Worst install ever, frustrated and need some help. Blinking Cursor Of Death

[RockCityGhost]

I am about to lose my mind with my latest PC build and am hoping someone can help! I am using a MSi Z97 Gaming 3 Motherboard with a Crucial MX100 (512GB) SSD. I am trying to clean install Windows 8.1.

Installing using UEFI… NOT
I have tried everything I could to get it installed using UEFI, but it would fail in various spots, and would never get installed correctly. First install attempt, the Windows 8.1 install created the partitions for me just fine, but then wouldn’t format the main partition. From there I tried many, many, many times to get the partitions formatted. I tried using DISKPART and then MiniTool (from a bootable CD). In trying to fix/format, I would often lose connectivity to the SSD, even in between DISKPART commands. For example, I could run list disk, then select disk 0 and then I would type clean and it would say there was a network error and then the disk was unlisted.

Gave Up on UEFI, back to BIOS
I finally resigned myself to just using BIOS, something I am more familiar with any way. I tried from DVD and it failed after reboot. I tried to repair it using the DVD and an hour later it failed again. I reformatted the drive yet again and FINALLY got Windows 8.1 installed using a USB Stick instead of a DVD. SUCCESS! Hold up…

Now Windows is installed, BUT, I get the blinking white cursor of death. I know SOMETHING is wrong with the boot MBR, but I can’t figure out WHAT! I have tried the bootrec command and MiniTool to fix the MBR partition, but still I am faced with the stupid cursor. If I use the install disk to get to the command prompt, all the Windows files are there, so I know I am close.

I know I should probably RMA this SSD, as I have tried different SATA ports and cables, so I do not believe it is the board, BUT I am hoping I can save it.

As far as partitions go, I have a System partition and Windows partition. They are both PRIMARY partitions, and I believe I have tried both the System & Windows partitions marked as active. I thought the System partition was supposed to be the active one?

Does anyone have any last ditch ideas to try before I give up and send back the SSD?

Thanks in advance for any and all help.

 

[Memhorder]

Do a secure erase the way Crucial tells you here on this page and start from scratch. I'm not sure why you would have to use UEFI to install windows other than to set boot order but maybe I'm missing something.

http://forum.crucial.com/t5/Crucial-SSDs/SSDs-and-Secure-Erase/ta-p/112580

 

[rolli59]

Well I have 240GB SSD as the largest system drive with win8.1 on it and my install had no issues since I did not bother with partition at all, bare drive install media in install!

 

[Memhorder]

Make sure your BIOS setting for the drive is at AHCI as well not IDE before you go ahead and install OS

 

[RockCityGhost]

Make sure your BIOS setting for the drive is at AHCI as well not IDE before you go ahead and install OS

Yes, it is in AHCI by default for this board.

 

[RockCityGhost]

Well I have 240GB SSD as the largest system drive with win8.1 on it and my install had no issues since I did not bother with partition at all, bare drive install media in install!

My first attempt I let Windows do its thing, without manually touching the partitions but it kept getting worse and worse. It would not format partitions, then it couldn't delete partitions, then it couldn't create partitions which is why I went to DISKPART & MiniTool

 

[RockCityGhost]

Make sure your BIOS setting for the drive is at AHCI as well not IDE before you go ahead and install OS

this post, plus a post on another forum lead me to the answer. The BIOS was setup for AHCI, BUT Windows was not detecting it, and it wasn't loading a (useful) AHCI driver, which made talking to the SSD very unstable.

So the solution was to load the AHCI driver, re partition and format the drive and then fix problem #2, which was installing the WLAN card before its driver.

 

[Memhorder]

So you got her?