Cannot Reinstall Windows or boot from USB - very strange need help.

NavyLCDR said:

Does the computer have both Blue and Black USB Ports (the plastic inserts)? If you are plugging the USB flash drive into a blue USB, try plugging it into a black USB port- especially one on the back of the computer mounted directly on the motherboard. NVME drivers are not required to boot from a USB flash drive.

Yes - I have it plugged into the black one next to the one labelled “Bios”

I have also tried it in the BIOS port

No go

- - - Updated - - -

itsme1 said:

To start the usb key have you tried, after having the usb drive in the first position in the bios or after pressing the F8 boot menu key, turning off and/or restarting the computer 1 or more times?

Yes I have, more times than I am prepared to admit :)

- - - Updated - - -

I have made some SS

Imgur: The magic of the Internet

Fast boot is off
I cannot turn off secure boot but it is set for UEFI

Some screenshots at the link below.

Strangely, even though I just formatted the M2 drive it still thinks it’s a boot option for windows boot manager. Could this be a clue?

I.e. in BIOS i can try to boot to that even though I formatted the drive and it goes into the repair lock screen

Re: Can't disable Secure Boot on Asus Maximus VII ... - Republic of Gamers Forum - 604486

SIW2 said:

Re: Can't disable Secure Boot on Asus Maximus VII ... - Republic of Gamers Forum - 604486

Thanks - i got rid of the keys and now secure boot says “Secure boot state Setup” (but grey

Still no improvement. I also changed to “other Os” which evidently disables secure boot if CSM is enabled, which I did.

Problem still exactly the same - cannot boot from M2 or USB

I found a setting under CSM called “boot from storage” and set it to UEFI mode but it made no difference.

What is weird is it still gives me the option to boot from the M2 drive but I have formatted it - so there should be no option to boot there.

It’s like it starts looping before it even checks to see if windows is on the drive

I have solved this - I found a thread on Tom’s Hardware where someone had the exact same issue.

It came down to having to remove the M2 drive completely and then you can boot from the USB. Evidently having the same drive in the slot causes the issue. I got a new M2 drive and it’s installing now with now issues.

Oddly, the old drive seems to still be working fine. I have it in an enclosure and it works fine on the laptop so it doesn’t appear to be an issue with the drive itself.

Steps to correct if you have this issue:

1: You have “preparing to repair” loop
2: Your drive won’t boot from USB bootable media
3: Remove drive that had windows on it.
4: PC will boot from the USB

Thanks for everyone who paricipated