Corrupt graphics during Windows 8 installation

So, I've prepared flash drive with Windows 8 Pro x64, booted from it (HDD was completely clean) and seeing something like this:

Proceeding with installation this way, after first reboot display goes into "sleep" mode.

The graphic adapter is NVidia GeForce 7300 GS, it is fully working (Windows 7 x64 and Ubuntu 12.10 works fine, even under load)

What can I do about this (getting another video card/using x86 is not an option)? Thanks in advance.

Solution 1:

Wow, never seen anything like it before; but since it happens in Windows 8 and you haven't experienced it in 7 it could be an incompatibility between your graphics card and the stock driver that comes with Windows 8.

You can give this a try, this process would integrate the latest NVIDIA drivers in the Windows 8 image, so they would probably be chosen instead of stock ones:

1. Download the latest drivers for your card and have them extracted in a folder (beware if it is a mobile or a desktop system not to download the wrong package).

2. Extract the contents of the Windows 8 DVD to a place where with write access. Since you have it in a USB stick you can probably use that already.

3. Create an empty directory, it will be used to mount the installation image.

4. Open a command prompt (I used an elevated one) and mount the installation image:

   dism /mount-wim /wimfile:"path-to-install.wim" /index:1 /mountdir:"dir"
   

   Where path-to-install.wim is the full path to the file install.wim which is inside the directory sources where you extracted the contents of the DVD. dir is the path to the directory you created, the execution of that command will mount the image there. Use index 1 for the Pro edition of Windows 8 and 2 for the Core one.

   Expected output:

   Mounting image
   [==========================100.0%==========================]
   The operation completed successfully.
   

5. Integrate the drivers into the image:

   dism /image:"dir" /add-driver /driver:"nvidia-path" /recurse
   

   Where dir is the same as before and nvidia-path is the path to the main folder where the NVIDIA drivers were extracted. /recurse is used to parse all the directories and integrate all drivers.

   Expected output:

   Searching for driver packages to install...
   Found 38 driver package(s) to install.
   Installing 1 of 38 - D:\NVIDIA\Display.Driver\nvaa.inf: The driver package was successfully installed.
   Installing 2 of 38 - D:\NVIDIA\Display.Driver\nvac.inf: The driver package was successfully installed.
   Installing 3 of 38 - D:\NVIDIA\Display.Driver\nvam.inf: The driver package was successfully installed.
   Installing 4 of 38 - D:\NVIDIA\Display.Driver\nvao.inf: The driver package was successfully installed.
   Installing 5 of 38 - D:\NVIDIA\Display.Driver\nvar.inf: The driver package was successfully installed.
   Installing 6 of 38 - D:\NVIDIA\Display.Driver\nvbl.inf: The driver package was successfully installed.
   Installing 7 of 38 - D:\NVIDIA\Display.Driver\nvct.inf: The driver package was successfully installed.
   Installing 8 of 38 - D:\NVIDIA\Display.Driver\nvcv.inf: The driver package was successfully installed.
   Installing 9 of 38 - D:\NVIDIA\Display.Driver\nvdm.inf: The driver package was successfully installed.
   Installing 10 of 38 - D:\NVIDIA\Display.Driver\NVFM.inf: The driver package was successfully installed.
   Installing 11 of 38 - D:\NVIDIA\Display.Driver\NVFU.inf: The driver package was successfully installed.
   Installing 12 of 38 - D:\NVIDIA\Display.Driver\nvfx.inf: The driver package was successfully installed.
   Installing 13 of 38 - D:\NVIDIA\Display.Driver\nvgb.inf: The driver package was successfully installed.
   Installing 14 of 38 - D:\NVIDIA\Display.Driver\nvhm.inf: The driver package was successfully installed.
   Installing 15 of 38 - D:\NVIDIA\Display.Driver\nviv.inf: The driver package was successfully installed.
   Installing 16 of 38 - D:\NVIDIA\Display.Driver\nvlbh.inf: The driver package was successfully installed.
   Installing 17 of 38 - D:\NVIDIA\Display.Driver\nvlo.inf: The driver package was successfully installed.
   Installing 18 of 38 - D:\NVIDIA\Display.Driver\NVLT.inf: The driver package was successfully installed.
   Installing 19 of 38 - D:\NVIDIA\Display.Driver\NVMI.inf: The driver package was successfully installed.
   Installing 20 of 38 - D:\NVIDIA\Display.Driver\nvmm.inf: The driver package was successfully installed.
   Installing 21 of 38 - D:\NVIDIA\Display.Driver\nvmt.inf: The driver package was successfully installed.
   Installing 22 of 38 - D:\NVIDIA\Display.Driver\nvpm.inf: The driver package was successfully installed.
   Installing 23 of 38 - D:\NVIDIA\Display.Driver\nvqn.inf: The driver package was successfully installed.
   Installing 24 of 38 - D:\NVIDIA\Display.Driver\nvqu.inf: The driver package was successfully installed.
   Installing 25 of 38 - D:\NVIDIA\Display.Driver\nvsm.inf: The driver package was successfully installed.
   Installing 26 of 38 - D:\NVIDIA\Display.Driver\nvszc.inf: The driver package was successfully installed.
   Installing 27 of 38 - D:\NVIDIA\Display.Driver\nvszn.inf: The driver package was successfully installed.
   Installing 28 of 38 - D:\NVIDIA\Display.Driver\nvszq.inf: The driver package was successfully installed.
   Installing 29 of 38 - D:\NVIDIA\Display.Driver\nvszw.inf: The driver package was successfully installed.
   Installing 30 of 38 - D:\NVIDIA\Display.Driver\nvtd.inf: The driver package was successfully installed.
   Installing 31 of 38 - D:\NVIDIA\Display.Driver\nvtm.inf: The driver package was successfully installed.
   Installing 32 of 38 - D:\NVIDIA\Display.Driver\nvtq.INF: The driver package was successfully installed.
   Installing 33 of 38 - D:\NVIDIA\Display.Driver\nvts.inf: The driver package was successfully installed.
   Installing 34 of 38 - D:\NVIDIA\Display.Driver\nvtw.inf: The driver package was successfully installed.
   Installing 35 of 38 - D:\NVIDIA\Display.Driver\nvvd.inf: The driver package was successfully installed.
   Installing 36 of 38 - D:\NVIDIA\Display.Driver\nvwi.inf: The driver package was successfully installed.
   Installing 37 of 38 - D:\NVIDIA\HDAudio\nvhda.inf: The driver package was successfully installed.
   Installing 38 of 38 - D:\NVIDIA\NV3DVisionUSB.Driver\nvstusb.inf: The driver package was successfully installed.
   The operation completed successfully.
   

6. DISM can do all sort of things, execute dism /? or dism /image:"dir" /? for more info but that's out of the scope of this walkthrough. After the process finishes commit the changes to the wim file and unmount it:

   dism /umount-wim /mountdir:"dir" /commit

   Expected output:

   Image File : D:\Temp\install.wim
   Image Index : 1
   Saving image
   [==========================100.0%==========================]
   Unmounting image
   [==========================100.0%==========================]
   The operation completed successfully.
   

   (dism /commit-wim /mountdir:"dir" would commit the changes only)

7. Once it is done recreate the Windows 8 DVD with the updated image (install.wim file) by using any image editing utilities, create it anew from the directory you extracted its contents with oscdimg for example or copy install.wim to the USB stick you'll use for the installation, it would have grown a bit.

After all this, try to install Windows 8. Through the installation you may still see those graphic inconsistencies since the drivers were integrated in the image itself, but hopefully after the reboot at the driver install phase the updated drivers will be used.

Given that graphic drivers are usually much more complex than other kind of drivers I don't know to what extent they could be integrated this way, you would probably have to execute the installation program in the regular manner after the system is installed even if it worked.

If it doesn't work, you may try integrating motherboard drivers, or maybe contacting Microsoft directly. Also, it wouldn't be a clean install but you could try installing a previous version of Windows and performing an upgrade.