I recently decided to try out Linux because some friends of mine have it installed. However, I didn't enjoy the experience and would like to switch back to Windows. I created a bootable USB with Windows 10 Home, but when I start the installation, I see an empty white table asking me where to install Windows, with no options to choose from. The only buttons available are 'refresh,' which doesn't help, and 'load driver,' which I don't think I need. I'm just looking for a way to get Windows 10 installed again since this laptop is mainly for gaming and I prefer Windows 10. Any advice would be greatly appreciated!
2 Answers
Check your BIOS settings, especially if your laptop uses an Intel CPU. Sometimes, Intel Rapid Storage Technology (IRST) is enabled by default, which can cause Windows not to recognize your drive. In the BIOS, look for an option to disable IRST (or VMD) and then try the installation again. If that doesn’t work, you may need to download the IRST drivers from your laptop's support page and load them during the Windows setup.
It seems like the issue might be related to your partitions from Linux. If you still have your Linux live USB, plug it in and use a tool like GParted or Disks. You should find your hard drive there; you might need to delete the existing partitions (be careful, this will wipe everything!). After that, create a new partition (make sure it’s NTFS), and Windows should recognize your drive during installation. Sometimes, Windows doesn’t see Linux partitions, so this could solve your problem.
I think I messed up. I noticed two partitions on my drive: one small (about 400MB) and another taking up the remaining space. I deleted the small one, but got an error when trying to delete the larger one. Now, I can't boot into Mint anymore. I have an older laptop I could use with Rufus to get Mint back on my main laptop, but I'm not sure what to do next.
Oh no, that’s frustrating! If you can't boot into Mint at all now, you might have to create a recovery USB or reinstall Mint from the old laptop. Just make sure that you back up any important data first!
I have an Intel CPU too, but I didn't run into this issue when I originally had Windows installed. That’s interesting!