For the first time in what feels like forever, or at least since HP brought Compaq all those years ago, I found an HP laptop that did NOT need me to remove, buy, and replace the rubber foot strips in order to take it apart! An HP Laptop 15-fc0037.
The bad news? It came to me because its SSD (M.2 NVMe) died so suddenly and so completely, out of warranty, that the firmware diagnostics said nothing was installed.
Periodic reminder: Make backups, check that your backups are actually what you think they are, and test your backups.
It's been about 15 years or so since Microsoft's first version of the Windows Media Creation Tool, and the latest version STILL needs to run while logged into an Administrator account, even when downloading and writing to a USB thumb drive.
"Run as Administrator" from a Standard User account STILL isn't good enough.
Since I needed to replace the booting SSD with another one, to install a new OS on, I needed to boot into the BIOS and:
1. Disable Secure Boot,
2. Delete the saved keys,
3. Reload the factory default keys,
4. Save and exit, then go back into the BIOS,
5. Re-enable Secure Boot, and
6. Save and exit.
Why does everyone document getting Windows on a thumb drive with the Media Creation Tool to install on a new SSD, while no one documents actually BOOTING the thumb drive?
The Windows installer gives up without an error message, leading folks to conclude the replacement SSD or system board is a dud.
The only way I found this out was by installing a Windows 11 ISO on a thumb drive via Rufus on an absolutely bonkers lark. It edited the image to show critical messages Microsoft won't:
[INFO] Starting Microsoft Windows bootmgr...
[FAIL] Windows bootmgr encountered a security validation or internal error
*beeps, then spins at 300 RPM inside a Sony Mavica*