Trouble Installing Windows 8.1 to Custom Desktop

Hey there,

I am currently attempting to install Windows 8.1 64-bit to a desktop computer. I've got a 1TB HDD and a 8GB USB boot stick with Windows 8.1. I've booted from the stick and gone through the normal setup, however after selecting my HDD (the only one in the system) it goes to the normal "Copying Windows files" screen, however it hangs up there and does not show any progress above 0%. After a while, it tells me that Windows cannot create a partition on my drive.

I've tried going into the command prompt in the "Repair your PC" section of the windows installer and using diskpart to clean the drive, but diskpart is unusable for some reason. I was wondering is someone could help me figure out what the problem might be, and any possible workarounds.

Below are my specs.
-ASRock Z77 Extreme6 board (UEFI)
-Western Digital Green WD10EZRX 1TB HDD
-Windows 8.1 Pro ISO
Note: This computer is home-built, if that's relevant at all. Additionally, I am not very experienced with installing Windows, nor am I very familiar with the command prompt.

Any solutions/suggestions are welcome and appreciated!

Look at these, http://www.eightforums.com/tutorials/15458-uefi-bootable-usb-flash-drive-create-windows.html

http://www.eightforums.com/tutorial...e-firmware-interface-install-windows-8-a.html

Possible did something wrong. Is drive new ?

Yes, the drive is totally new. It's possible I may have messed it up during previous installation attempts.


I've created a new boot stick with the instructions above and followed the guidelines, however when I get to the part where it asks where I want to install Windows, I select my unallocated HDD, however it says that Windows was unable to install there, something about the HDD being formatted as NTFS when it needs to be FAT32.

Do the install again. This time delete all partitions on the drive so it's one, big, empty, unallocated drive then let the Windows 8.1 installer partition it as needed.

Once install is complete you can resize partitions to separate OS and data if you want.