Older HP G6, hard drive crashed .When using the recovery disks on a new HDD I am getting an error.

[traumajohn]

Hello,

I am helping my friend that has an older HP G6.  It is a G6-The hard drive crashed. When using the recovery disks on a new HDD I am getting an error. The error is Sysprep was not launched properly. The process will casuse CTO panic because the image might not be normal. There is no legacy setting in Bios and I have tried three times now to get it to install successfully.  Any assitance would be appreciated. Not sure what to do next. new HDD and fresh install attempt.

Regards,

john

[Paul_Tikkanen · Accepted solution]

Hi, John:

There isn't much you can do when the recovery disks don't work.

The only suggestion I can offer is if you can still read all 25 characters of the W7 product key on the PC's case, would be to make a bootable W7 installation flash drive.

Here is the link to the W7 Home Premium 64 bit English (US) ISO file.   The link will be good for 24 hours from the time of this reply.

https://download.microsoft.com/download/E/A/8/EA804D86-C3DF-4719-9966-6A66C9306598/7601.24214.180801... 

Use the Microsoft tool that I zipped up and attached below that you will need to transfer the ISO file to a USB flash drive so that it is bootable, or you can use the free Rufus utility for that as well.

Rufus - Create bootable USB drives the easy way

The ISO file is an August 2018 refresh of the installation media, so it is too large to fit on a standard 4.7 GB DVD.

After W7 has completed installing you can install the drivers and available software from the g6-1d00, since HP has retired support for the G6-1cxx model series.

Do not use any of the BIOS or firmware files though.

HP Pavilion g6-1d00 Notebook PC series Software and Driver Downloads | HP® Customer Support

[traumajohn]

Thank you Paul. These are brand new disks from Computer Surgeons. Not sure why i am getting the error. I will try to format the disks again, and installing to see if there was something from the first attempt install causing the issue. If that doesn't work, i will need to perform your suggestion. The disks make it nice to get a recovery partition.

Regards,

John

[Paul_Tikkanen]

You're very welcome, John.

You may want to reach out to Computer Surgeons customer service/support dept and see if they have any suggestions for you to try.

That error happens sometimes and perhaps they can give you some pointers.

There could be several reasons why you are getting that error, from installing a different capacity drive than what the original one was, a different brand/model than the original...

[traumajohn]

Thank you Paul. I will reach out to them tomorrow to see what they suggest besides sending a 10 pound laptop to them for service.

Regards,

John

[traumajohn]

After using the zip files and trying to save the image to the USB. I get an error. Files copied successfully but unable to run bootsect to make it bootable.

[Paul_Tikkanen]

If you are referring to transferring the W7 ISO file with the Microsoft tool, use Rufus instead.

[traumajohn]

I am not sure of what settings to put for Rufus. I don't see anywhere to select the ISO to add it to Rufus. Can you give me the settings to use to get the ISO to Rufus please? Is the link for the Win 7 ISO still good? I just tried to put it onto my wifes desktop and it has a red X next to it.

Regards,

John

[Paul_Tikkanen]

Hi, John:

I just download the W7 ISO file from the link I posted, and it worked fine.

If you need me to re-post a new link, that will be no problem.

Here are the screenshots from Rufus for how to set it up using the same ISO file...I used the Rufus portable version.

Have your USB flash drive plugged in.

This is the first screen you get when you open Rufus...

Next, you browse to and select the W7 ISO file you downloaded.

You do that by clicking on the Select option, browse to the location of the ISO file, select it and you should see the file name of the file in the left side of the program next to the 'Select' option.

It is going to default as shown above, but on an old notebook like that, I recommend you change the partition scheme from GPT to MBR.  GPT won't work if the notebook does not have a UEFI BIOS.  Leave the target system as it is, and all of the other settings as is.

Click on the Start button on the lower right side of the program.

You will get the warning regarding the flash drive will be formatted and all data will be lost.

Click OK.

It will begin to copy the ISO file to the flash drive after formatting it.

The process will take several minutes, mine stayed on 97.4% for a long time, the time counter on the lower right side of the program window indicated the process took 5 minutes and 54 seconds, and when it is completed, you should see this...

Close out of the program, unplug the flash drive, and you should be able to boot from it on the g6 to install W7.

[traumajohn]

Great screen shots. I was missing the part about clicking on select. Working on this now. Much appreciation for the guidance.

John