How to install Windows 7 on a Samsung Series 9 NP900X3A laptop / notebook

Question

(Question + answer since it took me 12 hours to find a solution)

I had big trouble installing Windows 7 (Professional or Enterprise) on a Samsung NP900X3A, without using the recovery media DVD or after the harddisk / SSD has been completely formatted.

When installing from a bootable USB flash drive / stick, I got the following error messages:

Required cd/dvd drive device driver is missing.

And later on:

No new devices could be found. Make sure the driver files are correct and located on the driver installation media.

For me the trick was to remove the USB flash drive from the left-side port after getting the second stated error message. Then click the window close button and go back to the installation start screen. Stick in the same USB flash driver into the right-side port and click "Install now". Installation now continues flawlessly.

No additional drivers needed, just switching ports does the trick.

Solution

I believe the issue you had is caused because the left side USB port is a USB 3.0 port. Windows 7 doesn't have drivers for this port type by default. I had the same problem, but when I simply started with my external drive plugged into the right port it worked no problem.

Comments

[Mokubai]

Why not edit this to be an actual question, and then post the answer below? You'll be able to accept it after a day or two and we'll have one less "unanswered" question around here...

[Koopai_us]

It's also a pain trying to boot from USB. I had to disable the SSD HDD (using Shift+1 in BIOS) as changing boot priority didn't seem to work.

[Koopai_us]

Exactly right. USB 2.0 works fine, but for the USB 3.0 port, the windows installer needs a driver.