[SOLVED] New Ryzen system not recognizing W10 boot disk

[spottymaldoon]

I've just put together a Ryzen 5 2400G with an ASRock B450M PRO4 motherboard
and a 16GB (2 x 8GB) DDR4 SDRAM. There's also a 1TB SSD.

Everything appears to be working - I can get the BIOS screen and the SDRAM and 1TB hard drive are correctly recognized. I have set the boot order to put USB first.

There is an internet connection.

I have downloaded "Windows 10 media creation tool 1903" onto a blank USB drive.

Starting up, however, I get the black prompt screen only and is says no boot device is recognized: this is repeated - following keypresses and resets.

What am I doing wrong please?

 

[rgd1101]

How To - Windows 10 clean install tutorial

If you are looking for the Windows 11 Clean install tutorial, you can find that here: Windows 11 Clean install tutorial (Click here) Otherwise, welcome to the Windows 10 Clean install tutorial This tutorial is intended to help you, step by step, to perform a clean install of Windows...

forums.tomshardware.com

 

[SgtScream]

Things to try:

1. If you are using a usb 3.0 port, try usb 2.0 and vice versa.
2. If you are using front usb ports try the motherboard usb ports in the back.
3. Is there a setting for uefi usb as a boot option? Try that.
4. Is there a function key for the boot menu? Try that and see if the usb drive shows up in the list.

 

[spottymaldoon]

rgd 1101: Thanks for this - the first part is exactly what I did except I downloaded the Media Creation Tool to my own PC and copied it to a clean thumb drive. Then I powered up the new PC with the thumb drive inserted and I got no splash from the Media Creation Tool - just the prompt screen saying the boot was not recognized.

I only have one connected target drive - 1TB SSD

 

[SgtScream]

But does it show up on the list for boot menu?

 

[spottymaldoon]

Sgt Scream: Thanks for responding. I already tried a chassis USB - didn't think to try USB3 but I will. Also the uefi USB

Not sure what you mean by a function key - where should I be looking for that?

The boot menu recognizes that I have a sandisk in the USB drive.

The e

 

[spottymaldoon]

Same result with uefi USB and switching USB3/2.

The only thing I might have done wrong was to insert the ASRock Driver DVD in at the start and I then got a response with a prompt screen that asked me to correct the date and time. I did that - and the last screen I got was a C: prompt.

I assume I can reverse any error I made there by clearing the CMOS?

 

[USAFRet]

rgd 1101: Thanks for this - the first part is exactly what I did except I downloaded the Media Creation Tool to my own PC and copied it to a clean thumb drive. Then I powered up the new PC with the thumb drive inserted and I got no splash from the Media Creation Tool - just the prompt screen saying the boot was not recognized.

I only have one connected target drive - 1TB SSD

You don't boot from the MediaCreation tool.
As its name suggests, you use that to create media for installing on your PC.

On your existing working PC, run that tool and create the USB installer.

 

[spottymaldoon]

By golly, USAFRet - I see that you're right! Thanks.

..some things cannot be rushed ...

 

[spottymaldoon]

Updating - as USAFret quite rightly said, if you are doing a clean build like me you first have to run the MediaCreationTool on another existing PC and use that to create the full Windows 10 boot drive on the clean USB. However, when I tried to do this on my up and running Windows 10 setup I got an error message right at the end (many people found this and there are almost as many suggested work-arounds!). My work-around was to try again, using an old Windows 7 computer, and then the boot drive got created and the new PC booted up fine.

My thanks to those who tried to help and especially to USAFRet who had the right answer.

I have a new question, though - can I assume the graphics driver for the Ryzen 5 2400G will be automatically installed under Windows 10 or must I extract the driver from that abominably-documented ASRock driver DVD? And, if from the ASRock - is the driver installed under windows or DOS?

 

[USAFRet]

Windows will install at least the basic driver, enough to get up and running. It also may install an ASRock one.
It is advisable to download the most recent one direct from the manufacturer.

The 'driver' is an exe, and it installs under Windows, and basically becomes part of the OS.

 

[spottymaldoon]

Thanks again USAFRET