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Microsoft => Microsoft Windows => Windows Vista and 7 => Topic started by: Novel8 on February 07, 2018, 08:13:26 AM

Title: Recovery partiton?
Post by: Novel8 on February 07, 2018, 08:13:26 AM
First off, how does a Recovery partition get installed? What is it? How do i see the contents of it, if any are there? Just what is its purpose? Disk Manager shows it at 450mb's size. I have a dual OS on one HD, win 7 & win 10
Title: Re: Recovery partiton?
Post by: patio on February 07, 2018, 08:16:00 AM
It's purpose is to restore the PC back to Day 1 status should all other repair methods fail...
It is normally hidden...for good reason and shouldn't be written to or messed with...

It will contain whichever Win ver. the PC shipped with...
Title: Re: Recovery partiton?
Post by: SuperDave on February 07, 2018, 10:01:22 AM
Quote
It is normally hidden...for good reason and shouldn't be written to or messed with...
It is normally created on the D partition in plain sight but should not be used unless necessary.
Title: Re: Recovery partiton?
Post by: Geek-9pm on February 07, 2018, 12:42:50 PM
Question.
The version of Windows 10 I not have does not seem to hive a recovery partition.
Is it possible for make one?
Title: Re: Recovery partiton?
Post by: Mark. on February 07, 2018, 01:51:56 PM
if there is a recovery partition, it gets created during the initial install of the OS.
go to Control Panel, Admin Tools, Computer Management, Disk Management and you should see it.

if there isn't one, you can't manually make one.
Title: Re: Recovery partiton?
Post by: BC_Programmer on February 07, 2018, 02:47:08 PM
There are a few different kinds of recovery partition.

The first is an OEM recovery partition. These are the recovery partition that is on the hard disk of a laptop or desktop you buy from a manufacturer like Dell or HP. They are used alongside tools provided as part of the installation to create recovery DVDs as well as to perform a Factory Restore. For example, my Lenovo Thinkpad T550 came with Windows 8 Home and therefore had a partition that would be utilized if I wanted to do a Factory Restore.

Another kind is installed by Windows 10. (possibly Windows 8 as well). This is a Windows Recovery Environment and will be booted if the system fails to boot a specified number of times. It is a good idea to keep this one around as it will provide some capability to troubleshoot the system if it encounters boot issues. it is also necessary to access a few boot options.

A "Third" kind is sort of unusual, in that some motherboards actually provide the capability to create a "recovery" partition. With those motherboards you could install your OS environment and the desired programs onto a partition, while leaving unallocated/unpartitioned space on the drive, then enter the System BIOS and create a recovery Partition out of that installation that you can "factory reset" using the BIOS later, wiping the existing data on the drive and restoring it to how it was when you created the image.