Recovery partition

hornetstinger · 7 Mar 2025 at 10:56

Prebuilt machine, there is a 1GB recovery partition.

Does this include the Windows ISO, in case of a totally knackered C: Windows OS? Seems really low capacity.

I thought recovery partition would be 6GB+ for recovery util plus 6GB Windows ISO?

Does it mean there is no Windows reinstall method in primary c: corruption?

ED209 · 7 Mar 2025 at 11:34

What brand\make\model is the PC?

hornetstinger · 7 Mar 2025 at 13:12

ED209 said:
What brand\make\model is the PC?

Acer

Mcnumpty2323 · 7 Mar 2025 at 13:34

1GB is sort of the upper limit size
For the winRE
It can be smaller than that too
It may be a bit bigger than usual because it might
Contain some sort of acer software as well as winRE

Edit
So there's no iso or image in there

Edit 2
There may be a hidden partition
With the stuff required for factory restore
Been years since used a laptop so don't remember
What the acer factory restore method was

nade · 7 Mar 2025 at 17:06

There is likely an Acer branded Recovery Media creation tool or application on your system. I've not bought a prebuild in a long time, but I know other family members who have bought machines and they've had to basically create their own recovery media/USB using a tool installed on the machine.

The ISO could just be sitting on C: somewhere so the recovery partition itself probably does not need to be that big.

My suggestion would be check the start menu for any "Acer" recovery apps.

Murphy · 7 Mar 2025 at 17:47

hornetstinger said:
Prebuilt machine, there is a 1GB recovery partition.

Does this include the Windows ISO, in case of a totally knackered C: Windows OS? Seems really low capacity.

I thought recovery partition would be 6GB+ for recovery util plus 6GB Windows ISO?

Does it mean there is no Windows reinstall method in primary c: corruption?

No one will be able to tell you what's in it so you'll need to look for yourself, download some like DiskGenius...

DiskGenius Download Center | Free Download DiskGenius

Free download DiskGenius to recover lost data & partitions, manage disk capacity, backup Windows and personal data, and fix disk issues on PCs and Servers.

www.diskgenius.com

There's a portable version so no need to install anything, that will list all the drives and enable you to see the files (plus sign next to the recovery partition). However even with knowing what files it contains it may still need a bit of guesswork because even though the Windows recovery image will be a file called 'winre.wim' located in the '\Recovery\WindowsRE' folder Acer could have used the same thing for a custom image.

Having said that if it's only 1GB, and you don't see any other +6GB partitions (recovery or not) then it's probably safe to say that they didn't include a Windows ISO. Not that should be much of a problem as you can easily download Windows ISO's directly from MS these days.

ED209 · 7 Mar 2025 at 17:55

Maybe the recovery petition is just to kick off the recovery and to save on space and outdated files it downloads them instead.

I could be completely wrong though but as mentioned, its easy enough these days to just download the ISO and make a USB stick with it