I'm preparing a laptop to give to my grandmother and need to install the operating system, but the installer can't detect the SSD. I've checked that the drive is connected properly and have installed an operating system before, but I'm not sure which drivers are needed or how to load them.
3 Answers
Look up the exact model of the laptop on the manufacturer’s support website and download its storage or chipset drivers. Put the extracted driver files on the installation USB and load them from the setup screen. Make sure you’re downloading drivers for the correct model and operating system.
If the laptop uses an Intel processor, the installer may need Intel Rapid Storage Technology (IRST) or VMD drivers. Download the storage driver from the laptop manufacturer’s support page, extract it onto a USB drive, then choose “Load driver” in the installer when it shows no drives. Some BIOS menus also let you disable VMD or switch from RAID/IRST to AHCI, although that option isn’t available on every laptop.
The issue usually isn’t whether the SSD is formatted as GPT or MBR—Windows Setup can generally detect either. On newer Intel laptops, VMD/IRST is a much more common reason the drive doesn’t appear. If the installer was created on a Mac or Linux computer, recreating the USB on a Windows PC may also help, especially with some AMD-based systems.
GPT versus MBR normally won’t prevent the drive from appearing. If needed, the installer can clean and repartition the drive, but that erases everything on it, so the storage mode and missing IRST/VMD driver should be checked first.