I run 3 HDS. 1 SSD, and 2 normal drives.
I just clean formatted my SSD and installed Windows 8 on it, which I always put on that drive.
However I am seeing a bunch of partitions, 4 recovery partitions. Are these normal? If not, how would I get rid of them?
I recently decided to buy an ultrabook and I got me this one: LG Z360-7416, with a ssd and windows 8 (x64). As usual, it came with a lot of garbage installed which was using almost half of the ssd storage (128GB), so I decided to do a clean install. I got me a msdnaa copy of the windows 8.1 pro (x64). So, i used a pendrive to boot up on UEFI mode and selected custom install and when i get to the select partition, it shows everything fine, i select a partition and when a click on install, it returns an error saying it cannot install on my partition (i dont remember exactly what it says), and when i click on refresh, all my partitions vanishes, even going into the prompt and using diskpart doesnt show my partitions anymore. I tried to load some drivers, but it didnt work.
I was only able to install windows 7(x64), where nothing of these things happens, it installs realy easy. I tried to install windows 8 from windows 7, like an upgrade, but after it restarts, it gets stuck also. My disk is formatted on GPT, as im using EUFI on my windows 7 installation.
Tried almost a hundred times using all solutions i found online, but always the same result. And to get even more weird, some rare times it gets to the installation part, where it says the progress, but stays on 0% of unpacking files...
Its seens to be missing some especific driver to windows 8 be able to work with my ssd, but i cant get it right, but if it came installed with windows 8, it must be a way to make then work together.
Unfortunately i deleted the recovery partitions, so im stuck on windows 7.
Recently I got my new laptop running under Windows 8.1 and was surprised with how the partitions were sized.
Here is the screenshot from the DiskManagement:
So I shrank the size of C: disk as you can see and got unallocated space. I want to attach that space to D: disk. I thought that is possible to extend recovery partition to unallocated space, then shrank recovery partition, and newly appeared unallocated then attach to D:/ disk. But failed with that.
I don't think that I really need those 900Mb and 350Mb recovery partitions and that they are useful, but it would be unwise to delete them while I don't know what are they for. Latter 20Gb recovery partition at the picture at least has the significant size to store something
My Dell XPS One 2710 was delivered with Windows 8 with wrong language. Dell therefore sent me a Windows 8 MUI Recovery Media-DVD, and told me to follow the instructions on this link: [URL] .....
At the first installation attempt I got to a point where a pop up asked for drivers. I didn't know which drivers, and I thought everything was included on the DVD (but even the DVD-ROM wasn't recognized, only "Boot (X:)"). I read a tip in the Dell forum to change the boot setup to legacy. So I did and I got a few steps further to the point where you shall choose the partition(s) under the custom menu. But no partitions were found. Perhaps the reason was the 32 GB mSATA with Intel rapid storage technology.
So I did exactly the following:
1. I downloaded the newest version of the IRST-driver and extracted the files to a USB device.
2. I booted from the recovery DVD (UEFI, safety mode: ON).
3. When it asked for the driver I installed the IRST-driver from the USB device (AHCI, 64 bit, located in the driver-folder - the only words I recognized from the forums... 0:).
4. A total of six partitions were shown: Partition 1 ("ESP", System), partition 2 ("DIAGS", OEM (reserved)), partition 3 (MSR (reserved)), partition 4 ("WINRETOOLS", recovery), partition 5 ("OS", primary), and partition 6 ("PBR Image", recovery).
5. I followed the instructions in the link (above) and deleted all of the partitions.
6. I installed Windows 8 on the new partition, without further complications.
7. I ran Windows Update.
8. I installed the Dell drivers for this service tag, in the order specified by Dell, starting with chipset, card reader, IRST, audio, video, network and everything else, and with a reboot between every single driver installation. The system, including the IRST, seems to work fine so far (no exclamation marks in the Device Manager).
9. I replaced some of the software, including Dell Backup and Recovery.
I started Dell Backup and Recovery and the program initially told me that it couldn't find a recovery partition, and therefore couldn't backup the system. Other programs in the Control Panel, like File History and Storage Spaces, can't find available drives.
The Disk Management tells me the following about my 1 TB HDD:
EFI System Partition 100 MB - Recovery Partition 898 MB - Primary partition (NTFS, boot, page file, crash dump) 930.11 MB - Recovery OEM partiton 300 MB - Recovery OEM partiton NTFS 300 MB
So finally to my questions: Should I have kept one or more of the recovery partitions during the Windows 8 installation? Could this affect Windows' System Restore (I guess not since Windows creates its own recovery partitions)?
And finally: Is Dell Backup and Recovery any useful? I already have the recovery DVD in case I need a factory reset. For backup purposes I will use a cloud service, and maybe a NAS in the future. Do I even need a recovery partition?
I have 2 partitions: System Reserved (100mb) and Windows 8 (465gb). Windows 8 is marked as the system partition while system reserved is marked as Active & Boot. Is there any way I can like split windows 8, copy the files onto the new bit of unallocated space and make that partition the system partition instead of the "old" windows 8 partition?
View 1 Replies View RelatedI am using the guide to install Windows 8 over two partitions and I get the error:
Windows cannot be installed to this hard disk space. The partition contains one or more dynamic volumes that are not supported for installation. I followed all the steps 100%
Found this Get the paid version of EaseUS Partition Master at discount. Magic Partition Manager Freeware for PC/Server users. Upgrade EaseUS Partition Master Free can I use this to copy partitions?
Worked it all out, the software linked above was able to convert my Dynamic drive to a Basic drive for free!
I have an pre-installed Windows 8 in my notebook. When I first got the PC, I got only C:/ partition so I needed D:/ and for doing this I used EaseUS Partition Manager. This is just a guess but I guess Windows can't find those recover partitions that are in my HDD. I haven't deleted those partitions just created D:/ and here is a screenshot I just take to show you the partitions I have.
I have already tried copying the Install.wim from my BIOS_RVY partition which was about 9GB and I moved it to C:/WinRec and used this command as I saw it from internet : reagentc.exe /setosimage /path C:WinRec /target c:Windows /Index 1 But i still get the error:
"Insert media some files are missing. Your Windows installation or recovery medial will provide these files."
This method didn't worked so any other too. I wonder how can I refresh or some sort of return my notebook to the factory settings from the recovery parts I have.
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 installed Windows 8/8.1 on a system with a Gigabyte GA-Z77X-UD5H MB. When I look at the SSD where Windows is installed I have one partition. I also installed Windows 8/8.1 on an ASRock Z77 OC Formula MB. When I look at the SSD where Windows is installed I have three partitions - 300MB (Recovery Partition), 100MB (EFI System Partition) and 111.27GB (Boot,....Partition). Why did the Windows 8 installer create three partitions on the ASRock system? I think I understand the EFI partition since the ASRock BIOS has a "Load UEFI Defaults" option. The Gigabyte MB does not have this option in the BIOS? Is that because the ASRock MB has truly implemented EFI and uses the EFI System Partition to store boot information?
Why was the Recovery Partition created? I built this system from scratch so there is not any third party involvement. If I reinstall Windows 8 using a new - never used SSD will I get the three partitions? If I format the SSD with one partition prior to Installing Windows 8 what will I get?
I not concerned about the loss of 300MB,why I got different partition configurations on fresh installs of Windows 8 on two different MB's/Systems?
I have Windows 8,W7,Wxp working well in multiboot. But i have Windows 8 instaled in C:but it is the 2nd partition.How can i move it to first partition ?W7 and wxp are probably on the 1st D: partition.
View 2 Replies View RelatedI'm mostly a Linux user, but I recently bought a laptop with Windows 8 on it. After a few days dual booting I decided it wasn't for me, so I decided to delete the windows partitions and usa just Linux. I would like, however, to keep the recovery partition, so to be able to easily reinstall Windows again if I felt like I needed to, but I'm not sure what partitions should I keep. Here's a picture of my hard drive partitions as of now:
Do I need more than the restore partition? Can I get rid of the boot one? What about the recovery one? And the one flagged msftres?
I dual booted win 7 n 8. now i am running out of space in the drive which contains Windows 8.
Win 7 is installed on C drive and Windows 8 on D drive. How can i interchange the OS on the drive. I want to install win7 on Drive D and Windows 8 on Drive C.
I've got a HDD currently using MBR that has 2 partitions.
Code: DISK 1:Partition 1 - C: (System)Partition 2 - D: (Data)
At the moment I'm using Win 8 on the MBR HDD and I would like to convert to GPT without losing data stored on partition 2. I'll be reinstalling Win 8 on partition 1 so I can take advantage of UEFI.
I had a 17 GB unallocated partition. I changed it to a Primary partition. It is empty. Can I merge it with the C: partition ? Picture--- edit--- A picture---
View 9 Replies View Relatedusing the UEFI install instructions from this forum. I do meet all of the requirements (Windows 8 64-bit iso, ASRock Z87 Extreme4 mobo, blank SSD). When I get to Step 7 in the UEFI guide, I only get 2 partitions instead of the 4 shown(Recovery, System, MSR, Primary). I only get System and Primary. I decided to delete all partitions and just run the setup on the unallocated drive...everything worked fine. I am just wondering what the consequences are of not having those 4 partitions. I still have the UEFI interface when I boot up so it appear that is working.
View 3 Replies View RelatedWhy windows 7 and windows 8 introduced a limitation when using Disk Management, and is NOT possible to create more than 3 Primary Partitions? However, using DiskPart from command line it is VERY possible, no warnings or notices.
Code: C:Windowssystem32>diskpartMicrosoft DiskPart version 6.3.9600Copyright (C) 1999-2013 Microsoft Corporation.On computer: PAINKILLERDISKPART> listMicrosoft DiskPart version 6.3.9600DISK [code]....
As far as I know, there is a maximum of 4 Primary partitions on a hardisk, or 3 primary and one extended, and IN the extended partitions more that 4 logical drivers.However, from any disk utility like the old, deprecated, and buggy Partition Magic, acronis disk partition utility, gparted Linux, parted, cfdisk, fdisk, or even on the older Windows like Xp, nt, 2000, 98, me, ms-dos, freedos, I WAS ALWAYS BEEN ABLE TO CREATE 4 PRIMARY PARTITIONS, but with the new WINDOWS 7 and the new WINDOWS 8, it appears this limitation of only 3 PRIMARY PARTITIONS instead of 4. Don't know about Vista as I have skipped that version of windows on every PC that I have build or worked.
Or is working like this because of some hidden reason which I can't figure out by myself what could It be, and the only thing that I can observe is that while technology is evolving (hardware and software), we have limitations like this, to create only 3 primary instead of 4 primary while using Disk Management from administrative tools or right clicking on the computer and "manage" console.
Personally I am a little irritated/annoyed that now the disk management is having "handicap" and I can NOT find a serious reason for this idiocratic limitation. As we are "evolving" the normal path It would be more normal to be able to use more that 4 primary on a hardisk, from my point of view, not limiting to ONLY 3 Primary.
Protecting partitions from factory reset?
View 1 Replies View RelatedI have a very peculiar issue; after using various disk imaging tools such as Macrium and Paragon, my boot partitions seem to be strangely corrupted. The effects of this corruption are:
1) Plain-text boot menu instead of the new graphical boot menu,
2) Long delays before the boot menu is shown,
3) Even longer delays when doing native VHD boot, after choosing the boot entry from the menu.
I have done a lot of testing and experimentation, and on a virgin fresh installed system from the Windows 8.1 setup ISO, these symptoms do not appear. Only after I have imaged the system using the imaging tools above, do these symptoms start appearing. Unfortunately, just copying my main Windows C: partition using the same imaging tools re-creates the same issue. So I cannot rely on these partitioning tools.
I need a way - a set of commands - to re-create the boot partitions, re-initialize their BCD stores, etc. so that I can normally boot from my C: partition, as well as native VHD boot.
Needless to say, I want to avoid having to completely reinstall Windows on my C: partition, as that would be extremely time and effort prohibitive, if I only knew how to re-create and/or re-initialize just the boot partitions in question.
How to hid all the partitions in the factory installed HDD for Lenovo Y580.
This is the scenario.
Firstly, i successfully migrated all of the following partitions:
OEM/Hidden partition,
C partition: boot drive/ program files and data drive &
D partition: containing drivers
from my Lenovo factory installed HDD to the SSD and to use the SSD as the primary boot drive . Now, i plan to use the factory installed HDD as my data drive. (I am using a caddy tray for this whereby i plan to swap out the optical drive and pluck in the Lenovo factory installed HDD). However, for "safety reasons" i do not plan to re-format the entire factory installed HDD but rather to keep those partitions just in case if my SSD fails.
Hence, how do i turn all the three partitions above (in the Lenovo factory installed HDD) to become dormant? I want the computer to boot up from the existing SSD but then to treat the factory installed HDD as the data drive and not to read from any of the three partitions in the factory installed HDD.
I am planning to use EASUS as my disk partition freeware.
I am having problems installing UEFI & a Error 0x80004005 with Windows 8.1 OEM saying it can't create partitions for UEFI then creating 2 partitions for MBR installation instead. This using a 400 TB, hard drive, setup with a GPT system & nothing else & ready for Windows 8.1 to create the partitions.
The first time it happened I used MiniTool Partition Wizard Professional, to delete the partitions created by Windows 8.1 & convert the MBR to GPT, then used Wipe Disk function to erase all data and set all the bits to a 1.
The only thing that I can think is upsetting the installation is that I have left the other drives in the system including 1x3 TB drive, 1x2 TB drive and a second 4 TB drive.
The 2 TB drive has "Win 7 Ultimate" installed using MBR, the 3 TB drive is empty but ready to install Windows 8.1 setup with GPT, and the other 4 TB drive has a UEFI Windows 8.1 installed but broken.
I have also tried to install UEFI Win 8.1 on the 3 TB drive but it failed with the same error code as above.
This UEFI takes a lot to get ones head around dose't it, and me being much older than I once was makes it even harder. I have tried this installation at least 3 to 4 times now and doing these "Wipe Disk Functions" every time has so far lost me 3 whole days just in wasted time.
Is it possible not to have the partition "recovery"?
Because if you look at the two tutorials:
- UEFI (Unified Extensible Firmware Interface) - Install Windows 7 with - Windows 7 Forums
- UEFI (Unified Extensible Firmware Interface) - Install Windows 8 with
In the tutorial to install Windows 7 in UEFI, there is not that damn partition recovery, while in the tutorial for Windows 8, we can see it.
When I install Windows 7 (MBR mode), I avoid this partition "recovery" by creating a partition with a name before installation. I install the OS on it and everything is fine, no partition "recovery" But here, since one must delete all partitions, If I create a GPT disk with a partitioning tool before installing, is that it might be appropriate?
I need to re-arrange partitions and one recovery partitions is blocking me. I though a factory reset would take everything back to place but it didn't.
View 8 Replies View RelatedI'm running win 8.1 x64 on a new Samsung laptop.
Recently i noticied that in Disk Managment there are multiple recovery partitions that are stated as 100% free (they are not visible when opening My Computer). (I recently did a system recovery from recovery utility, don't know if it's relevant to my "problem").
Is it expected to have these partitions? And if yes, why they seem to be 100% free?
When i try to install 2. OS on my PC , I deleted to win 8 and recovery partitions. How can i install new win 8 ?
I couldn't install because serial problem happen. Although i have a serial i can't enter. Win 8 use embedded serial and so I can't enter another serial. What can I do ?
After upgrading from 8.0 Pro to 8.1 Pro, the "Windows 7 Recovery" desktop app had disappeared. How can I recreate the "Windows 7 Recovery" in 8.1 Pro?
View 1 Replies View RelatedI 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)
All of a sudden I can't reliably play any video media on my Win 8 64bit computer -- was working fine yesterday and AFAIK nothing (other than perhaps Windows automatic updates) changed. My first thought was to try and restore but even though I'm sure I created a restore point it tells me there isn't one. Sigh.
Okay, so then I try to perform a reset (but keeping all my files) and it tells me some files are missing and to insert my recovery media. All well and good, I actually have that (and know where it is) but when I insert the disk it tells me it is NOT a recovery disk.
It is, of course, precisely that -- a Windows 8 Recovery Media for Windows 8 Products 64 bit. I am running an official copy of Win 8 (well, 8.1, but I have no media for that since it was a free update). Yes, it's OEM (Dell) but that shouldn't make a difference. And, more importantly, what I am to do now?
it goes thru all 3 disks and then says failed...I have reset EUFI and CSM & formatted drive...it is maddening....I have 3 HP 2000 doing the SAME THING!!! what is going on with simple wipe and reinstall FROM THEIR recovery media...the other 2 are Toshiba using USB...
View 9 Replies View RelatedIt's too late for me to return the computer so I want to be able to use it, unfortunately I don't know his password and there's no chance he will tell me. I can't reset the password because it's linked to his email that I don't have access to.
So doing some research online I found some programs to recover the password that I could burn onto a disc and then boot from the disc. The problem is despite changing the boot order in the BIOS to but from CD/DVD (in my case I'm using a DVD), it doesn't boot from it and eventually just goes to the password login for Windows.
I disabled Secure Boot, I didn't have anything called Legacy Boot to enable, but I did disable something called Boot Quiet Mode, and once I did that when I first start the computer instead of getting a Gateway logo I get the Windows logo. I've searched the BIOS and can't find any other type of boot option.
I figure if I could get the darn thing to boot from disc I could try one of the many programs for password recovery but I can't get that far.
My Acer Aspire A7600U-UR24 came with windows 8. I made a recovery drive by choosing "create recovery drive" in windows 8. After making the drive i installed windows 8.1 from DVD. Some time later I tried to restore it back to factory with my recovery usb. Every time I try I get "windows cannot find a system image on this computer" even though my flash drive is plugged in. I tried booting from the drive, doesn't seem to work. Not sure if my windows 8.1 version not being activated has anything to do with it (I installed 8.1 on 2 computers from the same dvd didn't realize i couldn't do that) . but I think I should still be able to boot from the drive.
I was thinking if the problem is my flash drive, can I somehow transfer the system image from one flash drive to another?
Here's the screens: at this point there should be an option for windows 8 but there's not.
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.
