Hi All, , Happy Hump Day !!!
friend of mine brought their pc to me, , and wanted to see what was wrong with it, ,
Fired it up and seems like someone (sic) tried to install Win 10, but did not complete install for whatever reason, , ,
They want to go back to Win 7 Ultimate, which we have the install for, HOWEVER, after removing the drive and formatting on utility pc, , the %$#$ Windows 10-11 Install code is written to the HDD / BIOS and will not allow access to system option to access DVD drive nor USB to install different O/S, , !
How does one either low level format the drive or is there another workaround to get to install Win 7 ???
So you physically removed the drive and connected to another pc? How did you connect it? Is the other PC Windows?
All you should have to do is remove all of the partitions. Your failed install of Win 10 (or maybe 11) may have left a “recovery” and a “system” partition that formatting alone will not erase.
Use Disk Manager or (DISKPART in a command prompt window) to remove the partitions. Once all are gone, and the drive reinstalled back into the original PC, it should load the Windows disk.
Of course Win7 support (all flavors) ended 4 years ago. Even Win 10 ends Oct 2025.
To install Windows 7 on a PC with an incomplete Windows 10 installation, first try accessing BIOS settings to prioritize DVD or USB boot. If that fails, check for a separate boot menu. Disable Secure Boot and switch to Legacy Boot mode in BIOS if available. If you still can’t access installation media, use diskpart in Windows PE to clean and reformat the drive, or try a third-party tool like DBAN to wipe it completely. As a last resort, check for BIOS updates or hardware write-protection issues. Remember to back up important data before making any changes.
