I got this message when I was trying to install Windows Server 2012 R2 on a brand new DELL T430 server, so I thought, why not share how I fixed this! I have to mention that ESXi 5.x was running on this box before I tried installing Windows on it. I encountered this before, so it’s not new for me and usually I got this when the partition had some sort for Unix/Linux file system.
In my previous situations I will just hit Shift+F10 to launch the command prompt and use diskpart to clean the disk and create a new partition manually:
| 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 | DISKPART LIST DISK (identify your disk number where you want to install the OS) SELECT DISK <number> (whatever disk number you have) CLEAN CREATE PARTITION PRIMARY ACTIVE FORMAT FS=NTFS QUICK ASSIGN EXIT (twice) |
After this, the installation just worked, but not in this case; so I launched the command prompt again to read the setup log file. This is located in the temp drive\Windows\panther. Inside this directory is the setupact.log file which stores everything about the installation setup, but if you try to open it you will get an access denied message.
To be able to read the log file, make a copy of it,
and open the copy. When I saw what the problem was I could not believe it; because the disk I was trying to install the OS is not the computer’s boot disk, the wizard can’t create a partition and start the install. And to be honest, the computer’s boot disk at that moment was an SD card, because ESXi was booting from an SD card.
I rebooted the server, entered the BIOS and modified the boot order so the RAID controller to be the first boot device, and not the SD card.
And what do you know ! It worked.
I know this is not a general solving solution, because every infrastructure out there is different. Make sure to check every configuration of the server, because as you just saw, smaller settings are the ones causing the big problems.
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33 comments
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BDD Sol
30/07/2020 at 02:45 (UTC 2) Link to this comment
This worked for me! I was actually hitting F12 to boot to the flash drive, but this was making the flash drive the boot drive. I stopped hitting F12 and just let it boot up naturally and it worked. this was for Windows 2016 server on a Dell computer.
Adrian Costea
30/07/2020 at 06:49 (UTC 2) Link to this comment
Glad I could help out.
Paa Yaw
01/04/2020 at 18:41 (UTC 2) Link to this comment
Thank you, Dude. You saved the day
Adrian Costea
08/04/2020 at 13:31 (UTC 2) Link to this comment
Glad I could help.
Sorin
21/08/2019 at 20:28 (UTC 2) Link to this comment
Multumesc maestre!
Adrian Costea
02/10/2019 at 10:31 (UTC 2) Link to this comment
Pentru nimic.
Harry
24/07/2019 at 17:14 (UTC 2) Link to this comment
this saved me a half a day on my poweredge 2950 thank you so much for this
Adrian Costea
07/08/2019 at 13:14 (UTC 2) Link to this comment
Glad I could help Harry, glad I could help.
premax
16/06/2018 at 19:31 (UTC 2) Link to this comment
This solved my problem on HPE DL380G7 and Hyper-V Server 2012R2. I thought that this is a missing raid driver problem, but after reading this blog I’ve just changed the boot order to CD/RAID/USB instead of CD/USB/RAID and it works as a charm. Thank you.
Adrian Costea
18/06/2018 at 12:54 (UTC 2) Link to this comment
I know, it is annoying when this small stuff create the big problems :-).
Zoro
11/10/2017 at 08:59 (UTC 2) Link to this comment
Thanks a million, got me out of a long two nighter
Adrian Costea
11/10/2017 at 10:06 (UTC 2) Link to this comment
Nice! Another happy visitor.
You are welcome.
David
01/05/2017 at 21:46 (UTC 2) Link to this comment
Hi, I met with the same problem I did all the steps but still Arvrmydh
Bimi
24/07/2016 at 08:19 (UTC 2) Link to this comment
Thank you Ardian, it save a lot of time for me, it worked great for Dell T410. You are the best! Good luck!
Adrian Costea
27/07/2016 at 17:38 (UTC 2) Link to this comment
Thanks, I’m glad it helped.
MS
05/07/2016 at 21:39 (UTC 2) Link to this comment
Not exactly the solution, but you pointed me in the right direction. My case:
HP blade installing through iLO, with ISO loaded on virtual CD-ROM/DVD.
Only one logical drive on server. No USB, No SD cards.
Logical drive is already first on boot order in BIOS.
Issue:
Looking at the setupact.log, it says, disk [0] (my only disk) “the selected disk is not the computer’s boot disk.” and that “Disk [1] is the system disk” Further reading shows that Disk [1] is about 3TB in size.
Solution:
The host computer where I run iLO has mapped network drives. The target server for some reason sees that as the “system disk”.
Disconnected from mapped drives. That did the trick!
Like I said, you pointed me in the right direction after trying soooo many things. Thanks!
Adrian Costea
06/07/2016 at 07:03 (UTC 2) Link to this comment
Hi,
Thanks for your feedback, much appreciated.
Alan
02/07/2016 at 17:01 (UTC 2) Link to this comment
Work fine in my Dell R710!
Thanks!
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