same computer that have eluded to how much of a headache having an SSD and HDD in the same computer along with all of these partitions is. I don't know what to do next to get my computer to work. I appreciate any help I can get from the community. Thank you

If my previous post isn't clear enough - I can't even get into my OS. When I try to use the reset/refresh utility it says my the hardrive my operating system is on is locked or the partition needed is missing. I am trying to reinstall windows using the setup utility and then clicking through to the custom segment. Then it pops up with various partitions and asks me where I want it installed. It won't let me install it on any partition. Do I need a specific driver or something? I have tried downloading drivers from Dell and putting them on a USB, but I can't figure out how to get them installed also. I am just shooting in the dark. Thank you

once you get to the "partitions" screen
click on and delete every partition..

then point the installation to the unallocated disk space

Hi KYHI, just to clarify the disc is a reinstallation disc of windows 8. Will it still be okay to delete the partitions and do what you instructed? Thank you for your help!

you can also use the windows 8.1 setup media,
downloaded from here > Create installation media for Windows 8.1 - Windows Help
No longer any need to install Windows 8

Thank you so much for your help, I will do that tonight. Do you have any idea why it is saying my drives are all locked, etc...? Just curious.

due to a pending operation.. be it a restore, startup repair or whatever..

Use could also > while on the INSTALL screen
press SHIFT + F10 and bring up a Command Prompt
Type> Diskpart
Type> Select disk 0
Type> Clean

Close command prompt and continue with installation

This will also clear your HDD

Hey KYHI, it worked, but I did windows 10 instead of 8. I am having a problem where many of my devices are not being recognized like Intel Rapid Storage Techology, etc.. Is this as simple as installing the drivers? My computer still have to boot in legacy mode under ACHI. Thanks

if you clean installed - then yes you may have to download drivers

For people configuring their PCs for the first time all by themselves, an error message like “Windows cannot be installed on this Disk” can be a big time problem. One, the message explains little about its cause and second, most of us don’t really have a lot of experience in setting up systems. The problem, however, is not as elephantine as it seems. It is simply a compatibility issue. This problem generally occurs when you try to install windows on a UEFI-based system while your hard drive partition scheme does not support UEFI.

The agreement between the firmware and the hard disk partition scheme is essential for locating the boot loader for the Operating System and hence, is the first step in the installation process of windows on a computer system. By default, recent hardware boot using UEFI mode. Thus, when one tries to use an old hard disk with an updated UEFI-based system, the message “Windows Cannot be Installed On this device” pops up. This is because old hard drives maintain partitions using MBR scheme which is not supported in UEFI-based systems. Therefore, for windows installation it is important to convert either MBR partition scheme to GPT partition scheme or configure the system to boot with the legacy BIOS-compatibility mode.

You can use a freeware AOMEI Partition Assistant to convert disk between MBR and GPT without data loss.

Or you could just > while on the INSTALL screen
press SHIFT + F10 and bring up a Command Prompt
Type> Diskpart
Type> Select disk 0
Type> Clean

Close command prompt and continue with installation

This will also clear your HDD

THanks mysery126. I continue to have to boot into legacy mode. I will read into what you were saying more, because I do not completely follow. I am also trying to get my computer to work on "Intel Rapid Start Technology" mode in my sata bios setup. Any clue on how this works? Do I have to reintall my OS on a RAID volume to get that to work (I am throwing out various acronyms I do not fully understand just based on my recent troubleshooting research)? Any help is appreciated. Thanks again

how do I tell what the partition scheme on my current disk is?

Also, my SSD shows up in device manager, but not in disk management. Why is that?

How to determine if a hard drive is configured with the MBR or GPT partition table (see screenshots below).





Quote from this post: UEFI Boot Mode (installing using the GPT partition style) and Legacy BIOS Boot Mode (installing using the MBR partition style). -> link

Note: If you want to delete the MBR/GPT partition table entry, you must delete all the partitions until you only see Drive 0 Unallocated Space (see screenshot below). On the Where do you want to install Windows? screen, select a partition and click on the "Delete" option for each partition.

- Once you have deleted all of the partitions, click on the "Next" button. The installation of Windows will begin. All the required partitions are created automatically during the install.
- Or, if you know what you're doing, you can click on the "New" button and create a separate data partition.



Normally, you should be able to delete all the partitions on the Where do you want to install Windows? screen.

Note: But if you cannot delete all the partitions on the Where do you want to install Windows? screen.

- Boot the computer using the Windows 7/8/10 installation media.
- On the first screen, press SHIFT+F10 to bring up the command prompt.
- Run the following commands at the command prompt.

diskpart
list disk (this will give you a listing of the disks on your system)
select disk # (select the disk you want to clean, for example select disk 0)
clean (running the clean command will delete all partitions on the disk)
exit

Even if you are going to use the GPT (GUID Partition Table), you do not need to run the convert gpt command, since you are not creating the partitions at a command prompt.

- Close the command prompt window and continue your Windows installation as usual.

Click to expand...

Another way: Open Disk Management, click on View, then Top then Disk List.