I joined because Win 7 installer does not see drivers on Rufus stick

Maybe it's a Win 7 limitation.


I've been having difficulty getting Win 7's installer to see a Dell HDD.

I should have checked this earlier, but in Win 10 the drivers for that disk are C:\Windows\System32\drivers\
disk.sys
EhStorClass.sys
hpdskflt.sys
partmgr.sys

Maybe my solution is either to copy or to slipstream those 4 files into my UEFI USB ?
 
This is a Dell Optiplex 7050. Fortunately, Dell still has the W7 drivers for download.

1. Download Intel-Rapid-Storage-Technology-F6-Driver_J84KX_WIN64_15.7.5.1025_A03_01.EXE
2. Unzip the EXE file.
3. Browse to "Intel-Rapid-Storage-Technology-F6-Driver_J84KX_WIN64_15.7.5.1025_A03_01.EXE\Drivers\Production\Windows7-x64\"
4. Add this folder to NTLite's Drivers screen.
 
I did. That folder is included in the ISO that NTLite made for me. I ran that ISO through Rufus, and that folder is included in the bootable UEFI USB that Rufus created from the NTLite ISO.


This is a tricky one. I wonder if I should assume that HDD is a lost cause, as far as the Win 7 installer is concerned, and find a SATA SSD with drivers that are known to be observable by the Win 7 installer?
 
Have you integrated these drivers into boot.wim (Windows Setup) too ?

For next time, when you mount install.wim, you can integrate them at the same time in boot.wim (Windows Setup) with the option Reapply tasks across editions (Apply page) and check boot.wim (Windows Setup)
 
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Did I err in assuming NTLite would handle it ?

Is that a step I needed to perform in NTLite ?

I'm completely new to slipstreaming and NTLite
 
garlin said:
Normally the steps are:
1. Extract the W7-compatible drivers to a local folder.
2. Load the image.
3. From the Drivers screen, load the folder containing the drivers.
4. From the Apply screen, expand "Reapply tasks across editions" and check boot.wim (Windows Setup).
5. Apply changes.
6. Use Rufus or another tool to write NTLite's created ISO file to the USB drive. NTLite will only create an ISO file for you, it doesn't handle the step of converting it to an USB filesystem.
Click to expand...

I'm not sure if I performed "apply" steps. The user interface looked different today after I extracted the ISO. I saw more details and controls yesterday when I didn't bother with extracting the ISO before I started.

I do see the driver folders in the Rufus'd ISO that was created by NTLite.
 
tistou77 said:
For next time, when you mount install.wim, you can integrate them at the same time in boot.wim (Windows Setup) with the option Reapply tasks across editions (Apply page) and check boot.wim (Windows Setup)
Click to expand...

I need a bit more familiarity with the user interface. The user interface looked different today after I extracted the ISO. I saw more details and controls yesterday when I didn't bother with extracting the ISO before I started.
 
In the drivers page (install.wim mounted), add the Intel RST drivers
Then, on the Apply page, do this:

NTL.PNG
 
I did something wrong today. I was not able to see that after extracting from my ISO to be augmented with the drivers.
 
I downloaded the 24h2 ISO once, extracted and then saved the installation directory and I only use this directory with NTLite (which I copy/paste before using NTLite to always have a backup of this directory)
 
Thanks everyone !


I finally did some hardware troubleshooting that theoretically might have been done a couple days ago, except I'm new, and I did this inefficiently on the software side.


So today I finally ran the Win 7 installer's version of diskpart, and it can't see the HDD. I re-installed the NVMe, and Win 10 has no problem seeing the HDD in both Disk Management and diskpart.


The history of this HDD was I cleaned it in Disk Management, and initialized it as a GPT disk, as it now appears in Win 10's diskpart.


Internet browsing tells me Windows setup can chuck a fit when it discovers a drive with an invalid MBR/boot sector and won't install to it. So I'm thinking it might actually make a difference for Win 7 installation if I format the HDD in Win 10, and then try Win 7 installation again.
 
Thanks so much. I'm pretty sure I want to install Win 7 on the HDD.

Will use EasyBCD to navigate dual-booting, having installed Win 7 and Win 10 on separate drives.
 
After I've tested Win 7 installation on the HDD, then I'll see if I can re-install on a SATA SSD.

I have a good Win 10 system on the NVMe, so I'm going to leave it there, and dual-boot using EasyBCD.

My little tower is provisioned for simple installation of one NVMe and one SATA SSD. If I can get Win 7 working on the SATA SSD, then the HDD will be used for back-ups and data.
 
Interesting, I can see a disk that I don't have a driver for, but I can't see a disk that I do have a driver for.

In the Win 7 installer's diskpart, I can see the PCIe NVMe GPT drive, even though I don't have a driver installed for it.

But I can't see the SATA HDD, also GPT, even though I do have a driver for it embedded in my bootable UEFI USB.


Maybe I should convert the unseen disk from GPT to MBR ?

Then the disk could have a boot record without messing up my UEFI Win 10 system on the NVMe drive that I can see in Win 7 even though I don't have a Win 7 driver for it.

Rationale: a known issue is that sometimes Win 7 installer doesn't want to work with a disk that doesn't have a boot record and won't install to it, even though I have a driver for it embedded in my bootable Win 7 installation USB.
 
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