HP Recovery partition not accessable after repartitioning

Question

I have HP Laptop that came with preinstalled Win 7. It actually had 4 primary partitions:

• 200 MB System partition that is not visible in Windows
• C: partition
• HP_Recovery partition of about 15 GB
• HP_Tools partition of about 5 GB

I wanted to add additional D: partition for data, which was not possible since all existing partitions were primary. What I did was:

1. Made an image of HP_Tools partition with Clonezilla
2. Deleted HP_Tools partition with GParted
3. Created new Extended partition with GParted
4. Copied existing Primary partition HP_Recovery inside Extended partition, thus creating a new Logical partition (again with GParted)
5. I deleted original Primary partition HP_Recovery with GParted
6. I created 6GB empty Logical partition HP_Tools with GParted
7. I created partition D: and arranged sizes in GParted

I rebooted into Windows, there was a standard CHKDSK screen, after which Win 7 booted w/o problems.

However, when I tried starting Repair Your Computer at the startup menu, and I got the 0xc0000225 Error code and a message: The selected entry could not be loaded because the application is missing or corrupt.

I tried this solution: Using GParted to Resize Your Windows 7 or Vista Partition, no success.

I also tried solving the problem with BCDEasy, manually pointing to *.wim file. But with BCDEasy I can only add a new entry (there's no entry for Repair Your Computer option). Either way, when I try this solution I get 0xc0000017 Error: Ramdisk device creation failed due to insufficient memory

Anyone have an idea? I'm refusing to give up :) since I believe I only need to point to the correct disk/file to get this working. But I just don't see how.

Solution 1

You have two options here. You could create a new boot entry, with the correct options for the boot entry (in particular, WinPEMode and RecoveryOS). Alternatively, you could fix your existing boot entry to point to the correct location.

Most BCD editing tools don't show the recovery entries for whatever reason. It is possible to edit those entries through the registry (HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\BCD00000000\Objects\), but that could get confusing quite quickly. Visual BCD Editor does display recovery entries, among others, in a friendly view.

I've personally gone through a similar process, and have more detailed steps here. You could either fix the existing entries as I did, or add a new entry with the correct options as seen in the screenshots on the linked answer. ^{I have not tested adding a new entry, and am unsure if it will work or not.}

Likely differences from the solution in that answer are as follows:

The first thing to do is make sure you edit the recovery entry the main OS entry's RecoverySequence points to. This is the one that will be loaded on startup.

The ApplicationDevice and OSDevice options must point to the location of the Windows Recovery Environment's image (.wim). For me, this is a 169,213,970 byte file called Winre.wim. Since you shuffled the partitions, it's likely the path is already there but the drive letter is missing. You must identify which partition contains the appropriate path and files. On a normal Windows installation, this is the main OS drive (C:).

I can see HP_Recovery partition in Windows and there I can find some *.wim files. For instance E:\Recovery\WindowsRE\winre.wim 160MB file is there.

That is likely the correct image. In your case, those options should have the drive letter set to E:.

I'm not sure WinRE can be loaded from a logical/extended partition. It's worth a try, otherwise you should probably restore the recovery partition back to a primary one. Or you could even try copying the image into the main OS partition. The worst that should happen is a failure to boot into the RE.

Solution 2

I can't comment on SuperUser yet, so I'm leaving an answer (sorry), though I'm not convinced this will fix it.

What about something like TestDisk - it searches for lost partitions and can rewrite the partition table to include them. I've never tried it for a boot partition before, but I have recovered NTFS and FAT partitions that had otherwise been deleted this way. TestDisk is free at http://www.cgsecurity.org/wiki/TestDisk

Comments

[tvdo]

Not quite the same, but I've asked a similar question. I've also asked this over at Microsoft Answers. So far I've concluded I'll have to manually edit the BCD in some way. I wish you luck!

[tvdo]

I should also point out that Repair Your Computer is a Windows thing (WinRE), not a HP thing. It sits in C:\Recovery\ , where C: is the OS partition containing \Windows. on my HP laptop too. I think the HP Tools is accessible through the BIOS menu, containing some debugging tools, and HP Recovery would be to restore your computer to the original HP image.

[Moab]

You changed the HP custom MBR when you edited the partitions, not sure if you can recover that function since it is part of the MBR. Not a big deal (you can also delete the first partition named "system"), you can repair your computer by booting from a W7 install DVD or make a System Repair disc, not as convenient but provides the same tools except for HP recovery which can be accomplished another way....h10025.www1.hp.com/ewfrf/wc/…

[imagodei]

Thank you for your comments. @Bob, I'm not sure this is the case with my laptop. I have a hidden C:\Recovery folder, but it's empty. I can see HP_Recovery partition in Windows and there I can find some *.wim files. For instance E:\Recovery\WindowsRE\winre.wim 160MB file is there.

[tvdo]

@imagodei Well, the only WinRE installation documentation I could find indicates it's done by the OEM. So it's entirely possible HP built their own image that puts the WinRE images onto their own recovery partition. I don't feel like breaking my HP laptop by repartitioning to verify, but if you want me to get any default values feel free to ask.

[imagodei]

:) I agree, you shouldn't break your laptop. I'd like to ask you for default values, tho - you were probably thinking of BCD entries?

[imagodei]

My laptop is HP ProBook 4530s - if that helps in any way...

[tvdo]

@imagodei I did fix my own BCD problems just now, perhaps you can use the same method to verify? See here.

[tvdo]

@imagodei Also, for the record, you must use @Bob or I won't be notified of your reply.

[imagodei]

@Bob, you should write an answer, linking to your solution, so I can award you with the correct answer ;) Thank you!