Problem with installing Windows on M2 chip – no storage detected.
Problem with installing Windows on M2 chip – no storage detected.
Hey there, I’ve got a puzzling situation that’s been keeping me up at night. As someone who regularly installs Windows on machines, I recently encountered two laptops that refuse to install properly. They seem to have no storage detected, yet when I boot them normally, Windows 11 runs fine. The built-in recovery attempts to fix things but keeps failing with errors about incomplete processes. I’ve moved the M2 models to another machine and they still won’t show up for installation. Placing them in an M2 caddy works like a typical external drive—files transfer easily, but when I reinstall, the same problem persists. Today I found a laptop that actually boots Windows, so I installed it on both devices and restored them to their original systems. They load up and attempt automatic repair, but nothing changes. Inserting a pen during installation gives me the same “no storage found” message. All M2 models use GPT partitions, which I suspect might be the root cause, but I’m not sure if that’s relevant here. Any advice or troubleshooting steps would be greatly appreciated.
Did you choose the BIOS setting to use only Legacy or UEFI? It should allow adjustments if you have a newer laptop or motherboard. Regarding the USB stick, the creation process might be affecting boot options—check the setup carefully.
These are Intel storage devices that often need a specific driver to function properly. I found a guide for replacing a drive in a friend's laptop using an Intel 670p drive here: https://www.uubyte.com/ssd-not-found-win...ation.html
The USBs were created with the Windows creation tool. I’ve tested them across several machines, which is reassuring. The laptops offer minimal BIOS settings, and unfortunately they’re not UEFI enabled—there’s nothing I can do to alter that on either device. I’ve tried all possible adjustments in the BIOS.
Use an open media creation tool. Instead of deleting the USB, save the ISO for Windows 11 and place it on your desktop. Download Rufus, burn the ISO using it, and keep everything set to default. This method usually works well. I often create bootable USBs with Rufus rather than media tools, so give it a shot here: https://rufus.ie/en/
You didn't mention what these laptops are. Some devices need drivers installed for the Windows installer to work properly. I first saw this when helping my brother with an Asus laptop. When I searched online, many discussions appeared, and Asus even maintained a dedicated page about it.
One is an Acer and one is HP The weird thing though is that I've installed windows on these drives now, so I'd normally expect them to load into windows as usual, but they show as having no drives at all. Even in windows setup, they show no drives But I know they read the drives as they get to a point where they want to do an automatic repair if left to load into windows as normal
With Windows installed on the storage device, the process differs from the original configuration. Look for the "Load Driver" area in the setup wizard. There, you can download and install drivers from a separate USB drive. After installation, the setup will recognize the drive. Currently, the system doesn't know how to access it—check the laptop model page for available drivers. You'll need to download and install them yourself.