Issue performing a clean Windows installation

I didn't plan to do anything temporary. As soon as I am ready with drivers and the installer sees the drives, I'll delete, format and install right back on the current C: 

I' m still working on gathering the drivers. It was too hot for me to think today. Now I am back at it. 

Nightgypsy​  You can certainly use the D drive and don't need to wipe it.  You might even put the drivers you want to use on D.  But that obviously doesn't work if you're going to wipe D and install Windows on it temporarily.

You could also partition D and install Windows on part of it without wiping the rest.  (Disk Management has all the options you need there.)  But of course it would be best to be able to install Windows on C without having to take any intermediate steps.

ok I can understand that concept and find one of my thumb drives or go buy one. Thank you!

I don't need to wipe the D: drive, didn't you say I could use it? Maybe I misunderstood that. I will do what I have to do, though if I can use D and not have to go buy something that would be more ideal.  

Nightgypsy​  It's not just that D is a SATA drive, it's that it's an HDD, so yeah, you wouldn't want Windows on that drive for more time than it took you to reinstall on the proper drive.

I'm not sure where the RAID part comes from, but I would guess HP offers it as an optional upgrade on its Omen desktops.  So you could have seen something to that effect, and the RAID driver, and put them together.  I wouldn't know.

You can't put other data on a bootable installer, I mean not if you want to access the data.  The only thing you could do is partition the drive you're using before creating the bootable installer, then create the installer on one partition and use the other for whatever else you want to store.

So I just went in to my bios to check on the drive configuration and now I am really confused. The drives are not set up as raid. There has to be something, somewhere that said they were. I wouldn't just make that up. I wonder if I could have somehow messed everything up somehow the last time I was attempting this. I don't see how though when the installer wouldn't see the drives. I can access them through disk management but I wouldn't have attempted anything with the drives while in a live environment. With that said I did find that the C: is a PCIe drive and D: is sata so that foils my switching them at this time. 

Ok now I'm off to try and get the drivers you mentioned. 

The Windows 11 usb drive is a bootable installer and the used space on it is only 5.15 of 22GB. I was going to put a folder on it with everything I needed in it. That would work right? I do have two drives on the pc and was thinking I would wipe both drives and install windows to what is currently the D: drive. It is 2TB and the one Windows is on right now is only 1TB. With my games I only have 388GB free on C: and I don't even have Sims 2 or 3 installed atm. I don't keep data on my pc as I use externals for that and disconnect them when not needed. So switching the drives would just give my C: more room. I do not see any difference between the two drives in the drive properties. and they're both listed as basic drives. I don't think I am missing anything there?

I'm going to remove my hdmi switcher and connect the hdmi cable directly to the tv. I'm not sure that would cause any problems but it seems better to disconnect any unnecessary external devices and I don't really need it right now since I left my job after a car accident and returned the iMac. 

I will definitely do the installation offline, glad you mentioned that because I might have forgotten. I'll have to go back and get the other drivers you mentioned. I thought I could just get those afterwards. The problem is even though they know my machine, they show all of this different stuff that is meant for different machines. If I use the option for them to autodetect,  it sounded like they might only offer items that I don't already have installed. I guess I can try it to be sure as it would be much easier to get everything you said and know it was the right ones if I do it that way. 

I was just reading that wikipedia about the raid setups and I think that blew up my brain. I can't determine which one my computer is using because most mention splitting data across drives and my D: has nothing on it but what I put there. There is a folder but it would normally be hidden and is probably just the usual windows stuff. I guess I will have to look in my bios and see if I can tell there. I'm not sure it makes a difference but if I get asked to make a choice during installation I need to know the answer. That would be my luck. So, I am going to grab some sleep and be ready to tackle all of this over coffee later lol. I really appreciate your help as I wouldn't have known to prepare more without you making me realize that I needed to. It's bananas I am doing all of this for my darn sims lol. Not totally, but definitely in the moment. So thank you,

Nightgypsy​ Having a RAID setup would certainly do it.  The type would definitely matter if you cared about data loss, but since you're wiping the drive(s) anyway, I guess you don't have to care about that.  In case you're still poking around, this is a case where the Wikipedia entry has all the relevant information and not too much extra.

In terms of reinstalling Windows, the way I would go about it is to save the graphics driver, and all the drivers from the product support site, on a separate USB.  Perform an offline installation of Windows 11 so that the OS doesn't install any drivers for you at all.  Install your saved chipset drivers, reboot, install the graphics driver, reboot again, install any other drivers HP provides (and not any bloatware it pushes, of course), and only then go back online.  You'd get exactly the drivers you want before Windows had a chance to interfere in the process, and offline also means you can keep your Windows account local.

You do of course need a separate drive or USB, or at least a separate partition on your existing one, since creating the bootable installer erases anything else on that drive.

If you were to perform an online installation, Windows would definitely attempt to install the graphics and chipset drivers it found suitable, which you could replace later, so it's probably fine but maybe not as clean an approach as you're looking for.

I actually thumped myself and made my brain work and figured it out. In theory anyway. I uninstalled my av and firewall and turned off secure boot for now. I had to go to HP website and download my raid drivers and now I need to follow some instructions to extract the driver(s) from that .exe file and put them on my windows usb stick so that when I get to the part in the installation where it should be seeing my drives, I will be able to use the button to have it locate and load the driver(s). I have been stumped as to why it could not see my drives and forgot they are set up as raid. This is my first time with that so not really sure what the difference is. I suppose I should look it up as I feel like a dope not understanding my own system anymore. Not all that complicated I guess but my brain just hasn't been in the mode for a long time now. Use it or lose it is the truth when it comes to all this and I've been doing tech support for a different company for way too long now and not keeping up with necessary stuff like I used to. Now that I am thinking about it, I wonder if I should try to find a way to extract my graphics driver from its installer as well, or if the windows install will use a generic one and I can update it when it finishes installation. I seem to remember this not going well with the hp omen laptop I had, and it got a black screen and I finally had to take it to Best Buy.

I will not be doing all of this until tomorrow evening so any tips or info you think I might need will be appreciated. If I mess something up I can come ask for advice on my iPad, so I won't be totally disconnected. If all goes well I should have everything fresh and not need that DDU thing but we will see once all is said and done. I've needed to do this for a good while now so that Windows 11 isn't an upgrade from 10 as I am not a big fan of what I consider a mixed OS. I feel so much better knowing you're here just in case and really hope this will make my Sims game run much smoother if my graphics driver isn't throwing a bunch of errors like it is now. 

Nightgypsy​  You're not required to connect your computer to a Microsoft account in order to use DDU.  The point is that you need a proper password, not a PIN, because when booting into safe mode, or while your computer is offline for that matter, it can't connect to verify that your PIN is legitimate.  But I promise you a local Windows account (not linked to an MS account) is fine; I've used DDU myself to make sure I understand how it works, and my account on my main computer has always been local.

At any rate, what do you see when you're trying to install Windows from the USB?  Please post a screenshot or photo so I can take a look.

You could also physically disconnect your secondary drive to see whether it helps.  It shouldn't be necessary, but it takes less than a minute if you know your way around your computer.

I meant to say the physical version I purchased of windows is Windows 11 Pro. Not sure that it matters but figured that I would clarify