Sorry – I missed this question … I really should know better, than to attempt to put pen to paper before I’ve had coffee … :-/
From your description, it sounds like you have successfully
- partitioned and formatted the drive(s)
- copied the initial
dom0software to the machine - booted from the harddrive
but the INITIAL SETUP has failed (or skipped) - since it’s the INITIAL SETUP that
- copies templates
- creates the system qubes
- configures the system Qubes
As I read the reddit-link, it’s about how to boot the machine – not about how to get templates installed and system qubes created – so I don’t think it will help in your situatio
n. 
Did you succeed to verify your installation media as it was suggested in Installation problem. No Software/No Templates/No Default System Qubes - #30 by apparatus?
