Unable to reinstall Windows with rufus bootable USB

Ben Myers:
Thanks for contributing to this thread! I had seen the ASUS page you referenced and explored all the topics listed to no avail. I will keep plugging along until I figure it out. I don't have an immediate need for this computer so I can take my time and enjoy the learning experience

futbolfan said:

Megahertz:
When first trying to reinstall the OS, I received this error message: Windows 11 can't be installed on disk 0 partition 2 (The selected disk is of the GPT partition style). At that time, I still had access to a cmd prompt and used diskpart to convert the disk from GPT to MBR.

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You received that error message because of:
- You booted the Win 11 USB installation drive as Legacy and was trying to install on partition on a GPT drive.
- You did not deleted all partitions on the drive.

If your drive was GPT, Win 11 it was installed as UEFI - GPT and you should reinstall as UEFI - GPT. To do it, you must boot the Win 11 USB installation drive as UEFI and delete all partitions on the drive and then proceed.
I still think that your Rufus Win 11 USB installation drive isn't set properly and cant boot as UEFI, only Legacy. I suggest you rebuild it.

Megahertz said:

You booted the Win 11 USB installation drive as Legacy and was trying to install on partition on a GPT drive.

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I don't see where that is a problem. I ALWAYS boot from MBR USB Flash Drives on anything and everything that I install including every single UEFI based system that I have ever installed on. Period. I NEVER use GPT based USB Flash drives.

hsehestedt said:

I don't see where that is a problem. I ALWAYS boot from MBR USB Flash Drives on anything and everything that I install including every single UEFI based system that I have ever installed on. Period. I NEVER use GPT based USB Flash drives.

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You didn't understand what I meant.
The Win 11 USB installation drive normally is MBR but it can boot as Legacy or UEFI.
Windows can be installed in two ways: Legacy-MBR or UEFI-GPT
To install as Legacy-MBR you must boot the installation drive as Legacy
To install as UEFI-GPT you must boot the installation drive as UEFI.

As OP have a UEFI BIOS, he should install as UEFI-GPT so he must boot the installation drive as UEFI.

nothing is showing up in the list because there isnt a valid boot partition

the drive is probably toast (highly likely, but not definite), failure during a task like that without user intervention is not a good sign, although it could have been a software glitch

I would test the drive, check smart etc, at the very least youre going to need to re-install windows, if you want to try and recover data Partition Find and Mount — free partition recovery software is a good quick way to check if anything is easily retrievable, prior to running any recovery software, and its free

you should be able to remove ALL boot options from the bios and it should automatically find one, if one is present

Megahertz said:

To install as UEFI-GPT you must boot the installation drive as UEFI.

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I'm still not sure I understand.

Are you saying that the system must be booted in UEFI mode or that the media must be configured as GPT?

Not trying to be difficult, just want to understand correctly what you are saying. If you are saying that the system needs to be booted in UEFI mode, then I agree., If saying that the media must be formatted as GPT, I completely disagree

hsehestedt said:

I'm still not sure I understand.

Are you saying that the system must be booted in UEFI mode or that the media must be configured as GPT?

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Must be booted in UEFI mode

hsehestedt said:

Not trying to be difficult, just want to understand correctly what you are saying. If you are saying that the system needs to be booted in UEFI mode, then I agree., If saying that the media must be formatted as GPT, I completely disagree

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Needs to be booted in UEFI mode,

Megahertz said:

Needs to be booted in UEFI mode,

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Ok, that makes sense. As usual, it was my understanding which was off. Thanks for the clarification.

hsehestedt said:

I don't see where that is a problem. I ALWAYS boot from MBR USB Flash Drives on anything and everything that I install including every single UEFI based system that I have ever installed on. Period. I NEVER use GPT based USB Flash drives.

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That can only work if your computer has the facility to boot MBR stuff in the BIOS - some newer hardware doesn't allow it though,

Cheers
jimbo

SOLVED!
I'm embarrassed to explain but here is the recap. After the system crashed, entering the boot menu only offered "Enter Setup" whether or not the rufus created bootable USD drive was connected. Simply powering the system on entered the BIOS directly. Next, using a dual partition USB built according to the Brink tutorial, the boot menu still only offered "Enter Setup". However, the system now displayed the ASUS splash screen when powered on. But when nothing else happened after about 1 minute, I powered down. I rebuilt the USB using the Windows Media Creation tool and tried that. This time after the splash screen appeared and seemed to be stuck, I left the machine on and walked away. Several minutes later, the installation process had begun! I just wasn't patient enough. In retrospect, I am quite sure that the manually created dual partition USB drive would have also worked.

Because I had previously converted the computer SSD to MBR, the install stopped. But after deleting that partition and creating a new one as GPT, the install continued normally.

Sometimes, we just can't see the forest for the trees. Thanks to everyone who contributed to this thread; I really appreciate that.

Regards,
John

Glad to know that you've found the way to fix it.

futbolfan said:

SOLVED!

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Glad you got it sorted out!

Likewise...it only took me 2 weeks!