Can't boot from CD/USB? (Windows 10) Help?

[Sabre_X]

Hi all. Thanks for all your advice on choosing a laptop last week. I've just bought a Lenovo Yoga 500 15.6" and love the feel and look of it, but I've encountered a problem. The amount of bloatware is rather annoying so I wanted to do what I've always done on previous laptops or PCs of mine. I have a bootable KillDisk CD and a Windows 7 CD, and a USB CD Drive, all of which I've used many times. I usually run KillDisk, wipe all the drives, then install a fresh Windows 7.

I cannot for the life of me figure out how to get it to boot from CD/USB.

I've gone into the Advanced Boot Settings in Windows 10 where one can select a device to boot from. I've tried selecting the USB CD Drive, and the Lenovo logo pops up, it hangs for a bit, the disc spins for a bit, then it returns to normal Windows 10.

I even tried making a bootable USB and booting from that but have encountered the same problem. And it's occurring with both my bootable KillDisk and my bootable Windows 7 disc.

I've tried going into the UEFI, changed the boot order, and disabled Secure Boot (don't really know what that does), all to no avail.

I know since Windows 8 it's become harder to install your own OS. An old Windows 8 laptop I had proved a little problematic to boot from disc but it worked in the end. Having no such luck on this machine though!

Stuck where to go from here, would really appreciate any suggestions!

Thanks very much x

 

[sharndowg]

Have you tried enabling "legacy boot" in BIOS?

Edit: Should be under boot options.

 

[jimmysmitty]

It is not that it is "harder" to install your own OS, you just need to disable Secure Boot and enable Legacy booting in the BIOS. Secure Boot lets Windows control the boot process and not allow any unsigned processes from loading during boot. It actually stops a lot of attacks and malware.

 

[SchizTech]

It is not that it is "harder" to install your own OS, you just need to disable Secure Boot and enable Legacy booting in the BIOS. Secure Boot lets Windows control the boot process and not allow any unsigned processes from loading during boot. It actually stops a lot of attacks and malware.

That shouldn't be needed for a proper 8/8.1/10 installer since the install media for 8 and up have secure boot keys and support UEFI. Booting from USB DVD drives isn't completely reliable in my experience. As to the flash drive, make sure you prepared it properly. It should be formatted to FAT32, have an exact copy of the disk image and it needs to be bootable. To check that last part, go to disk management with the flash drive plugged in. The description on the flash drive should include the word "active."

If it's not active, start a command prompt as administrator and type "diskpart" Use the command "list disk" to determine the disk number of the flash drive, then "select disk X" where X is the disk number assigned to the flash drive. Now type "active" and exit the command prompt.

 

[jimmysmitty]

It is not that it is "harder" to install your own OS, you just need to disable Secure Boot and enable Legacy booting in the BIOS. Secure Boot lets Windows control the boot process and not allow any unsigned processes from loading during boot. It actually stops a lot of attacks and malware.

That shouldn't be needed for a proper 8/8.1/10 installer since the install media for 8 and up have secure boot keys and support UEFI. Booting from USB DVD drives isn't completely reliable in my experience. As to the flash drive, make sure you prepared it properly. It should be formatted to FAT32, have an exact copy of the disk image and it needs to be bootable. To check that last part, go to disk management with the flash drive plugged in. The description on the flash drive should include the word "active."

If it's not active, start a command prompt as administrator and type "diskpart" Use the command "list disk" to determine the disk number of the flash drive, then "select disk X" where X is the disk number assigned to the flash drive. Now type "active" and exit the command prompt.

On any OEM based laptop/desktop Secure Boot will be enabled which has Windows take over the boot management. If you reboot into the BIOS it will show a "Windows Boot Manager" as the only boot option so long as Secure Boot is enabled. If you disable it you can activate UEFI and Legacy boot options so you can boot to both.

I know this because I do it for a living, in fact I just did 3 new Dell laptops with clean installs and the only way to be able to PXE boot was to disable Secure Boot in the BIOS and enable legacy boot.

 

[SchizTech]

I also do this for a living. In my recollection I've never had an issue booting original install media for 8 or above via USB flash or DVD with secure boot enabled (the boot menu should show a UEFI boot option for either). Only when booting other install media (e.g., win 7 or diagnostic or data recovery tools) I have to change those BIOS settings.

ETA: your issue may have to do with whatever PXE bootloader you use.