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I have just installed a fresh windows 10 v1909. Having installed some apps, I activated bitlocker. Bitlocker warned me saying "something" about a recovery partition not existing and how it can be made manually if needed. When I went to disk manager there indeed was no recovery partition and all of my advanced startup options were reduced to boot options. No command prompt, no restore points... How do I remake a recovery partition that windows usually automatically creates and how do I return all of the options to WinRe/Advanced startup? Edit: I would also like to add that the System reserved partition no longer exists and the one from which windows boots is unnamed.

Enforcer
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1 Answers1

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PCs with BIOS motherboards are often configured without a WinRE partition, instead storing WinRE on the Boot or OS partition

WinRE should always be on its own partition, but only Win ≥10 clean installs do so:

  • Windows ≥10: \\WinRE_partition\Recovery\WindowsRE
    (Upgrade: C:\Recovery\WindowsRE)
  • Windows ≤8.1: C:\Recovery\WindowsRE

To move WinRE to its own partition: (ReAgentC)

  1. Open an Admin Terminal: WinKey+R → Open: powershell → Ctrl+Shift + OK
  2. Backup current winre.wim:
    1. Verify %WinDir%\System32\Recovery\winre.wim exists: 
      ls "C:\Windows\System32\Recovery" | FindStr /I "winre.wim" ; ls "C:\Windows\System32\Recovery" -Hidden | FindStr /I "winre.wim"
    2. If it doesn't: 
      Xcopy /H "C:\Recovery\WindowsRE\winre.wim" "C:\Windows\System32\Recovery"
      • BIOS: May store WinRE on Boot partition: Mount Boot at Y: → Update WIM path
        (Once copied over, remove Y: mountpoint: DiskPart → Sel Vol Y → Remove)

  3. Create a 650MB WinRE partition: WinKey+R → Open: DiskPart → OK 
    ::# WinRE partition should have ~300MB free for future winre.wim size increases

    ::# Select OS partition: 
sel vol c
    

    ::# Shrink partition by 665MB [RAW]:
shrink desired=665 minimum=650
    

    ::# Create WinRE partition:
    

    ::# BIOS:
cre par pri size=665 id=27

::# UEFI:
cre par pri size=665 id=de94bba4-06d1-4d40-a16a-bfd50179d6ac
gpt attributes=0x8000000000000001


    

    ::# Format partition:
format fs=ntfs quick label=WinRE
    

    ::# Mount partition:
assign letter=z
    

    exit

  4. Disable WinRE, set custom location of winre.wim, and re-enable WinRE: (ReAgentC) 
    # Copy WinRE.wim:
  MkDir "Z:\Recovery\WindowsRE" ; Xcopy /H "C:\Recovery\WindowsRE\WinRE.wim" "Z:\Recovery\WindowsRE"

    Disable WinRE:
    

    ReAgentC /Disable
    

    Set Custom WinRE Path:
    

    ReAgentC /SetREimage /Path "Z:\Recovery\WindowsRE"
    

    Enable WinRE:
    

    ReAgentC /Enable
    

    Verify:
    

    ReAgentC /Info
    

    Remove WinRE mount point:
    

    DiskPart
    sel vol z
    remove
    exit

JW0914
  • 7,865
  • So the WinRE mountpoint is now removed, but windows defragmenter recognizes the partition as a separate drive. It also now recognizes the system reserved boot partition. Is it possible to hide them like windows does normally? – Enforcer Jan 06 '20 at 15:01
  • For that, I don't have an answer. Do you have a BIOS motherboard or UEFI? BIOS: setting the WinRE partition ID to 0x27 (#3.3) identifies it as a special Windows Recovery partition, whereas w/ UEFI, the same is set via GPT ID de94bba4-06d1-4d40-a16a-bfd50179d6ac, w/ partition being hidden via GPT attribute 0x8000000000000001 (#3.6). I don't have a BIOS PC to troubleshoot with DiskPart (verify DiskPart is showing the ID - lis vol > sel vol <#> > det vol), so you're likely going to need to refer to Microsoft Docs, or create a second question on SuperUser for this specific issue – JW0914 Jan 06 '20 at 15:17
  • @Enforcer I've just checked my own PC and w/ UEFI, the WinRE partition is shown in Disk Defragmenter (likely because it's formatted NTFS) – JW0914 Jan 06 '20 at 15:23
  • Perhaps it is visible because I'vs set it up as id=27 instead of 0x27? – Enforcer Jan 06 '20 at 15:26
  • I have checked it out with "det vol" and it says that it isnt hidden. – Enforcer Jan 06 '20 at 15:28
  • So apparently id 17 is for a hidden partition and id 27 is for oem recovery. Is it possible to use multiple ids on a single partition? – Enforcer Jan 06 '20 at 15:36
  • 0x27 is the full hex identifier, with the full identifier only required if setting the ID after the partition is already created, and no, a partition can only have one identifier. Windows previously didn't list the WinRE partition because there was no WinRE partition, and the most likely answer is that because WinRE is an NTFS partition, it's going to show as a partition under Disk Defragmenter because it's a valid partition - i.e. this is expected behavior – JW0914 Jan 06 '20 at 15:39
  • My boot partition is also showing as \?\Volume{some digits}. Is it okay to change their ids to 17? or will that break something? – Enforcer Jan 06 '20 at 15:41
  • I'm not sure about the boot partition, but I wouldn't make changes unless you've thoroughly reviewed Microsoft Docs, especially if using BitLocker (I haven't used a BIOS PC in 5yrs, so I'm not going to be much help here - Was WinRE stored on the boot partition, and if so, was it's mount point removed after copying the WinRE.wim?). As to the WinRE partition, 0x27 is the correct ID – JW0914 Jan 06 '20 at 15:50
  • I have set the id to 27. It is now recognized as a restore partition in disk management. It would seem that formatting it resets its id. And disk manager also no longer recognizes it. – Enforcer Jan 06 '20 at 16:26
  • Let us continue this discussion in chat. – JW0914 Jan 07 '20 at 12:40