I have installed on several Dells, this is not a "known Issue"
Restart the computer and press F2 to Enter Setup (Bios)
Under System Information on the left, does it list your HDD? If not, then it is not plugged in or is not being recognized by the computer.
Next Go to the Boot selection, Move CD/DVD rom drive to First Boot Device, Set Hard Drive Mode to AHCI. Save and Exit.
Put Windows DVD in and restart, you should see the message Press Any Key to Boot From CD/DVD. If not, the CD/DVD drive is Not the first boot device, the Windows DVD is not bootable, the The optical drive is not reading the DVD. Try the disc on another computer. If it fails to boot that computer, it is not a bootable disc.
Once you Boot from the Windows disc, choose your Language, and go next, then choose Install. Go to Custom Installation, then Drive Options. Delete all partitions, and go Next.
If Drive Options doesn't show your drive, make sure it is plugged in and showing in the Bios. Then follow these instructions.
No Drive to install Windows 7:
1– Boot from the Windows Disc/USB
2- Go to Repair Your Computer, Or Press Shift + F10 to go directly
to the Command Prompt
3- In the RE (recovery environment) choose command prompt and type following commands pressing Enter after each bold command:
i) diskpart
(ie) DISKPART >
ii) list disk
(ie) DISKPART > list disk
It now lists disk by number
you have to select the disk next with
iii) select disk <disk number>
(ie) DISKPART> Select Disk (disk number) = as listed in previous command. The selected disk now has an Asterisk next to it. iv) clean (this erases all data on the Disk, so be sure you choose the correct one)
(ie) DISKPART> clean
now for verification of disk status and free space type
v) list disk
the status should be "online" and free space should be "disk size"
‘vi)exit
4- now restart the machine and boot from the Windows Disc/USB again
proceed and at "select disk to install windows" you would be able to view the hard disk drives.
Under Drive Options the drive should now be all Unallocated Space. Do not create any partitions, just go next and Windows will automatically create partitions, format them while installing Windows.