Hello,
I’ve recently assembled a new PC with the parts listed below and I am having problems with the initial install of Windows 11 Pro.
- MSI B850 Tomahawk Max WiFi
- AMD Ryzen 9 7900
- Corsair Vengeance RGB DDR5 64GB
- MSI GEFORCE RTX 5070ti
- NZXT Kraken 360
- Samsung 990 Pro 4TB
- HYTE Y70 Touch Infinite case
I’ve downloaded the .iso and burned it to an USB stick and after booting, I get a window titled “Windows 11 Pro Install Driver to Show Hardware” and the option to browse for the needed driver. At the bottom of this window, it reads “A media driver your computer needs is missing. This could be a DVD, USB, or Hard Disk Driver.”
I’ve downloaded and flashed the BIOS to the version 7C91v29 dated 2025-07-04. It’s been a while since I’ve built a PC and it seems like most of the hardware now comes from the manufacturer’s website with its own exe that would be run to install the driver. This is my only Windows computer so I’m not sure how I can get the drivers installed. Any help or pointers would be greatly appreciated. Thanks!
You sure your SSD is plugged in all the way? Otherwise, I don't see any hardware exotic enough that Windows would justifiably not ship with drivers for it. Re-seat all the connections and try again, and if it still doesn't work, try re-downloading the ISO.
(Also, obligatory "your real problem is wanting to install Windows instead of Linux in the first place.")
Funnily enough, I had already installed Mint to test the SSD and it formatted no problems and installed. I reformatted it back to one partition to install Windows first and then later will put Linux back on in a dual boot. Thanks.
And that's why we just roll our eyes when somebody tries to claim Linux lacks hardware support compared to Windows, LOL.
I was trying to give Windows the benefit of the doubt and keep the evangelism to a minimum, but Hell, maybe lack of driver support for your SSD really is your problem! I don't understand why that would be, since an NVME drive is supposed to be pretty standardized and ought to work with a generic driver, but maybe Microsoft sucks even worse than I thought it did. ¯\_ (ツ)_/¯
~~I do think your ISO being corrupted is the most likely issue at this point, though.~~ Never mind, I read your other reply. If Windows has failed to install properly twice with separate ISOs, my advice is now just to single-boot Mint and call it a day.
It’s looking more and more like that’s going to be my solution. I was hoping to get win11 installed to ease some other network connectivity (with my astrophotography hardware) but it’s beginning to seem less worth the pain.
What's going on with Linux lack of network connectivity to your astrophotography hardware?
How are you making the iso I had the same issue making it from Linux. Might not be the best solution but I ended up installing windows in a VM and the doing USB pass through to get the windows iso on the flash drive using Rufus from within windows in the vm.
I had an issue similar to this earlier this year.
In the end, it turned out that my SSD wouldn’t work with Windows no matter what I did but could be seen in Linux. The SSD was working with Windows, so this isn’t some odd manufacturer issue, I’m thinking my drive is on its way out.
But I just installed it in a throwaway Linux laptop I have yesterday and it’s working with no issues. Health tests come back clean too.
Getting another SSD worked out for me.
Not sure if that’s the same for you or not.
Hmm, I hope not, it's a brand new SSD. Good to know if I want to move it to my linux box later. Thanks.
I have successfully formatted the disk using Linux and then deleted the partitions I created.