Windows cannot be installed on this disk

In October 2012 I create a blog about not able to install Windows 8 on my SSD (install Windows 8 on SSD). After almost 2 years, I have a simulair issue!

Again late at night, cleaning my laptop before returning it to the office. From my installed Windows 8.1 I formatted my secondary drive. This was the Original drive of the laptop and because I’m about to return my laptop, I changed the drive back as primary drive and started a new installation of Windows 8.1.

I booted from USB, which is no problem, started the wizard like I did lots of times before and… When I wanted to select the partition to install on, I noticed the error: “Windows cannot be installed on this disk”. I was not able to remove, or format the partition. It was all greyed-out! Crap! Here we go again…..

So I started to download the Win7 ISO from MSDN, due to my experience last time (see my post: install Windows 8 on SSD). While waiting for the download to finish, I googled around and noticed more people with the same error and found an easy fix!

Restart and boot from USB or other bootable media and start the Windows 8.1 installation. Then at first screen, where you have the button “Install Now” (before selecting drive etc), press the key combination: <Shift>+<F10>. This will launch the Command Prompt.

From the Command Prompt type:

DiskPart
List Disk
Select Disk 0
Clean
Exit
Exit

DiskPart (to start the DiskPart application)
List Disk (show list of all disks)
Select Disk 0  (assuming the disk you want to install on is disk 0)
Clean  (this will clear the configuration information off the disk)
Exit  (to close DiskPart)
Exit  (to close the Command Prompt)

Now continue the Windows 8.1 installation wizard and Voila! You can select the disc and install Windows!

 

Leave a Reply

This site uses Akismet to reduce spam. Learn how your comment data is processed.