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Alright so this is a stretch forum but @lostinlodos knows like everything...

Got a couple of computers for free to recycle. But they were still serviceable so I wanted to flip them. One I did right...one not so much lol the hard drive had Ubuntu installed on it. I tried to install windows and I don’t know what I did but somewhere in there I deleted a partition, started the install, the install stalled at 97% and ever since I can’t get it to boot to even do a new install. The partitions arent recognized. Getting no filesystem found, error unknown grub rescue, etc. i don’t care to recover anything, just make the hard drive serviceable again so I can install windows. Steps I found online all assumed a boot record could be found but I don’t have the same luck.

I know enough to be dangerous (apparently lol) but try to keep responses dumbed down and easy to follow

With leaving Linux, hard drive issues are commonplace.
Many file systems work in the Linux environment. Some are containerised (much like Apple’s APFS). And having other tools, especially Windows PE, see all various aspects, doesn’t always work.
If various standard tools and installers have issues try gParted. they also offer a live cd image or live USB.
I’ve used that to recover from Uber borked installs. Just delete all partitions and then create a new one. I suggest using ext3 as the partition and then letting windows do NTFS. The open NTFS library is flaky. Going to true windows should use Microsoft’s own legitimate NTFS platform. Ext3 is ‘supported’ under windows and any windows disc or usb from 7 or later will at the minimum see the drive.
The point of doing a new partition here is to make sure there’s no remanent of any boot loader left behind that’s not overwritten. A minimalist safety net of sorts.

That is assuming you can boot off a USB/live CD.
If you can’t boot off a live disc or USB now, you have a larger issue than a botched OS install. Which would require a bit more digging to look into. And another longer post so try this first.

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Quick note: I’m assuming this is some sort of PC or Mac. Thus having an x86 processor (Intel, AMD, etc) and not some sort of Sparc cpu. Or other Risc chip. If it’s a small form factor or thin client (little boxes) it may also be a risc processor.
Just a generic FYI.
Consumer Windows prior to 10 will choke on anything other than X86 and 10 or RT can run on ARM and some other RISC CPUs.

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By a live Cd do you mean the windows install disk?

Don’t know if these images provide any clarity into the mess I’ve created lol

(Pics are apparently in reverse order sorry about that - and rotated, too, how fun)

Yes. That’s a good sign. No hardware issues. (Except the hard disk that is).

Live disc: Any disc you can boot off of and run from.
The gParted image can be downloaded and copied to usb or Cd/DVD for booting the same way you would the windows disc. Gives it much better control over the disk drives. Just click on the software name above,
I linked directly to their site for you.

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And yes the images confirm what I thought. Just a partition container issue.
Done that myself before coming from Linux, Unix and others to a new windows install. Windows isn’t very good at dealing with partitioning in general. And very bad at mixed and multi part partition file systems.

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Ok I don’t know what’s going on...see images.

First screen says to tab to edit options. As soon as I tab the screen goes to what’s shown in the second image and apparently can’t change anything from there and have to force a shutdown

Ok tried again and now I’m in gparted

What specifically do I do here?

Ok more progress made....and now stuck on installation after inputting the product key (which you may recall was NOT an issue at the beginning of this process...as mentioned before the install got up to 97% before locking up)

Ideas?