[jazza11]

I recently tried to perform a clean install on my dell mini 10v and have come up against a problem that I hope someone may help me with. Using the Windows 7 Reinstallation dvd disc to boot up via an external disc drive, everything is fine until I get to the part where it asks me which partition I would like to use for the new install. It asks me to choose but there is no partitions showing at all. I get the message " No drives were found. Load driver to provide a mass storage driver for installation". I tried searching the installation disc and also the drivers and utilities disc that came with the laptop for the drivers without success. I even tried to go online to download the correct drivers but as I wasn't sure what I was looking for, I again drew a blank. It seems the hard disc is not being detected for some reason. When I go in to the main section of the bios to check if the hard is displayed, it's not there but if I remove the battery and then replace it, hey presto, it's displayed. This has become very frustrating and I would appreciate any help that would allow me to successfully install windows 7. I do happen to have access to another mini 10v exactly the same that is in perfect working order and was wondering if the solution may lie in transferring any relevant info (drivers etc) from that via a flash drive to my own mini laptop.

Thanks

[rrfranczak3]

maybe your battery is dead and resetting it allows it to work temporarily (does it work without the battery in at all, strictly on AC power?) or your hard drive is actually dead, try putting your hard drive in the other machine...if it works, then install windows onto it from there, then put it back in your own machine.....the other hard drive will not be touched so the other person shouldnt mind....

NOTE: PLEASE DO NOT CROSS POST ON THIS FORUM....IT WILL NOT GET YOUR QUESTION ANSWERED ANY QUICKER....I HAVE DELETED YOUR OTHER POSTING IN THE 10V SECTION...THANK YOU

PS. Welcome to the forum.....

[jazza11]

Thanks for your reply.

Yes the laptop still operated when I removed the battery and used ac-power only but unfortunately the install still failed at the same position.

I tried your suggestion of removing the hard disc from my laptop and inserting it in to the working laptop but again got the same result during installation.

I was beginning to fear the worse in that the hard disc was damaged and that I would need a replacement when I came across a possible solution on the internet. I tried it and good news....SUCCESS AT LAST.

I was asked to download a disc partition utility called GPARTED LIVE CD. It comes as a .iso, so it needs to burned to a CD. What this utility does is it scans your hard drive and gives you details of all the drives and partitons on it. Then it asks you to delete them all, leaving you with one disc of unallocated space. Once you save the information, you remove the disc and insert your windows reinstallation disc, boot up and begin to reinstall. When you get to the position that was causing the problem before, namely, when it asks you where you want to install windows, your hard disc should be visible for you to select. You just carry on and reinstall the rest of windows and you should have no problems.

It worked for me and I hope that it works for anyone else that has this same problem.

Thanks again.