Author: parsec
Subject: How To Install Windows On A PCIe SSD
Posted: 20 Mar 2016 at 2:10am
Thanks for the information. I figured you were trying to use Windows 7.
Win 7, or really the location of an essential file for a UEFI booting installation, is in the wrong place among all the files used for an installation.
The Win 7 installation program cannot find the EFI bootloader file/program. It expects it to be in a certain folder, but it isn't. That program must be used instead of the legacy bootloader. As you saw, the Win 7 installer cannot find this file, not that the error message being displayed is informative. That is the problem you are having.
The good news it is possible to fix the bug in the location of the EFI bootloader file. The not so good news is it takes some work to fix the location of this file in your installation media.
Below is a link to a guide that describes how to fix the Win 7 installation file layout. This guide works, I've used it myself in the past. It will be far more useful than trying to explain this to you myself:
http://www.eightforums.com/tutorials/15458-uefi-bootable-usb-flash-drive-create-windows.html
Step 11 is the part that describes the fix for the location of the EFI bootloader file. You will need to study the ENTIRE guide since you will be creating the Win 7 installation on a USB flash drive. You cannot fix the Win 7 installation disk, since you cannot write or modify that disk.
This guide covers multiple ways to create the USB flash drive. That means you don't need to do everything explained in the guide. I strongly suggest you read through this guide and know what you will be doing before you start. If you just try to do a "cookbook" type of procedure, following instructions without reading things first, you will likely make mistakes.
There is no other way I am aware of to fix the Win 7 installation media for a UEFI booting installation.
I'll be happy to help you with this if you have questions, etc. One tip you need to know that is not in the guide is don't use a USB flash drive larger than 16GB. A USB flash drive of 8GB or 16GB is the ideal size. The Windows installation program can't deal with a larger flash drive.
Another thing I noticed, about changing to RAID mode. You cannot just change to RAID mode with a Windows installation that was NOT done in RAID mode. If you are installing Win 7 fresh again, then set the SATA mode to RAID before you do the Win 7 installation.
I'm not sure where you plan on doing the Win 7 installation, on your SM951 or the BX200.
Subject: How To Install Windows On A PCIe SSD
Posted: 20 Mar 2016 at 2:10am
Thanks for the information. I figured you were trying to use Windows 7.
Win 7, or really the location of an essential file for a UEFI booting installation, is in the wrong place among all the files used for an installation.
The Win 7 installation program cannot find the EFI bootloader file/program. It expects it to be in a certain folder, but it isn't. That program must be used instead of the legacy bootloader. As you saw, the Win 7 installer cannot find this file, not that the error message being displayed is informative. That is the problem you are having.
The good news it is possible to fix the bug in the location of the EFI bootloader file. The not so good news is it takes some work to fix the location of this file in your installation media.
Below is a link to a guide that describes how to fix the Win 7 installation file layout. This guide works, I've used it myself in the past. It will be far more useful than trying to explain this to you myself:
http://www.eightforums.com/tutorials/15458-uefi-bootable-usb-flash-drive-create-windows.html
Step 11 is the part that describes the fix for the location of the EFI bootloader file. You will need to study the ENTIRE guide since you will be creating the Win 7 installation on a USB flash drive. You cannot fix the Win 7 installation disk, since you cannot write or modify that disk.
This guide covers multiple ways to create the USB flash drive. That means you don't need to do everything explained in the guide. I strongly suggest you read through this guide and know what you will be doing before you start. If you just try to do a "cookbook" type of procedure, following instructions without reading things first, you will likely make mistakes.
There is no other way I am aware of to fix the Win 7 installation media for a UEFI booting installation.
I'll be happy to help you with this if you have questions, etc. One tip you need to know that is not in the guide is don't use a USB flash drive larger than 16GB. A USB flash drive of 8GB or 16GB is the ideal size. The Windows installation program can't deal with a larger flash drive.
Another thing I noticed, about changing to RAID mode. You cannot just change to RAID mode with a Windows installation that was NOT done in RAID mode. If you are installing Win 7 fresh again, then set the SATA mode to RAID before you do the Win 7 installation.
I'm not sure where you plan on doing the Win 7 installation, on your SM951 or the BX200.