Windows System Restore. Windows System Restore Windows 8 System Image Recovery

To from the image, you need a recovery disk, which is described in the article "". In addition, you will need several blank optical discs or an external drive to save the system image.

Creating a system image

To restore a system from an image, you must first create it, so let's start with that. The system is created using a utility with the strange name "Windows 7 File Recovery" (Windows 7 File Recovery). (Why not just call it "File Recovery" or "Windows Backup"?)

To launch this utility, press the +[W] keys to search by options and enter the keywords "file recovery". In the results, select "Windows 7 File Recovery" (Figure A).

Figure A Starting Windows 7 File Recovery from the Start screen is easy.

In the window that opens, click on the “Create a system image” link in the left pane. On the first page of the wizard that appears, you need to choose where the image will be stored. I'm going to use multiple DVD+Rs for this, as shown in fig. b.

Figure B On my test computer, I'll save the system image on multiple DVD+R discs.

Click Next. You will be prompted to confirm the backup settings (Figure C). As you can see, in addition to the main partition, the System Reserved partition is included in the image. On my test machine, which is now almost empty, the system estimates the size of the image to be 36 GB (at the end of the procedure, the compressed image took only three 4.7 GB DVD+R discs). When you're ready, click the "Start backup" button.

Figure C At the stage of confirming the archiving parameters, review the information provided and click the "Archive" button.

In preparation for archiving, the system will prompt you to sign and insert the first DVD (Figure D).

Figure D Insert the first disc and click OK.

After inserting the first disk, you will be prompted to format it. Check the "Don't ask me again for this backup" box to have all the following disks for this image automatically formatted, and click the "Format" button. After that, the system will start formatting, as shown in Fig. E.

Figure E Don't forget to check the "Don't ask a question about this backup" box.

During archiving, you can monitor the process on the progress bar. After writing the data, the system performs verification and prompts you to insert the next disk (Fig. F).

Figure F When the image is burned to DVD, the system performs data verification.

When the backup is complete, you will be prompted to create a System Repair disc (Figure G). But this is the same as the Windows 8 Recovery Drive (Recovery Drive), and if you already have it, you can click "No" (No). After that, a message will appear indicating that the backup was successful.

Figure G In Windows 8, the system repair disc is the same as just the recovery disc.

Now that you have a system image, you are ready for any trouble.

Starting System Restore from an Image

In the event of a hard drive failure, you can use the System Image Recovery tool available on the recovery drive. My recovery disc was created on a USB drive, but it could just as well be a CD / DVD (as part of the experiment, I also booted the system from an optical recovery disc - the results were the same).

After booting the computer from the recovery disk and reaching the choice of action, click the "Diagnostics" button (Troubleshoot, Fig. H).

Figure H On the action selection screen, click the Diagnostics button.

On the Diagnostics screen (Figure I), select Advanced options.

Figure I On the Diagnostics screen, select Advanced Options.

On the Advanced Options screen (Figure J), ​​select System Image Recovery.

Figure J On the Advanced Options screen, select System Image Recovery.

You will be prompted to select a system to restore (Figure K). The item may be superfluous, but in any case, you will have to press the "Windows 8" button to continue.

Figure K Select Windows 8.

Recovery process

After selecting Windows 8, the System Restore Image Wizard will launch and immediately begin searching for media with an archived image (Figure L).

Figure L The System Restore from Image wizard will immediately begin searching for media containing the backup image.

If the wizard cannot find the image, you will be prompted to insert a disc. Please note that when restoring from multiple DVDs, the disc that was burned last must be inserted first (Figure M). The fact is that when creating a system image, the information necessary for recovery is written to the last disk.

Figure M The information needed for recovery is written to the last disk.

When the last disk is inserted, the wizard reads the data recorded on it and displays information about the system image (Fig. N). As you can see, in my example, the image on drive "F" was created on February 25 at 11:28 pm and is intended for a computer named "Jovian-8". When you're ready, click Next.

Figure N When the recovery wizard is ready to go, the system image information will appear on the screen.

The next wizard screen (Figure O) will open with several options. If the system is restored to the same hard drive, there is no need to reformat it (I chose this option for testing, but the end result was exactly the same, only the process was longer). When restoring to a new hard drive, the option to format and partition will most likely be selected by default. If the new hard drive is the same or larger than the old one, there is nothing to worry about.

Figure O The second screen of the Recovery Wizard offers several additional options.

If your computer has multiple hard drives, you can click the Exclude Disks button and check which drives you don't want to process. The "Advanced" button brings up a dialog box with two additional options. Automatic reboot is selected by default, and in addition, you can enable checking the disk for errors during recovery. If these options are not available, you may need to install drivers for the drive by clicking the Install Drivers button.

Figure P Click Finish to complete the wizard.

Another confirmation will appear (Figure Q). Click "Yes" (Yes) to start the recovery process.

Figure Q In the final confirmation dialog, click Yes.

After that, you will be prompted to insert the first of the burned image DVDs (Figure R). Insert a disc and click OK.

Figure R At the beginning of the operation, you will be prompted to insert the first image DVD.

You can monitor the progress of the restore using the progress bar. Depending on the size of the hard drive, recovery may take several hours. When you're done with one DVD, you'll be prompted to insert the next one, and so on.

When the restore is complete, you will be prompted to click the Restart now button. And if you are not at the computer at this moment, the system will reboot on its own (Fig. S).

Figure S If no one is at the computer when the restore is complete, the system will reboot on its own.

After the reboot, the familiar login screen will appear.

What do you think?

Have you ever restored a system from an image? Share your experience in the comments!

materials

Hello friends! If you read various computer forums on the Internet, you can find one unsolvable problem. This problem will also not be solved for you in any computer service and you will be offered to simply reinstall the operating system again. The problem is that in Windows 7, 8.1, 10 there is a built-in operating system backup tool, but in some cases this tool may not find the Windows backup image created (by itself) during recovery. As proof, I can give you my own article, written two years ago: "", if you read the comments on it, you will understand everything, or maybe you yourself found yourself in a similar situation and did not find a way out of it.

Any user of a personal computer sooner or later decides to back up his operating system, I must say, this is very convenient, you install an operating system on your computer (it is already installed on a new laptop from the store), then install all the necessary programs, then create a backup image of Windows, if after a year the computer behaves unstable, you simply restore Windows from a backup and that's it, so we come to the most important thing.

To create a backup copy of the operating system, many programs have been invented, both free and paid, for example: Paragon Hard Disk Manager 15 Professional, but many users prefer the operating system archiving tool built into Windows, with which you can also create a backup copy of the OS and place it on a regular hard drive or portable USB hard drive. But it is not always possible to recover from this backup, and here's why.

• Note: Friends, in today's article I propose to use Acronis True Image Home 2014 to solve this problem, but not all users have this program, so I wrote two more articles, in the first I use the utility built into Windows, and in the second, the utility .

The point is the special whimsicality of the backup tool built into Windows. If you created a backup with the built-in Windows archiving tool, then after that it is undesirable to change the configuration of the hard disk (that is, divide it into additional partitions, change drive letters, etc.), it is also undesirable to touch the USB portable hard drive on which the backup is located, Under no circumstances should the folder name be changed. Windows Image Backup) in which the system archive is located or move it. Often, these conditions are not met by users, and when restoring, they will receive the following message: “Windows cannot find an image on this computer”.

Accordingly, the user is faced with the question of how then to restore. Despite the seeming hopelessness of the situation, there is still a way out and here it is!

So, for starters, let's create a backup copy of the disk (C :) of a Lenovo G710 laptop with UEFI BIOS and Windows 8.1 installed from the store using the built-in archiving tool.

Laptop Disk Management

In this window, we see that, in addition to the standard Disk 0 (1 TB), a portable USB hard drive is also connected to the laptop, also with a volume of 1 TB, it is on it (on partition I :) that we will save a backup copy of the Windows 8.1 operating system ( Drive C:).

We launch remedy withbacking up files using File History.

Click on the button System image backup.

In this window, the Windows 8.1 Backup tool offers to save a system backup to a portable USB hard drive (section ( I:)).

The built-in archiving tool automatically includes sections in the backup:

1. Hidden encrypted (EFI) system partition (260 MB) without a letter containing Windows 8.1 boot files.

2. Drive (C:) with Windows 8.1 installed.

If you turn the scroll wheel down, you will see

that the backup will include another hidden partition without a letter, containing the Windows 8.1 Recovery Environment.

Note: In this screenshot, we see three partitions of the laptop hard drive that will be included in the backup archive.

We also see the partition (I:) of the portable hard disk, on which the archive will be saved.

In the "Confirm archiving parameters" window, we check whether we have configured everything correctly.

Click Archive and the archiving process will begin.

The backup process starts.

Archiving completed successfully.

After the archiving process is completed, go to the USB portable hard drive, partition (I :) and see the folder with the newly created backup archive called WindowsImageBackup, this is - Backup Windows Image.

We go to the archive WindowsImageBackup and find in it Backup folder, it is in this folder that there are three files with the VHDX extension, this format is used in various Microsoft virtualization solutions.

In simple words, the built-in backup tool converted the drive (C:) with Windows 8.1 installed, as well as two hidden partitions, into VHD X virtual hard disk format files.

The very first file vhd X contains the Windows 8.1 operating system, this can be identified by the large file size. The other two VHDX files contain respectively two hidden partitions, the first with the recovery environment, and the second with system boot files (Esp.vhdx). You can also mount any virtual disk in« Disk management» and see its contents, not only that, you can even work with him.

Now imagine the situation, half a year has passed and your laptop for some reason has stopped loading, you decide to restore the laptop from the previously created backup archive WindowsImageBackup using the built-in backup tool. We connected a portable USB hard drive to the laptop, then booted the laptop from the Windows 8.1 installation flash drive, entered the recovery environment, selected in advanced options« Restoring a system image» ,

and then you get this error: "Windows cannot find an image on this computer»

Friends, I want to tell you that there is no definite solution to this problem, and even if you remember that a month ago you transferred the folder with the WindowsImageBackup archive to another hard drive, and then returned it to its place again, then this will not help you. 99% of users in this case simply reinstall the operating system or return the laptop.

We will not reinstall Windows and will take such steps.

We find another computer.

We connect our portable USB hard drive to it. We go to the folder WindowsImageBackup, find our virtual disk vhd X with Windows 8.1 files.

We will not touch the original, copy the file to another folder and give it a different name, for example Windows 8.1.

In Disk Management select Action ->Attach virtual hard disk.

Review.

We find our virtual disk Windows 8.1.vhdx, select it with the left mouse and click Open.

The virtual hard disk is attached, in disk management, and assigned the letter (H:).

Acronis True Image 2016

Beginning of work. System backup.

We uncheck the boxes everywhere and mark only our connected virtual hard disk (H:).

In step Destination, Local storage, specify a portable USB hard drive to save the backup and click the button Archive.

Acronis True Image 2016 VHDX virtual disk backup in .TIB format is ready and located in the G:\My backups\Windows8_OS (H) folder on the portable USB hard drive.

In Acronis True Image 2016, we create .

I want to restore the drive (C:) of my laptop from a backup we created.

Note: For the purity of the experiment, before the recovery process, I will completely delete the drive (C :) with Windows 8.1 installed from the laptop, and then restore from our backup using a bootable flash drive with the programAcronis. Naturally, you do not have to do this, well, unless suddenly someone wants to quickly remove Windows on the command line.

I connect a bootable USB flash drive with Windows 8.1 to the laptop and boot the laptop from it

When the initial Windows 8.1 installation window appears, I press the combination Shift+F10 and a command prompt opens.

I enter commands:

diskpart

lis dis (this command displays a list of all connected drives)

sel dis 0 (I choose Disk 0, since this is the main hard drive of the laptop, we are guided by the volume of the disk 1 TB))

lis par (I display a list of all partitions of Disk 0, we see that the fifth partition is just the disk (C:) with the Windows 8.1 operating system installed)

sel par 5 (choose section 5)

del par override (removing section 5)

That's it, drive (C:) is deleted.

The laptop now boots with error 0xc0000034 because drive (C:) is removed.

To check, I will boot from the Live CD AOMEI PE Builder. We see instead of a disk (C:) unallocated space. Boot environment assigned a letter(C:) to another partition, but there is practically nothing on it either.

We connect a portable USB hard drive to the laptop and boot the laptop from a bootable UEFI flash drive Acronis True Image

Choose Recovery. Disks.

Review. We need to find the backup we created, it is located on one of the partitions of the USB portable hard drive. Full path: G:\My backups\Windows8_OS (H), but since Acronis True Image confuses drive letters in the boot environment, the letter may not be G: but quite different.

Opening the item computer.

We go to the Local Disk (L :), it is similar in size to the partition of the USB portable hard drive on which the backup we created is located.

We go to the folder My backups.

Go to the Windows8_OS (H) folder.

Marking the partition for recovery Windows8_OS(H).

We do not mark the MBR item, since the hard drive of our laptop has the GPT partition style and the UEFI interface is enabled in the BIOS.

Click on the button New storage.

We mark with the left mouse the unallocated space 449.6 GB and click To accept.

Proceed.

The process of restoring the laptop from the backup we created begins.

The "Restore" operation completed successfully.

We reboot the laptop and the error comes out again, which means inStop the crashed Windows 8.1 bootloader.

Restoring the Windows 8.1 bootloader

I connect a bootable USB flash drive with Windows 8.1 to the laptop and boot the laptop from it.

When the initial Windows 8.1 installation window appears, I press the combination Shift + F10 and the command line opens.

I enter commands:

diskpart

list vol (this command lists all partitions. We see that the partition with the Windows 8.1 operating system is assigned the letter C:)

exit (exit diskpart)

We enter a command that will completely overwrite the contents of the Windows 8.1 boot storage of the laptop.

bcdboot.exe C:\Windows

Download files successfully created!

We reboot the laptop and finally Windows 8.1 is loaded!

In Windows 8.1 (at least in the currently officially available distribution of Windows 8.1 Preview), Microsoft decided to abandon the graphical Windows 7 backup tool left over from the days of Windows 7.
In the recently leaked Windows 8.1 RTM network, a graphical wizard for creating a system image still appeared. Details at the end of the article.

Naturally, this does not mean that in Windows 8.1 it is impossible to create a backup copy of the system image using standard tools (do not confuse system image backup and File History backup technology for user data), it’s just that now this functionality has been transferred to a separate Wbadmin command-line utility and is not accessible from the GUI. In this article, we will talk about the features of using the Wbadmin utility to create a backup copy of a Windows 8.1 image and then restore the system from this image.

Backing up the Windows 8.1 image

The operating system image takes up a lot of disk space, so to perform the operation, you must have enough free space (no less than the size of the occupied space on the system disk) on some external drive (for example, with a USB connection) or a network directory.

Open an elevated command prompt and run the following command:

wbAdmin start backup –backupTarget:H: -include:C: -allCritical –quiet

where H: is the external drive on which the system image is saved

C: - the drive whose image must be forcibly added to the backup being created

AllCritical is a very important parameter, indicating that all critical sections of the system must be included in the backup, i.e. partitions containing any system files or components (including the hidden boot partition).

Quiet - when executing a command, do not ask the user for confirmation

In the event that it is necessary to include several disk partitions in the backup (for example, C:\, E:\ and F:\), the command will look like this:

wbAdmin start backup -backupTarget:H: -include:C:,E:,F: -allCritical –quiet

If you want to write the backup to a shared network folder:

wbAdmin start backup -backupTarget:\\srv-bak1\BackupFolder -user:username -password:userPassword -include:C: -allCritical -quiet

Note: if authorization is required to access the network folder, please specify the username and password

Depending on the number of disks, the degree of their fullness and the performance of the computer, the process of creating a system image can take several hours (in this example, with 40 GB of information on the C:\ drive, the system backup took about 2 hours).

If, after completing the backup, you open the drive (or network directory) to which it was written in Explorer, you can find the WindowsImageBackup directory familiar from the days of Windows 7 (Backup and Restore function) with several .xml and .vhdx files in it. These are files with system partition images and configuration information.

Advice. In the event that only a few directories or a file need to be restored from the created image, we recommend that you read the article: How to restore individual files from a Windows 8 image
How to restore Windows 8.1 from an image

Next, let's try to figure out how you can restore Windows 8.1 from an image with a backup on an external drive.
Attention: When restoring from a backup, all data on the restored partition will be deleted and replaced with the data contained in the backup.

Boot from the boot or installation disk of Windows 8.1, connect the external drive to which you previously recorded the backup image of the system.

After starting the installation wizard, click on the Repair your computer link (in the lower left corner)

Then go to Troubleshoot -> Advanced Options -> System Image Recovery

Next, select the OS you want to restore. The system should automatically find the previously created backup copy of the Windows image on the external drive (if this does not happen, you will have to specify it manually).

And finally, by clicking the Finish button, start the process of restoring the system from the image.

System Image Backup in Windows 8.1

Update dated 09/06/2013. After getting acquainted with the recently "leaked" Windows 8.1 RTM (build 9471) network, we managed to find out that Microsoft decided to return the graphical interface for managing the creation of a backup copy of the entire contents of the computer. This feature is called System Image Backup. To create a full system image in Windows 8.1 (including EFI system partitions, boot, etc.):

Open Control Panel and go to System and Security > File History.
Click the "System Image Backup" button in the lower left corner
Select a drive or network folder on which the system image will be "folded"

Then you need to select the partitions that you want to include in the backup (system partitions are always selected by default).

Click Next, after which the system will start writing its image to an external drive or network directory.

Restoring the Windows 8 system may be required when critical errors occur in the PC. So that the user does not have to completely reinstall the OS, special tools are provided that allow you to restore the computer even without deleting files and changing general system settings. In this article, you will learn how to start recovery of a computer or laptop on Win 8 in different ways.

Below are two scenarios for the development of events: with a working operating system and with a faulty one. In the first case, you can restore from the Windows 8 interface without a disk or flash drive, and in the second, you will need bootable media to copy system files. All methods are shown below:

• rollback from a restore point;
• using Refresh your PC;
• reset to factory settings on a laptop;
• recovery using a boot disk or flash drive.

Let's consider each of the methods in detail. All instructions are fully working and suitable for any builds of Windows 8 32/64 Bit.

System restore point

This method allows you to roll back the OS to a certain state. You must do the following:

1. Open File Explorer using the icon on the taskbar.

1. In the left directory, find the item "This PC" and right-click on it to select "Properties" from the menu.

1. In the window that opens, click on the "System Protection" button.

1. In the selected tab, click on the "Restore" button.

1. On the first screen, click on "Next".

1. From the list, select a checkpoint according to the date when the state of the computer was stable and working. Click Next.

1. To start the procedure, click the "Finish" button.

Now you know how to use a checkpoint to roll back the OS state.

Create a checkpoint

If you don't have checkpoints set up automatically, you can do it manually. This option is useful in case of problems with the OS in the future:

1. Open the Properties window again and click on System Protection.

1. Next, click on the "Create" button marked in the screenshot.

1. Enter a name and click Create.

1. Wait until the end of the procedure. After it, the current OS configuration will be saved as a checkpoint. You can easily restore this state in the event of a Windows 8 malfunction using the above instructions.

Rollback through "Options"

Windows 8 first introduced the Refresh Your PC tool. With it, the user can roll back the state of the OS to the required one. You can save applications and settings, reset your PC to factory settings, completely reinstall the system, or launch a safe environment and perform the necessary actions through it.

First you need to open "Computer Settings":

1. Right-click on the "Start" icon and select "Find".

1. In the search bar, enter the query "computer settings" and open the appropriate application.

1. In the list of partitions, select Update and Recovery.

1. Go to the "Recovery" subsection. Here are tools that allow you to restore the original state of the OS or start safe mode.

The first option (1) allows you to restore Windows 8 to factory settings without losing personal files, music, photos, etc. Using the second item (2), you can call up a menu for completely reinstalling the OS and returning it to the factory preset settings. This will remove all personal files and installed applications. By clicking on the button in the third paragraph (3), you can call up a safe environment and continue settings through it. The first two options allow you to roll back the system from under the Windows 8 interface.

It is worth dwelling on the secure environment in more detail, since advanced functionality awaits you there.

Click on the "Restart now" button and wait - on the screen you will see how the menu starts with the choice of action. Click on Diagnostics.

As you can see, here you can perform all the same operations as in the Windows 8 interface. However, the diagnostic menu can come in handy if the OS does not boot. Click on the "Advanced options" button to go to advanced functionality. With it, you can:

• roll back the OS to a checkpoint;
• use a wim image for recovery;
• roll back the system through the command line.

Let's consider all the possibilities in more detail. We dealt with the first point above - the procedure is no different from running in running Windows 8.

By clicking on "System Image Recovery", you launch a program to automatically unpack a pre-created wim archive. It should contain the entire OS with personal settings and programs. You can connect a disk or flash drive to your computer to unpack a third-party wim image. This way you get a complete system.

"Command line" allows you to run the rollback procedure using simple commands. Click on the appropriate button to launch the application. Now enter the command "rstrui.exe" and press Enter to run. After that, you will get access to the menu with restoring the PC through the checkpoint.

You can launch this menu through bootable media if the installed OS does not work correctly and does not start. Let's consider such a situation.

Performing the procedure using a flash drive

To perform the procedure in this way will require some preparation. First, you need to create bootable media. To do this, you need to visit the official Microsoft website, where the Windows 8 web installer is located and download it to another computer. The bootloader will download the OS files and create the boot drive automatically.

Secondly, you need to make settings through the BIOS. To do this, when starting the PC, press the button responsible for entering the BIOS menu (it is indicated on the initial screen for turning on the computer). Go to the "Boot" menu and set the bootable USB flash drive to the first place in the boot priority. To save the settings, press F10 and restart the PC again.

Now, when you turn it on, you will see the installer menu. Here you will find the possibility of uninstalling, reinstalling the system, formatting the hard drive. The creators also highlighted the recovery function in a separate menu:

1. Select the desired item and start the procedure.

Rollback on a laptop with a preinstalled operating system

Notebook manufacturers that sell devices with pre-installed software provide the ability to roll back using proprietary utilities and tools. Part of the hard drive space is allocated for recovery, so in a couple of steps you can start the procedure for returning the PC to its original settings.

This applies to laptops from Asus, Lenovo, Acer, HP, and more. Consider the procedure using the Acer Iconia tab w5100 as an example. By default, this company uses the keyboard shortcut Alt + F10 , which must be pressed on the initial boot screen with the Acer logo.

You will see the "Acer eRecovery Management" menu. Select the marked item.

After that, wait until the end of the procedure. During the process, the laptop may restart several times. You can cancel the recovery process only by restarting the PC. After the end of the rollback, you will receive a device with factory settings.

The names of the utilities and how to access them differ depending on the manufacturer of the laptop, but using this example, you can easily restore Windows 8 on any device.

Conclusion

Using the described methods, you can return the working or original state of Windows 8 in almost any situation. Use checkpoints to restore your computer to its previous state. The Refresh Your PC functionality is useful when you roll back your PC to factory settings. A safe environment is useful if Windows 8 does not start - the necessary tools can be opened through a bootable USB flash drive.

Video

Below you can watch a training video that clearly shows all the steps in this article. Together with the video instruction, you will be able to understand the difficulties and restore your computer without outside help.

Windows 8 introduces a new System Restore feature called Refresh Your PC. She has two application scenarios, which I will talk about today. You will also learn about the technologies behind this exciting feature.

Along with updating your PC without deleting files (Refresh Your PC), Windows 8 has the ability to delete all data and reinstall Windows (Reset Your PC). It formats the system partition (and optionally all partitions) and installs the system clean, which is not very interesting. Her sister has more flexibility, and therefore much more attractive. One of its trumps is the ability to independently create an image for a rollback!

The Refresh Your PC feature and the recimg console utility are only available in Windows 8 and 8.1. These features are not available in Windows 10, but it does have the old backup from Windows 7.

Comparison table of recovery tools in Windows

Due to the variety of Windows recovery tools, I have prepared a comparison table. In it you will find a brief description of the recovery methods and how they work, as well as links to detailed articles about each of the tools.

What is a PC update without deleting files (Refresh Your PC)

The step by step instructions below are very basic. It is much more important to understand how to use the new feature and what results it will lead to.

Ways to apply in practice

Update PC without deleting files(namely, they decided to use such a term in the Russian OS) is a reinstallation of the system. It can be done with:

1. Installation disk. This saves personal files, as well as applications from the store (but only!). After the restore, the OS itself will be clean.
2. factory image. In this case, only personal files and store applications are also saved. After the restoration, the system itself will be the same as it was when you first turned on the PC.
3. WIM image previously created by the recimg utility. In this case, the operating system and installed programs (but not their parameters!) are returned to the state at the time the image was created.

If there is no image, Refresh Your PC is a convenient, but not the only solution for restoring Windows. Obviously, here Microsoft is focusing on the maximum simplicity and high speed of reinstallation, as well as the low value of conventional (“desktop”) programs for tablet users.

The difference between Refresh Your PC and reinstalling a system over an existing one

Usually, reinstalling Windows is addressed in the absence of backups. In this case, you can also reinstall the system over the already installed one, but ... only if you can log into the system!

This is the benefit of the new Refresh Your PC feature, which available from the recovery environment(Windows RE). This means that you can bring the system back to life even if it does not boot.

Another benefit of recovery is full process automation. In other words, you don't need to go through the initial steps of installing the system first, and at the end you don't need to configure the OOBE settings (language, time zone, etc.).

Restoring Windows using an installation disc or a factory image

Despite the simplicity of the recovery procedure, it contains a number of pitfalls, and at the very beginning. Let's first define the main rollback scenarios.

• You have purchased a Windows 8.1 PC. The manufacturer has registered the factory image as a recovery image for Refresh, so the procedure actually restores the factory settings. It doesn't matter if you run a rollback from under Windows or a special key combination before booting the system (see user manual) - all roads lead to Rome.

You bought a Windows 8 PC and then upgraded to 8.1. The manufacturer registered the Windows 8 image, so there's a good chance a factory reset won't work, and there's not even a relatively easy way to get it back. To restore, you will need a free Windows distribution.

• You yourself installed Windows 8 or 8.1 on your PC. If you didn't create the image yourself, you'll also need an OS distribution.

Now we can talk about everything that is acquired by overwork.

What data will be recovered

Based on my tests and data from the TechNet library, I prepared for you comparison table. It compares recovery with and without your own image, as well as a detailed breakdown of system and user settings (note that in the Excel workbook three sheets).

Note that regardless of the presence of the image, most of the personal settings are lost, as well as all desktop application settings. About the reasons for this behavior of Refresh Your PC, I told separately.

Start recovery when you can login

The beauty of Refresh Your PC is that it requires very little movement from you. Press Win + W and find Computer recovery(in the English OS -), or press Win + R and execute system reset.

Start recovery when login fails

If the system does not boot, you can get to the update mechanism from the recovery environment, where Windows 8 should automatically enter when unable to boot into the system. If this does not happen:

1. Boot from
   pre-created recovery disk
   or
   installation disc, select a language and click System Restore.
2. Click Diagnostics, then Reestablish.

And that's it! At the end of the process, you will have a working system, and a report of remote programs will be saved on the desktop.

Lost programs can be quickly downloaded, because. for your convenience, their names are made with links leading to the developer's site (if they provided links, of course).

In my experiment, recovery was generally successful. What was lost was the command line shortcuts and the Run window pinned to the taskbar and start screen. I think this can be attributed to the pre-release version of Windows 8.

Restoring Windows using a pre-created image

The ability to create a custom image and designate it as a restore mark is served as the tastiest part of the Refresh Your PC pie. The only difference from restoring without a preimaged image is that the Windows and Program Files folders are returned to the state they were in when the backup image was created. The rest is identical.

Creating an image with the recimg utility

Windows 8 includes a console utility recimg, thanks to which the image is created with one command:

Recimg /createimage D:\backup

where D:\backup is the folder where the file will be saved CustomRefresh.wim.

If the specified folder does not exist on the disk, the utility will create it itself. And if the wrong path is given, the image must be looked for in the System32 folder (I checked this in practice by accidentally putting a semicolon instead of a colon after the drive letter :)

The created image is automatically registered as a starting point for recovery, which is launched by the command you already know system reset.

Starting recovery from a pre-created image

Now you can roll back without the installation disc by logging into the Windows RE environment. But even if you boot from a disk or flash drive, the system is restored using the image you created, and not the standard one. I gave instructions for starting the recovery above.

How Refresh Your PC works

Saving Data in Shadow Copies

Having executed the command to create an image, I immediately noticed the line “Creating snapshot”.

This suggested that the data included in the image is first stored in shadow copies. Process Monitor confirmed my guess.

After that, I could not resist and looked into the shadow copies. With one command, you can list them and see the path to the shadow copy volume. And access from the file manager is already a matter of technology, thanks to symbolic links.

Vssadmin list shadows mklink /d c:\shadow \\?\GLOBALROOT\Device\HarddiskVolumeShadowCopy2\

Create a WIM image

Shadow copies allow you to create an image launched at the moment of the system, and this is a new feature of Windows 8.

In Windows 7 and Vista, a utility was used to capture a volume to a WIM image. imagex, and the operation had to be performed when the system was not running (for example, from another installation or Windows PE). Now the main tool for working with images, DISM, has acquired the functions of creating and applying WIM images.

DISM /Capture-Image/? DISM /Apply-Image/?

Obviously, recimg uses the same technology, but does not involve the DISM utility in the process, otherwise its log and Process Monitor would reflect this fact.

Image content

Having created the image, I did not fail to look into it:

DISM.exe /Mount-Wim /WimFile:D:\backup\CustomRefresh.wim /index:1 /MountDir:C:\mount

System folders and programs located on the system partition are present in full, which cannot be said about user data.

Of the user data, only the shared folder and the standard user profile are included in the image.

As a consequence, a WIM image by itself is not suitable as a backup, for example, in the event of a disk failure. Obviously, it does not contain data and user settings. However, when you restore Windows 8 with Refresh Your PC, your data will not be lost!

Restoring Windows 8 in Windows PE

The restore procedure is performed in the Windows PE environment, regardless of whether you launched Refresh Your PC from a running system or the recovery environment (Windows RE).

And here the well-known mechanism for reinstalling the system with saving the data and settings of the user environment comes into play. The sequence in short is:

1. The contents of profiles and other folders are moved to a separate area on the disk.
2. A new system is being installed.
3. Your files are returned to their original locations

The difference from reinstalling on top is that the contents of the profiles are not restored in their entirety, and therefore, in particular, program settings and personal settings are lost.

If you have created your image CustomRefresh.wim, it is used as a WIM installation image, and not a standard file install.wim from the distribution.

As in the case of reinstalling a system over an existing one, the old OS is stored in the Windows.old folder, which can be deleted.

As you can see, Refresh Your PC uses a combination of new DISM features and time-tested data transfer technologies to restore Windows 8.

Scenarios for using the recimg utility

The utility itself is extremely easy to use, but it is important to understand for what purposes it is intended.

recimg command line options

Since the built-in help of the utility is currently only available in English, I will briefly comment on the command line options:

• /createimage– creates an image in the specified folder using shadow copies
• /show current- displays the path to the image that is used for recovery
• /setcurrent- registers the folder where the image is stored as a starting point
• /deregister- unregisters (which allows you to restore using the installation disk)

As you can see, you can create multiple images at different times and register any of them as a rollback point.

Differences between how recimg and imagex are used

The recimg utility is not a replacement for imagex, since it is "sharpened" exclusively for the Refresh Your PC function.

• Launch environment. As I noted above, imagex can only capture an image if the system is not running. This can be done from Windows PE or another OS. In contrast, recimg is designed to run on a loaded system.
• Image dataset. The imagex utility captures the entire volume, excluding some unnecessary files, or according to your list. recimg has a different task - only the system, programs and the standard profile.
• Generalization of the image. Typically, imagex is run after the image has been generalized using the sysprep utility. Using recimg does not imply such a scenario, and the resulting image is only meant to be deployed to the system it was created on.

Thus, the recimg utility does not make any adjustments to creating a customized system image in order to deploy it to other PCs.

Discussion and Poll

The introduction of the Refresh Your PC feature in Windows 8 shows that Microsoft continues to improve and simplify Windows recovery mechanisms.

Now, even in the worst case scenario, when you can’t restore the boot, you can get a working system in no time.

In this case, all personal data will be safe and sound, and the losses will be reduced only to ordinary programs that are easy to reinstall.

And for IT professionals and enthusiasts who are aware of the possibility of creating their own image, there is another tool for creating a rollback image, although it cannot be considered a backup tool.

In Windows 7, I have a weekly scheduled image of the system partition. By the way, how do you create system images? Justify your choice in the comments!

If you would like to discuss the Refresh Your PC feature and other Windows recovery mechanisms, share your thoughts in the comments! If you want to speak on other topics related to Windows 8, the comments on this entry are still open.