I deleted the "recovery partition" Installing and Upgrading Vista Discuss I deleted the "recovery partition" in the Windows Vista forums; I deleted the recovery partition, now I want it back! Before I deleted, I created recovery disks (2 dvds). I also have the HP Recovery Disk. Here's my question, ......

[jkjk222]

I deleted the recovery partition, now I want it back! Before I deleted, I created
recovery disks (2 dvds). I also have the HP Recovery Disk. Here's my question,
...if I use option 4 from the recovery thereby reformatting the hd and restoring the original files, will the original "recovery partition" also be on the newly formatted hard drive????? I don't want to go through all this if the recovery partition isn't going to be there. HP (on phone) tells me that once the recovery partition is gone it can NEVER be replaced! But that wouldn't really be putting the computer back in brand new factory condition, would it?

[felix8406]

As far as I know and experienced, the recovery partition is gone. Your recovery disc is just to replace the files from the 'C' drive, not the recovery partition.

[jkjk222]

that's what one person at HP Tech support told me on the phone. However, earlier this evening I went on-line with their technical folks, and the person I was chatting with said that with the complete reformat of the hard drive (this would be #4 of the four options offered by the advanced options on the recovery disks I created), this person said the recovery partion WOULD be there, and fully functioning.....so I'm still unclear. Guess the only way to find out is to just take a deep breath, cross my fingers, and do it!

[felix8406]

I don't think you'll loose anything by trying, other than, maybe, wasting your time. I done three PCs, two from Dell and one from eMachine, and in all three occasions the reformatting did not bring back the recovery partition.

I don't like using the recovery partition because if you had your PC for a while, using the recovery partition will install old applications and drivers, then it takes a while to update everything again. Not to mention the ton of garbage that’s install as well and which you need to remove. You were wise in creating the two DVDs, though.

[jkjk222]

Thank you Felix...I really appreciate your comments. When I have a few quiet hours I'm going to give it a go. I was surprised to find that the backup option on recovery disks doesn't seem to work...it scans my system and tells me size of recovery, but then the "Next" box is greyed out, so I can't send the backup data to my external HD....no big deal though, I've already backed up everything the old fashioned way :>) .... It still bugs me that "they" would claim that recovery disks will put everything back as new!!!! Thanks again.

[felix8406]

If you are successful of reinstalling everything, I will advice creating an image once you have everything running the way you want it; e.g. after deleting the junk , installing your main software (except utilities like virus protection, register cleaner and so on) and applying all updates.

[Snuffy]

Felix, I agree with you... I have had to redo EMachine recently and NO IT DID not put the Recovery Partition back... It simply FORMATTED the existing HD space and installed the OS back..plus all the other crud, trial programs, and such...
Since the recovery partition is actually hidden, it might be possible to use a 3rd party recovery program to restore the partition and files...
I have not tried this, but booting to CD or DVD and using the program it might work..

[felix8406]

One thing that I failed to mention; when reinstalling the files using the recovery disk, the drive will be reformatted back to its original configuration. In other words, if you used Vista or a third party to create a new partition, the recovery disks will wipe out that extra partition, putting everything back to its original state. So make sure you have backup everything you have in that partition or it could be lost forever.