z400 windows10 refuses to install

[ric67]

Hello,

I have a z400 running windows 7 pro and I'm trying to upgrade it to windows 10 pro, but every time I try it fails. There is one thing I have noticed and that is that since I installed some cloning software to help back up my files when my computer starts up I now have to choose between the hard drive and a floppy drive (which I don't have, could this be the problem and if so how do I resolve it. It's a pain. I am including a screen grab to illustrate it. If anyone can help me to get the windows 10 upgrade to install I would be most grateful. I'm disabled and in poor health and could do without the extra stress at the moment. hoping somebody can help rescue me. Kindest regards. Gerald

[DGroves]

I would uninstall the cloning software , which you fail to mention the name of so nobody can actually advise you on this other than to say the installed software screen shown appears to be asking if you want to start a restore session using a floppy

backup all files you wish to keep as a precaution

once you have a normal boot screen that directly boots into win 7 go to the Ms site and download the

Create Windows 10 installation media

and run it under win 7 to create a win 10 pro 64bit installer (USB key )  you will need a 16GB key for this

https://www.microsoft.com/en-us/software-download/windows10

once the key is created, uninstall any antivirus software and reboot back into win 7, place the win 10 installer usb key into a usb 2.0 port (you should not use usb 3.0 but it may/may not work if no usb 2 ports are available)

dbl click on the usb drive icon and from the shown files select (setup.exe, or Install.exe) to start the win 10 upgrade from within the win 7 OS it should ask if you want to keep existing doc files (make your choice) then proceed to install win 10 and using the internet, check your current win 7 key and if a valid one is found create a "digital win 10 license" for the current motherboard that is being used when finished, you should have a working win 10 with a valid digital license

all future win 10 installs can be made directly, (you do not need win 7) and activation is automatic apon connection to the internet

[ric67]

Hello, Thank you for your detailed reply and for trying to help me, I have tried updating windows in a slightly different way to the one you suggested, I downloaded the Windows 10 download tool, then used that to install windows all via the hard drive without using an external memory stick, is the memory stick way that you suggest better?

Regarding the cloning software, I'm only presuming this is the cause, I also installed a new soundblaster sound card around the same time. I had three pieces of cloning software on my computer and uninstalled them all, so unfortunately i'm not sure which caused the boot up message to appear, anyway uninstalling them certainly hasn't made it go away.

I didn't wish to be forced to do a clean install as although I'm careful backing up my files I'm terrified of losing some as I have in the past. Sorry I know my problem must be a real pain, but i do appreciate your advice. Kindest regards. Gerald

[SDH]

There are several ways to use the USB stick.... the one you create via Microsoft's W10 install site.  At least until recently if you had an official HP W7Pro64 licensed operating system on your workstation that stick would allow you to install W10Pro64 equivalent gratis due to the MS/HP coordination.Hopefully that will still be allowed.  I have tended to use that stick to upgrade from a running OS.... I just navigate to the stick and its setup.exe launcher.  I do all the W7 updates before that and disk clean.... everything to make it have a clean W7 OS to work from.  Yours is not clean, and you don't know how to clean it.

That stick is bootable.  Boot into that and then you will have a clean OS running during the upgrade process.  That should get you over the hump of your very strange software.  The process will likely ask you for a license.  You do not have a W10 license so you have to say you don't have one, but the upgrade process later should recognize you have a valid W7Pro64 license present on your hard drive, and gift you a "digital license".  That motherboard will then become auto-registered at the MS W10 licensing servers via its UUID and forever be listed as eligible for W10Pro64 clean installs, etc.  You don't get a license number.... it just works.

You should learn about how to identify software and uninstall it, and you will be very pleased once you get this all accomplished to get a boot SSD drive installed.