Recovery Partition Showing After Upgrading To Windows 8.1
Aug 8, 2014
I upgraded my new refurbished Dell 15 7000 from Windows 8 to Windows 8.1. Now, my hidden recovery drives are showing on "My Computer". On Windows 8, they were hidden so the user, or softwares, can't access the partitioned recovery drives.
After upgrading to windows 8.1, they are all visible on "My Computer" and files are be written on them. How can I hide these drives? I am afraid of doing Windows Update or installing Office 365 since they extract the files on a different drive and move them back to C drive.
Dell 15 7000 specs
Windows 8.1 upgraded from Windows 8
Intel i7 4500u
Nvidia 750m GDDR5 2GB
8GB memory
1TB Western Digital HDD
4 USB 3.0 ports
I recover, my recover partition, to a usb 2.0 disc, i try to recover from there, but it only show me the blue screen options, to choose language and keyboard layout, then i choose again the same driver, and same thing again, i can't pass from here, i even try to boot from the usb disc, and same thing.
If you have a recovery drive - that includes the recovery partition - made on one computer, but have a toshiba laptop with a bad drive (but the recovery partition is ok), can you replace/copy the partition on the recovery drive with the recovery partition from the bad laptop HD?
My friend's laptop would not boot, and would not factory recover, reset, or refresh. I tried to clone the hard drive before I started messing with the disc. It would not clone, but I was able to copy the recovery partition to a USB drive.
He never make recovery discs, so could not re-install, but I can borrow the recovery drive that my aunt made for her laptop.
I read an article saying that some Windows version updates will choke if the user folders are located on a separate partition. Any problems upgrading from Windows 8 to Windows 8.1 when their user folders on located on a partition other than the c: drive?
Before upgrading I had 4 partitions for my UEFI Windows 8 install, the main partition for the system, and the three others it created during install. After upgrading to Windows 8.1 it has reduced the main Windows partition by 472MB and created a new 472MB recovery partition.
I have not yet run any Windows 8.1 updates as the drivers for my laptop are tricky and to make everything work as it should I need to install them before running updates. What I have run is Disk Cleanup, which I had remove the old Windows install.
Is it normal for Windows 8.1 upgrade to create this new recovery partition and is it going to delete it or the old recovery partition and merge it with the main Windows 8.1 partition?
Just installed 8.1 on one of my machines. The 100 mb "system reserved" boot partition is showing up as drive E in the drives. It does not show on my other Win 8 machine. Why would this be? Is there some way to hide it?
I'm trying to run the Dell Backup and Recovery application on a new windows 8 xps 8500. Unfortunately all the tile labels are only showing IDS tags eg: IDS_DS_022,IDS_DS_003 and when I click on a tile the subsequent window is also full of different IDS tags. I've tried reinstalling the app but no change.
I have an Asus ux32a zenbook and basically, I was wanting to reinstall my windows 8 back to the factory settings. My recovery image I saved is deleted and I may have started formatting my hard drive but am not sure. I try the f9 at startup to access the asus recovery but nothing happens.
I have a copy of Windows 7 I was going to just install over it but when I go to the advanced set up where it asks where I want to install windows I get a long list of disk partitions that have OS, Data, Restore ect. already on it looks like , which makes me think I can still access windows 8 somewhere on my computer.
The problem is, when I boot my computer without an installation usb, it directly takes me to the bios and nothing else. My question is, is it possible to see if I can access my recovery partition, if there is one, just through bios, since that is my only option when I turn the computer on?
I recently purchased a new Dell XPS laptop with SSD. The first thing I did after receiving it was to split the C drive into two using Easeus Partition Manager. Probably due to this, neither Windows nor the Dell Backup & Recovery software detect the recovery partition any more.
When I launch Windows built in recovery creator, it's 'Copy the recovery partition from the PC to the recovery drive' option is grayed out. If I click next, it would say 'We can't create a recovery drive on this PC. Some required files are missing'.
Dell Backup and Recovery says 'Corrupted Environment. Dell Backup and Recovery has not been able to detect the Recovery Partition on this computer. It may be missing or corrupted." (see screenshots below).One thing I am 100% sure is that the recovery partition is present and is intact. I was able to create a bootable USB using Dell Backup and Recovery (this is different from a full recovery media in the sense that the laptop will boot from USB, and then recover from the recovery partition). Using this USB, I was able to restore the OS properly. Unfortunately, even after this factory restore, Windows doesn't detect the recovery partition.
1. Output of diskpart Here, partition 4 and partition 9 both have WinRE.wim. Partition 4 also has Reagent.xml. Both have the GUID same, but offset is different.
2. Output of various commands Code: reagentc /disable successful
Code: reagentc /info & reagentc /enable REAGENTC.EXE: Operation failed: 3 REAGENTC.EXE: An error has occurred.
Code: recimg /showcurrent The recovery image configuration cannot be found. The system cannot access the configuration file. Error Code - 0x80070002
3. I also tried modifying the c:WindowsSystem32ReAgent.xml file without success. Based on the output of 'diskpart detail partition' shown below, I updated the file.
Attempt 1: Attempt 2:
Code: Here, 'WinRe.wim' is located in 'Partition 9WindowsRecovery'. That's why I used 'WindowsRecovery' as the 'WinreLocation path'.
My K partition is of 24.3GB and says that only 3.80GB is free.
However in reality, the data inside is worth only 14.3GB which means 10GB should be free, not 3.80GB.
What could be the problem? I have attached the screenshot too.
Even though there are no hidden files in this partition, I enabled 'View Hidden Items'. And the size is indeed 14.3GB only. So I wonder where my remaining 6.20GB is going!
System Info Utility version 1.0.0.2 OS Version: Microsoft Windows 8.1 Pro, 64 bit Processor: AMD E-300 APU with Radeon(tm) HD Graphics, AMD64 Family 20 Model 2 Stepping 0 Processor Count: 2 RAM: 2666 Mb Graphics Card: AMD Radeon HD 6310 Graphics, 384 Mb Hard Drives: C: Total - 281129 MB, Free - 233356 MB; D: Total - 19850 MB, Free - 2098 MB; E: Total - 4055 MB, Free - 935 MB; Motherboard: Hewlett-Packard, 3577 Antivirus: Windows Defender, Disabled
I am trying to build a recovery drive on a USB flash drive for Win 8.1. I have been unable to copy the Recovery Partition from the PC to the recovery drive. It appears to be disabled when I view it from the Recovery Drive. I have discovered that in Windows 8.1 the recovery partition is installed in a INSTALL.WIM file format. How do I locate the Windows 8.1 INSTALL.WIM file and how can I register the INSTALL.WIM file as the Recovery Image on my PC?
I downloaded the Windows 8.1 Enterprise evaluation kit and became totally lost.
I finally broke down and bought a modern laptop Asus A55A (K55A) and installed Ubuntu 12.04 in a dual boot situation. With the nefarious secureboot and other such nonsense Windows 8 install met with an untimely demise. However, I have the files left on the recovery partition (copied to my 16gb usb) and need to make an install disk. My only issue is that I can't find a way to do it in Ubuntu as all the tutorials I find assume that Windows is installed. Is there a way to make a bootable Windows 8 install usb or iso from the files on the recovery partition-without using Windows to make it? I would love to re-install Windows 8 and then setup a stale dual boot.
I have some problems with my laptop ASUS K55VD. I had windows 8, but with the store of windows I have updated to windows 8.1.
I have tried to use the recovery partition, but every time I try appears a message. Failed to reset your computer. A partition of unity necessary is missing. For that reason I have looking for some information, and with CMD commands like "diskpart". I have noticed that I have 8 volumen.
And in Computer Management appears this.
Then googling recommend to use EaseUS Partition, and some many things change. In the beginning, I had the same 3 partions in red and I don't know what happened.
But in diskpart change too, and I only have 4 volume, and it have dissapeared the recovery partition, and I don't know why?
Before to use EaseUS partition I have created a USB booteable with 9.79gb, and I had this:
But, in this days I have tried to create the USB booteable again, but I can't. And everytime I have tried to run the usb, appears to select the language, the keyboard, and then appears the same windows with troubleshoting and turn off (it returns at the previous windows in blue)
I have an i7 ASUS Ultrabook (HDD is 2xssd in raid0, UEFI, GPT partitions.) which is great but have an issue where wifi profiles don't retain and i'm not too concerned about retaining the data on the ultrabook so after attempting to fix the wifi profiles not saving (Have been through the driver scenario, folder permissions, sfc, etc and no joy) i'm just going to do a clean install from the recovery partition.
I started by trying the recovery methods 8 has built in, refresh the files, but fails without an error and makes no changes. Attempted to do a full restore via 8 recovery also but fails with no error also and then I realized I was actually missing the OEM options (F9 during boot doesn't allow for EMS boot to begin recovery from recovery partition like expected, just boots into normal recovery).
After installing windows 8.1 it no longer allows me to do an OEM recovery via Windows 8.1's built in recovery methods so I created a recovery USB from the recovery partition using the windows 8 tool since the AI Recovery Burner doesn't recognize the partition, the USB recovery creation did recognize the partition and allow me to create the USB recovery drive from this successfully.
When running the USB recovery, the recovery fails with "Required drive partition is missing"
I think this is because the recovery partition is actually a windows 8 partition, not 8.1, and will not work.
Seems like a lot of effort but I want to retain the OEM key and software set (because it's surprisingly not a piece of trash) so was thinking if I install windows 8 (I have an ISO and another key) over the existing 8.1 partition it may actually allow me to then do the normal recovery.
Since the recovery drive did not work I decided to clone the recovery partition and have the WIM file now, although since cloning the partition when running recovery I no longer have the option to create a recovery drive using the recovery partition, the partitions no longer show as recovery partitions in disk management but instead as OEM partitions (Not sure why this changed.)
The recovery xml configuration for REAGENTC does have the correct GUID's and offsets for the partitions although when running this in elevated cmd it results in error 3 unable to run.
Am I able to create a base recovery drive from another windows 8.1 pc and use the WIM file?
Any way to tell what partition table my created recovery drive is expecting so I can adjust the current partitions to match and perform the recovery? When I try to refresh the files from this recovery I get the error "Windows system is locked" which is why I went for the full recovery.
I wish to purchase a new laptop that has Windows 8 OEM pre-installed on a 256GB SSD and a recovery partition. I would like to move the recovery partition to an USB drive using the feature available in Windows 8 and create another partition on the SSD for a different OS (linux). I have several questions:
1. Is there any difference between a recovery USB and the recovery partition on the SSD?
2. [Answered] If I completely wipe the original Windows 8 installation can I restore my system using the USB drive?
3. [Answered] During recovery, can I chose on what partition I want to install Windows 8 or create a new partition for it (similarly to a fresh install) or is the whole thing done automatically? I want to know if the recovery process wipes the whole SSD or only the Windows partition and if my other partitions will be left intact (I can live with it overriding the bootloader).
4. If I shrink the Windows 8 partition, can I still perform the recovery? (assuming that I have enough space for the installation).
I purchased a Lenovo laptop with Windows 8 Pro preinstalled. It came with 500 GB HDD. I changed the DVD Rom with SSD/HDD tray to use for additional drive. I put an SSD in there and installed Windows 8 on it using a USB Recovery Drive, which I don't have anymore. So my current setup looks like this:
After upgrading to Windows 8.1, the license of some software I'm using got messed up and I couldn't manage fixing it, so the only option I've got left is to reinstall/reset Windows. But since the Recovery partition is on another drive, when I go about creating a Recovery Drive, the option "Copy the recovery partition from the PC to the recovery drive" is greyed out. I've got stuff on my HDD, which I can't currently backup so I don't wan't to format that drive. I'm perfectly fine with formatting the SSD, that's what I want.
How can I reinstall/reset my Windows? The only option I see is to install Windows on the Hard Drive (by doing a backup and formatting it first), and then create a usb recovery drive and reinstall again on the SSD, but that's a lot of hassle and I'd need to find an external hard drive for the backup.
I intentionally left the Hard Drive in the original bay (as Disk 0) because of the better protection against falling compared to the added bay in place of the DVD drive.
I built up a new PC featuring a brand new SSD (i.e fully unallocated). Then, I made a clean install of Windows 8.1 pro (64bits) using an ISO DVD. Using Windows disk management tool after the install, I can see that only two partitions have been created: one System partition in NTFS (350MB) and the remaining of the SSD is the C: partition while I was expecting a third one : a recovery partition. Of course, I do not remember a prompt during the install to ask whether I want a recovery parttion or not.
Is it normal ? Is a recovery partition useful knowing I have the install DVD ? If the recovery partition has some advantages, is there a way to create it after the install is completed ?
I have a Sager NP9377 with Windows 8.1 installed. I got hit by bad viruses and need to recover. How do I access and restore from the Recovery Partition?
I have a Samsung Ultrabook series 5 laptop..some couple of month usage i completely remove my hard drive and change the windows 8 to windows 7..when i use windows 7 i realize windows 8 is much better then windows 7 so again i clean install of windows 8. i boot drive in PXE UEFI Only Mode. Some reserved partition created also 300MB Healthy Recovery Partition is Created.when i install a Samsung Recovery Solution Software it Says "Recovery Partition Does Not Exist"..What do i do.also when i refresh Pc it gives me Error "The Drive is Locked Where the Windows Installed" I want to make my Laptop like 1st time it was...
I have a virus On my sony VAIO duo 11 windows 8, that makes everything a "shortcut" especially on my flash drives. The problem is, I want to reinstall windows from the recovery partition. However, every time I try to copy the recovery partition onto a flash drive, it copies over to the flash drive in a "shortcut" fashion which hinders me from creating a bootable flash drive. I tried malware bytes and other antivirus programs to make it stop creating shortcuts but to no avail.
I was playing around with my OS dual booting them from Windows 8, W7 and XP but I accidentally erased my recovery partition. The bios i have is different from anything I've seen before. To boot from a cd/dvd i had to enable launch csm and secure boot control. Its the asus Q500a laptop. I just wanna know if i can download the recovery partition from somewhere and put it in my hdd.
My sony vaio laptop model is VPCEH26EN.I recently installed windows 8 pro 64 Bit.I formatted whole hard disk and installed windows 8.I had a oem recovery partition when i bought this laptop with windows 7 preinstalled. By this hard disk partition, I used to recover the whole windows to its factory condition by using F10 key. The recovery hard-disk partition was of only 11Gb.it contains the whole windows with some software already installed . But now i have no recovery partition now. How to create recovery partition with in 12GB for future purpose.The windows default system image creation usually taking 40 gb space. So its of no use. How to create a recovery partition which can be used to recover windows to its factory condition using F10 key in case of any error in future?
I have bought a new PC/Server to be used as a media server, I have 2 x 2TB disks installed which I believe I have mirrored.
See below screenshot.
From the reading and research I have done I don't believe if one disk was to fail the other one would work, I think I may need to mirror the EFI system Partition and Recovery Partition of which I'm not too sure how to do this?
I recently upgraded my HP Pavilion m6-1000 to windows 8 from windows 7 using windowsupgradeoffer. Since then, I have only experienced bugs and problems with my computer so I want to downgrade to windows 7. I didn't get a recovery disc when I bought the computer, but I have a recovery partition on the computer, called "Recovery (D:)". I also have the product key for windows 7
I have read that it is possible to downgrade using this partition
I would like to create a custom recovery partition for windows 8.1 that I can use to refresh the pc. I would like to include the drivers that are required. How I can do this?
I have a 64GB flash drive I just bought to make a recovery for my laptop. I made the recovery partition just fine but its taking up 32gb when only using 21.5GB of space leaving over 10gb not usable. I am trying to shrink the partition to 24GB but it wont let me. Look at the attached screenshot.
Another question is my primary 1tb drive has a few extra 450MB partitions. What are they for?
