Unable to install Windows 11 Home to a new HP laptop without OS

[Radmilo]

I have bought a new HP 255 G8, without any operating system.

Also, I have bought Windows 11 Home, that is located on an USB flash drive.

However, I can't start my laptop, since it does not recognize this USB where Windows is, with a message

"Boot device not found

Please install an operating system on your hard disk.

Hard Disk (3F0)"

I have entered boot via F10 key, enabled USB boot, changed booting options and selected "USB Flash drive/ USB Hard disk" as a first one at UEFI Boot Order, but the message is still the same.

Also I tried with "USB CD/DVD ROM Drive" as a first option, but nothing changes.

It's worth mentioning that Windows USB drive works on other computers, so it's not like the flash drive iss corrupted or not working.

Thank you for your time.

[Paul_Tikkanen]

Hi:

Did you try pressing the ESC key and selecting the F9 boot options menu?

From there, you should be able to select the EFI USB flash drive with Windows on it and then press the enter key.

If you do not select the F9 boot options menu, the notebook will always want to boot from the hard drive which is why you are getting the 'Boot device not found" error.

[Radmilo]

Yes, I did that, but it does not recognize flash drive - it says Please select boot device, enter to select an option, but there are no options given.

[Paul_Tikkanen]

Try this:

Go into the BIOS and disable secure boot.

Then see if the EFI USB flash drive shows up.

If not, download the W11 ISO file from the link below (3rd option).

Download Windows 11 (microsoft.com)

Use the free Rufus utility to transfer the ISO file to a USB flash drive so that it is bootable.

Rufus - Create bootable USB drives the easy way

Set the Rufus menu up exactly as you see it in the illustration for Windows installations.

Hopefully that will work because if not, unfortunately, I don't have any other ideas you can try.

[Radmilo]

Thank you. I've managed to start the installation with quite a bizarre solution - i copied all the data from the original USB to another clean USB, and the computer recognized it. I don't know why it didn't recognize the original one.

[Paul_Tikkanen]

You're very welcome.

Glad you were able to install W11 on your notebook.