I'm having a tough time with my PC setup. It was running Windows smoothly until I noticed some issues like crashes with Kaspersky Antivirus, random reboots, and problems with my MSI Center app. To fix everything, I decided to clean install Windows from a USB, completely wiping my SSD. However, the installation keeps crashing at different stages: loading the setup, language selection, or product key entry. After each crash, I get a black screen and the PC restarts. If I unplug the USB and try to boot from the SSD directly, it just leads me to the BIOS screen. I haven't received any error codes, though sometimes I see a 0x3b kernel error. Here are my specs: MSI MEG Z790 ACE Motherboard, Intel i9-14900K CPU, Dual channel DDR5 RAM, NVIDIA RTX 3080 GPU, Seagate FireCuda 540 SSD, and a 1500W PSU. I've tested everything I could think of: the SSD is recognized, firmware is up to date, and I even ran MemTest86 on the RAM, getting zero errors. I've tried recreating the USB installer multiple times and used various BIOS settings, but nothing works. The problem started after the Windows 11 version 25H2 update released in October 2025. If anyone has experienced similar installation crashes or has any advice, I would greatly appreciate it! Thanks, Momo.
1 Answer
It sounds like you could be having issues with the storage setup. Did you happen to have multiple drives connected during the install? Sometimes the Windows installer gets confused with more than one drive. Also, consider the possibility that the SSD could be failing, as that could cause these types of crashes.
Thanks for the suggestion! I only have the SSD plugged into the M2 slot, but I'm considering connecting a HDD to see if that helps. I'll keep you updated!