Help Needed! Windows 8 Setup Keeps Restarting

[Harry]

I'm trying to install Windows 8 on my friend's Samsung NP530UB with a bootable USB drive (I used Windows 7 USB Download Tool to create it with a Windows 8 ISO).

Trying to install it to a fresh partition, the first part of the setup completes but when the computer restarts the setup resets and starts again.

I have the USB drive set to boot first in the BIOS. If I try to change the boot order to the HDD after the first part of the installation finishes I get lots of flashing text saying "Operating System Missing".

Any ideas? I'm stumped and if I can't get an OS back on there my friend won't be very happy with me.

Thanks.

[charlesr]

Are there other partitions on the HDD? It sounds like the HDD bootstrap thingy is not understanding that the new partition needs to be the primary boot partition. Can you install to a fresh HDD instead?

[Harry]

Yes, there is 3 partitions.

Drive 0 Partition 1 = 500GB HDD (Primary)
Drive 1 Partition 1 = 350MB (System)
Drive 1 Partition 2 = 16GB SSD (Primary)

I've tried installing it to both the HDD & SDD and setup keeps restarting on both.

[Harry]

The first time I did it, I formatted and deleted all partitions because my mate wanted to start fresh, I've done that on my laptop without a problem but I think deleting them on his has caused this problem.

The troubleshooting bit says the hard drive is missing a partition and is locked. Please help.