Solved Can't install Windows 8 on new rig with a UEFI motherboard

I put together a new rig with a new Asus Z97-A motherboard, 3.5GHZ Intel i5-4690 processor, 8 GB GSkill RAM, GE Force GT 650 and a Samsung 500GB EVO SSD plust two Western Digital 1TB mechanical hard drives. Both my Windows 7 and 8 DVDs are legitimate updates. Windows 8 came from Microsoft. I first tried to install Windows 7 and that would seemingly install but would never run past the opening screen when the balls spin and join. I then cleaned the SSD with diskpart to stop it from trying to boot to 7 and put the Windows 8 DVD in the drive. Following all the normal steps of a custom install it appeared that installation was going just fine. It installed all files without incident, rebooted and got to the "getting ready" screen and shut down quickly. The option I now have is to restart the computer and reinstall. That action results in the same result. In the UEFI BIOS I have CSM enabled and Boot Device Control is set to "UEFI and Legacy OPROM." I don't know if I have a failure with a new piece of hardware, a driver problem or am I setting something up wrong in the UEFI BIOS? Help me please.

I think that as you are are installing from a DVD you may be having an issue due to UEFI mode.
I would install off a USB drive setup to boot in UEFI mode. Then use your boot manager (F12 or similar at BIOS screen) to select the "UEFI USB stick" - that way you will know for sure what mode your installing in.
See http://www.eightforums.com/tutorials/15458-uefi-bootable-usb-flash-drive-create-windows.html?filter[1]=General Tips

Cecebee said:

or am I setting something up wrong in the UEFI BIOS?

Click to expand...

You should be able to install Windows 8/8.1 with the default UEFI settings.

The Asus motherboard UEFI firmware (BIOS) settings. -> link

How to download and create a bootable Windows 8.1 installation media. -> link

Thanks to everyone for the replies. Since receiving them I have downloaded a fresh copy of Windows 8 and built a bootable thumb drive. I have set all the UEFI firmware to all default settings. I also removed the 500 GB Samsung SSD from the system and replaced it with another brand new Samsung EVO 250 GB SSD. Finally I removed and re-seated the GSkill DDR 1600 memory. I have since tried to install Windows two times from the thumb drive. Each time it has installed files in what I would consider to be normal time, then it has installed updates very quickly indicating that it probably didn't do any downloading from Microsoft. Then it asked to remove the thumb drive and let the system reboot to complete installation. Next is quickly goes through "installing devices" and then when it hits "getting ready" it shuts the computer down to a black screen. I did this twice and decided that is is either a case of bad memory, bad mother board or bad processor The only other device that might shut the system down would be the video card but it works okay up until that point. Can anyone say what component is most likely to be the cause? I don't think it is a snafu with the Windows activation because I know the serial number I enter is a good one and Windows pauses for about 45 seconds to check it out before file installation ever begins.

Are you sure you are waiting long enough? I did the clean install of Win8 to a UEFI MB a few weeks ago, and I remember thinking the system went dead - I was just about to hit the power button when the next setup step started.

I just tried it all over again and let it sit for a full 10 minutes after it abruptly shut down. Got the same result. I am starting to think that maybe this kind of problem belongs in a different forum?

Just to provide a conclusion to this thread I can say that the problem turned out to be a bad out of the box motherboard. I have used a lot of Asus boards and never had a bad one until now. I hope I never have another because the RMA process is a PITA and unnecessarily slow to resolve. I may try another brand in the future but they are all probably just as bad as Asus has been?