Resolved No boot device available when booting from installation CD/DVD

This probably isn't specifically a Win 7 problem, but I don't know where else to post my question - please feel free to relocate it to a more appropriate forum.

I wanted to do a clean installation of Win 7 Home Premium (64 bit), but Dell no longer gives you the option of getting an installation disk with a new computer. So I downloaded the OS from a couple of different internet sites (planning to use my own product key during installation), burned the .iso disks (one from each site, just so as to have an extra one to fall back on), and with much trepidation set out to attempt the installation today.

I successfully ran Acronis Disk Director "recovery disk" from a bootable CD, and deleted the existing partitions (backups all taken care of - I'm not worried about having lost anything in *that* regard). Removed the Acronis disk, put in one of the installation disks (.iso) that I'd created, and got the following message:

No boot device available. Press any key to reboot the system​

I tried the other Win7 disk I created, but I get the same error.

I've gone into BIOS and changed the boot order - CD/DVD is set as first boot option. I just tried putting the Acronis recovery disk back in, and it fires up just fine, so it doesn't seem to be a problem with the computer recognizing the CD/DVD drive...

I was pretty sure the .iso files I downloaded from the internet were supposed to be bootable, but now I'm wondering if I've missed something obvious.

Any suggestions? Many thanks!

 

How can I write (burn) ISO files to CD or DVD?

 

Thanks for the quick reply, SpywareDr!

I didn't have any trouble burning the .iso files to DVD, and when I checked the DVDs in question (the two I made of the Win7 HP 64-bit OS), each of them shows up as a single .iso file on the DVD.

It seems unlikely that both the .iso files (downloaded from separate sites) are faulty in such a way that neither of them would work, which is why I think the problem is likely to be something *I*'ve messed up in creating the DVDs.

Still looking for possible solutions on the internet...

 

I used Roxio Creator DE to copy the .iso files to DVD. I was just going to try doing it again, and this time I noticed that when I select [make a] "Data Disc ", the resulting screen gives me three options: Add Data (which is what I did the last time - I simply selected the .iso file and it was copied to the DVD without further ado), Load Disc, and Make Bootable. I thought clicking "Make Bootable" might do the trick, but when I click on that, I get a popup that says:

Bootable Disc
Select the bootable floppy disc or bootable image to use:
Bootable floppy disk in drive A:
Bootable image on hard drive
Browse (Select an image by clicking the Browse button)​

The only file types I can select from Browse are .img, .bin, or .ima - so that doesn't help...

Maybe I should I try to select "Bootable image on hard drive ", and then copy that to a DVD?

 

You're right, Arie, I don't know. I got the links from our IT guy at work, though, and he vouched for them. The ideal would have been to be able to get a genuine Win7 disk from Dell, and I've learned my lesson now: I won't buy another Dell because of that failing. I don't know anyone who has an original win7 HP 64-bit disk, or I would have borrowed from them.

In the meantime, I really want a clean installation of Win7 - Dell has way too much junk installed that I don't want. I tried uninstalling some stuff last time, but I wasn't sure what all of it was, and whether particular items might be critical to the operation of the OS.

If my .iso downloads turn out to be junk or infected, I'll be no worse off than I am now, since I can't use my desktop computer at all right now!

In any case, I tried the program SpywareDr suggested above, but didn't have any luck with it. Then I installed ImgBurn, and tried copying the .iso file to DVD with that. When I right click on the DVD now, a bunch of folders show up - not just the .iso file (which is all that shows up on the previous DVDs).

Heading home now to see if this latest DVD will work!

 

Solved

The disk I created with ImgBurn is working fine.

I now know that creating a "Data Disk" (one of the options available on the Roxio DVD burning program I had installed) with an .iso file is not the same as burning an .iso to a DVD. Very good to know, as over the years I thought I had been creating bootable rescue disks (which I've obviously never had to use!) by simply copying the .iso files to DVD.

Thanks for the steering me in the right direction!