More urgent help needed please

I have downloaded the W10 ISO file onto a USB stick, in preparation for carrying out a clean install. I have then rebooted my pc and pressed F12 and chose the USB stick as the boot up method.

However, when I have done this I am still getting a black screen with a blinking curser in the top left hand corner. It would seem that I am still doing something wrong, can someone point me in the right driection please.

CountMike said:

Just an ISO file on the USB is not going to let you boot from it. You have to make a bootable USB first. You have to use something like Rufus: Rufus - Create bootable USB drives the easy way to do that.
If your MB doesn't have UEFI bios this one: Windows USB/DVD Download Tool - Microsoft Store is easier to use.

Hi CountMike, thanks for coming in on this, I keep seeing references to UEFI, what is this and how do I know if I've got it?

Do I download Rufus onto the USB or onto the pc itself? Thanks again.

CountMike said:

Not exactly, you download Rufus to your existing system and run it, it's portable self executing file, no need for installation.
Choose your USB device.
Quick format.
Create bootable USB disk using > choose "ISO image" and point it to wherever that ISO image is, preferably on HDD.
Push Start and it should make a bootable USB.

I think I've got it sorted now thank you. However, I'm not 100% sure that the process completed properly as although the green bar was filled up as if the process had been completed, the word 'Start' was still highlighted and so I'm not sure if the process had in fact jammed up. Is there any way that I can tell if the 'boot' process was completed ok?

Bluenose1940 said:

I think I've got it sorted now thank you. However, I'm not 100% sure that the process completed properly as although the green bar was filled up as if the process had been completed, the word 'Start' was still highlighted and so I'm not sure if the process had in fact jammed up. Is there any way that I can tell if the 'boot' process was completed ok?

View the 'Stick' in Explorer, if it has 9 items totaling approx. 3.65GB, you should be good to go.

Edwin said:

View the 'Stick' in Explorer, if it has 9 items totaling approx. 3.65GB, you should be good to go.

hi Edwin, I have had a look and there are 9 items but only 5 of them have a size by them and they amount to 1592kb. However, the clean install has completed but now I am concerned as to whether I have actually got all of the O/S

Bluenose1940 said:

hi Edwin, I have had a look and there are 9 items but only 5 of them have a size by them and they amount to 1592kb. However, the clean install has completed but now I am concerned as to whether I have actually got all of the O/S

You would select all items and right click for 'Properties'.