Hi All,
If you do not know which functions keys to use, don’t have an OS or Recovery CD/DVD or for any other reason cannot get to your recovery partition to
re-install your operating system, but you do have a
HIDDEN RECOVERY PARTITION on your hard drive, then here is a method to
reinstall your OS.
To do this, first make sure that you do indeed have a Recovery Partition by doing
> START>RUN>Type ‘compmgmt.msc>STORAGE>DISK
MANAGEMENT. Make a note of the disk number that holds your OS and Recovery Partition. If you only have one hard drive this will be 0 (zero).
Leave Computer Management open. See screen-shot example. (If your system will not boot, ignore this step).
(NOTE 1) Next you need to
UNHIDE the RECOVERY PARTITION and make it an
ACTIVE PARTITION. To do this
you will need to use the
DISKPART UTILITY, so either do
START>RUN>Type ‘DISKPART (If your PC boots
up), if not then use a Rescue CD of your choice that gives access to the
CMD PROMPT, I use ACTIVE@BOOT CD for this, but you could
use
UBCD for example.
(NOTE 2) If you do not have any kind of
Rescue Disk and your system will not boot, then you still have one other option open to you
and that is to
Remove the HDD from the non-working machine and '
SLAVE' it to a
known
working PC, making sure that the
HDD is recognised in the BIOS of the 'slaving' PC. Use the
working PC to run the
DISKPART utility following the steps below. When done,
replace the HDD in the original PC and
you will be good to go for your
Re-install.
Once in the command window, at the
DISKPART PROMPT follow these steps:
1. Type ‘
list disk’ without the quotes.
2. Type ‘
detail disk’ without the quotes.
This gives you the all the details of your disk. You will notice that the recovery volume does not have a drive letter yet. See screenshot example.
3. Type ‘
select disk 0’ without the quotes. This will be the disk that holds your OS and Recovery Partition. 0 (zero) in this example.
4. Type ‘
list partition’ without the quotes.
5. Type ‘
select partition 1’ without the quotes. The Recovery Partition,the smallest one.
6. Type ‘
detail partition’ without the quotes.
Check the TYPE, normally 27 and that it is HIDDEN.
7. At the prompt Type ‘
set id 07 override’ without the quotes, push Enter, this un-hides the partition. See screenshot example.
Leave the
DISKPART UTILITY open.
8. Return to the Computer Management Console and you will see that the system has assigned a drive letter to the recovery partition.See screen-shot
example.(Ignore if you have not got the Computer Management up)
9. Now you have made your Recovery Partition visible and active and a drive letter has been assigned.
Return to the
DISKPART UTILITY, Type
Exit twice at the prompts and reboot.
Your system will boot into the Recovery Partition and you can then reinstall your OS. Be aware that this will reformat your system partition so be sure you have
backed up your data first.
10. After the reinstall, read (
NOTE 1) and retrace the steps
1, 3, 4, 5, 7.In step 7, at the prompt, Type ‘
set id 27 override’ without the quotes and Enter, this hides the recovery partition again.
The final step is to Type ‘
inactive’ at the next
DISKPART prompt, without quotes and Enter.
Your Recovery Partition is now hidden and inactive again.
Type
Exit twice and reboot. Your system is now back up and running.
If you prefer, you can create an image of the recovery partition and save to another location, e.g. a CD/DVD and reclaim the space on the drive for your own
use.
Cheers, hope this helps.
ticker
