Windows 7 Install Error - HP Envy 15

I downloaded and burned an ISO Win7 install file (legal, I am using a purchased key to register it), and wanted to do a clean install of Windows 7 without all the HP Bloatware crap like the sticky at the top of this forum suggests.... and when the install is done its first restart, and is on the Completing installation... phase the second time, it gives me a:

"Windows setup could not configure windows to run on this computers hardware".

Are you serious?!?

Does anyone have a fix for this please. I now have an inoperable, and un-installable brand new laptop. Sweet.

I am installing it via the USB DVD Drive, through a DVD (Not even a USB flash drive problem!). I have tried it twice now and it failed both times. I even tried reseting the BIOS settings to default.

It's obviously a glitch in something, because I was running Win7 on the laptop this afternoon.

Helllppp????

 

The install file is either corrupt or is an OEM version that will only install on a specific brand. The windows install might be checking your bios for a specific key/config and won't install unless it finds it.

You should try a different version. Also, the win 7 version from HP should not have any bloat ware on it unless its factory restore cd. You should be able to get a regular win 7 cd from HP support.

 

I did not get a Win7 CD with my purchase. Was I supposed to?
There was a ton of bloatware from HP on my first install.

What was the little 2GB SD Card that came with the Envy 15? I can't imagine that's a restore image... /eyeroll.

 

make sure the iso is correct.

And you can use MS's official iso to usb software to put win7 in usb flash and install.

This is the way I installed my envy 15 today and before.

 

I tried to use a USB originally with MS's stupid Windows 7 usb/dvd download tool software, and it told me that either my USB was already in use, or it just wouldn't write to it. Using a 16GB USB drive. So obviously enough room.

So I waited and burned a DVD using the same tool.
And this is my result.

Now I am downloading a different .iso image and going to use a different program to burn it to a DVD I guess. Or try a USB again.

I've read people having same problems with 3-4 different ISO's though.. sigh.

 

Your hard drive might have had a recovery partition that had a copy of windows on it. Did you make restore disk/usb from it?

 

No I did not EntityX. I was trying to do a clean install so didn't want to backup an install with all of the HP Bloatware on it again.

I have tried downloading a completely different .ISO for Win7 64 bit (what Im told my OS is, could this be problem?) and burned the image to a disc with a completely different program, and I get the exact same thing and error.

Anyone? Please?

 

Do you happen to have a i7 Envy15 with USB 3.0?

If the answer to the above is yes, try installing by plugging the USB stick or USB DVD drive into your combo eSATA/USB port rather than a USB3.0 port. The reasoning is: Windows 7 does not have USB 3.0 drivers in the bootstrap OS, but the BIOS does. The BIOS allows the DVD drive to load the boostrap OS into RAM and begin the installation process, but the OS itself can't utilize the USB 3.0 ports to read the installation files on the disk. The eSATA/USB port is USB 2.0, not 3.0, so it could solve your problem if USB 3.0 is the cause.

If the answer to the above is no, do you have RAIDed SSDs? If yes, you might have to remove RAID before installing, or include the RAID drivers when you install Win7, but I'm not that sure.

 

I created a windows 7 USB installation disk just by copying the contents from the ISO directly onto the freshly formatted USB drive. That's it. Never had a problem.

 

Since Vista, all you've needed to do is copy the contents of a Win Vista/7 install CD or ISO directly to a formatted bootable USB stick. You can do it without any sort of special program, and it generally installs faster from a USB stick than from an optical disk.

 

Dont have an i7 and don't have raided SSD's. Just a 640GB HDD 5400rpm. And i5 540m processor.



I managed to get my hands on an OEM Windows 7 Pro disc from a friend, so going to try to install with that and see if it'll let me register for my Home Premium Key with this disc, as I hear that all versions of windows are on each Cd, just have to remove the ei.cfg and create an image of it.

Blah. Just wanna use this beauty.

 

Hm this is interesting...

Perhaps if I can't register as Home Premium through this Pro disc... I will just re-format my USB stick (FAT32?) and copy the entire contents to that, then delete the ei.cfg file.

Will the USB drive be bootable if I copy the disc though? it wasn't bootable when I just put the .iso onto it before... but that was with a downloaded .iso.

 

Plug the USB into a windows comp
go to "Administrative Tools" in control panel
go to "Computer Management"
In "Storage", select "Disk Management"

Find your disk in either the top or bottom frame, right-click and format it as FAT32 (you can do this in My Computer too, but you'll have to be in this screen anyway for the next step), you can name it anything and a quick format is fine

After it formats, right click it and hit "Mark partition as Active" if it doesn't already say "Healthy (Active, Primary Partition)" next to or below the disk name

Open the .iso in WinRAR or your favorite .iso opening program (Daemon tools, alcohol, whatever) and copy the contents of the .iso onto your USB drive, don't copy the .iso itself

Delete the .cfg file if you like

Restart your computer and boot from the USB stick and it'll be like the DVD from there

I did this process with two Kingston USB 2.0 stcks. One I reformatted for other purposes, but I keep Win7 without the .cfg on my 8GB stick and use the rest of the space for frequently installed items I have, like firefox, bookmarks, VLC, WinDirStat, VirtualCloneDrive, etc.

 

The process that worked for me was simply mounting the windows 7 iso as a virtual drive, then literally drag and dropping the entire contents onto the formatted USB drive. Then when you boot up all you do is hit F10 (or whatever your computer is set to) to choose the boot menu and choose the USB drive. That's all. Infact it's even easier using windows 7 than ubuntu because in ubuntu you have to either use ubuntu or another windows program to make sure the USB drive has a boot manager.

The i5 envy installed windows in literally 5 minutes. Infact I set my laptop up as a dual boot system with Windows 7 and Ubuntu 10.04 and installed all the drivers/patches/updates for both OS's in under a half hour.

 

some usb sticks don't come from the factory as active partitions, so you'd have to do the steps i listed above to make them bootable

 

Well.. guess I am trying the USB side again.

Using my friends OEM Windows 7 Pro disc, with my external DVD drive on Envy 15... It goes through the entire install, then at the very end after the first reboot when it is at the Completing Installation... part, an error pops up that says:

"Windows Setup could not configure Windows to run on this computer's hardware"

... sigh. It makes me think that it is confusing a drive or something, and thinks that the external DVD is the main drive when it is verifying something? This blows, can't even install Windows back onto it.

 

Huh, I reinstalled win7 on the envy that I received yesterday. I followed the instructions from this thread down to a T: http://forum.notebookreview.com/hp-...-hp-laptop-out-box-guide-2-0-windows-7-a.html

Which pointed me to this thread: http://forum.notebookreview.com/mic...-7-download-links-just-like-vista-before.html

I dl'd the Win7 disks using that guide, removed the ei.cfg file and burned it. I then installed win7 by attaching an external drive to the usb/esata port and changed the bios boot order to boot off the dvd and it worked. (I also backed up my activation keys before this process as well using their guide).

 

Well folks I have found the solution to my problem.

After a good 24 hours+ of trying things... The case seemed to be that my Envy 15 did not recognize my RAID controller (SATA Drive?) or something when I was doing the clean install.

I had to download the chipset controller from the Intel website, and load the drivers during the install at the partitioning phase. The install went smoothly after that and I am loading things onto it now.

I gotta say... its 10x faster without all that HP crap on it.

Cheers.

 

couldn't you have just used revo uninstaller to uninstall all the bloatware?
or is it not the same thing?

 

Hi Dave,

Nice to see someone else with exactly the same problem as me when trying to install a fresh Win 7 (1st gen Envy 15). I have been trying on and off to do this for months but with no success so got very excited when I found this thread! The problem is that I cannot load the drivers:

I have downloaded and unpacked the latest Intel SATA drivers (Intel Matrix Storage Manager or something like that). I then choose "Load Driver" during the partitioning phase, navigate to the x64 folder and Win 7 installation finds the drivers

"Intel ICH8M-E/ICH9M-E/5 Series SATA RAID Controller" (iaStor.inf)

When I click next, I get the following error and then get sent back to the partitioning window:

"To continue installation, use the Load Driver option to install 32-bit and signed 64-bit drivers. Installing an unsigned 64-bit device driver is not supported and might result in an unusable Windows installation."

How did you get past this? I tried F8 while booting the installation and 'disabling driver signing' option but this made no difference. I also tried 32-bit drivers but get the same error.

Any help would be great, I am so close I think!

jp

 

The file iastor.sys which is in the unpacked drivers is identical to the currently working one in my c:\windows\system32\drivers\ folder.

I still have no idea why the windows installer is refusing to install it?

 

Hey Guys..
I just got a HP Envy 15, i7 920xm and decided to do a fresh install..So I blew away all the partitions and started my install of the iso image..

Just my luck.. i am getting the error others have been complaining about.."Windows setup could not configure windows to run on this computers hardware" and the whole cycle starts all over again..

I tried all the suggestions on this thread.. but no luck..

Please let me know if you guys figured out some new ways arounds this problem. I don't even know which hardware it is complaining about.. I could have tried updating the drivers if i knew which piece of hardware its complaining about..

Please HELP !!

 

I unfortunately never found a solution to this very frustrating problem! In my case my only and last thought of a solution is that I upgraded the stock HD - I wondered if it could be due to this.

However it sounds like you have 'stock' hardware or did you change anything?

 

everything on my laptop is stock. I have the 1 TB HD drive.. As I said, I am out of options..I wonder if HP customer support will help since I am still in the warranty period.

 

Instead of the "Windows setup could not configure windows to run on this computers hardware" error, I keep getting the "a required cd dvd drive device driver is missing" after booting into the Window 7 setup through a USB flash drive.
I've tried two ISOs, and I've deleted two of the HP partitions (recovery and hp tools) just in case they were the problem. I can't seem to get around it.
Any ideas?

 

Wow, I just read here that it could have been because I plugged the flash drive into the wrong USB port. I put it into the eSATA/USB port, and now it works fine. Thanks.