How to recover OS on W511 after formatting the main partition only

I have an Iconia W511 of which I was happy for a period of time. After some normal updates (already was Win8.1 pro) it started to shut down by itself in few seconds after booting. If I was fast enough I was managing to input the pwd for login before it was saying "Shutting down" and off it went.

Eventually I managed to restore it to factory defaults (by quickly doing Shift + restart) but then, after starting the Win8 freshly reloaded it freezed during the first updates.

Long story short, I managed to boot Win8.1 from an external USB HDD but none of the recovery options given by the system seemed to work. So I installed a clean Win8.1 pro after formatting the partition. After installing the drivers, the tablet started to run almost normal.

My question is, all the other partitions created by the manufacturer for recovery being intact, but not having Acer Recovery Management tool, how can I restore the OS from those partitions?

Thank you,

RedoXat

Accepted answers

billsey

The 10.0GB partition is the one that would hold your recovery image, but it sounds as if it's not available any longer. Refresh and Reset will take Windows back to a known state, but will not take you back to factory default as shipped by Acer.

You have more than the normal set of partitions, so I'm thinking that one of the OS upgrades (or clean installs) took the space for the main partition and repartitioned it to hold what are close to duplcates of the original partitions, while leaving the originals intact. I'm guessing the first two and last are from the original install, the 128MB and 450MB are then overriding the functions of the originals, hence the lack of recovery option from the UEFI boot. I'm really not sure it's feasible to try and get the UEFI boot to recognize the different UEFI image that has the code for recovery in it.

Now, there are plenty of options for trying to get Windows Update working. I'd start by clearing out the contents of the SoftwareDistribution folder and running the Windows Update FixIt that Microsoft has. Between them they'll often clear out what's blocking and allow updates to continue. Google them for more detailed instructions. There is also a logfile you can wade through that quite often gives a hint as to the offending update, and a manual update of just that one can also help get past the blockage. And finally there are some updates that have been released since W10 shipped that are as large as the original OS. They will often take at least overnight to download and install, and it's not too unusual on older machines to see times in the 18-24 hour range (hopefully not failing at the last instant with out of space messages!).

All comments

billsey

IIRC you can do a system restore from the initial boot by powering up while holding the power and volume up (or down depending on orientation) to get into the recovery menu. If the recovery partition is intact it should allow you to take everything back to the factory defaults, just as it was when you first bought the tablet. Be aware that once you do that you'll have to reinstall darn near every update that's been released in the last few years, so plan on it taking a while to get fully up to snuff...

Also, I thought that model shipped with Win 8.1 Home, not Pro. The key used to validate it originally won't work with Pro, only with Home.

RedoXat

Thank you for your answer. Powering up while holding the power and volume down will lead me to the UEFI Menu from where I can't start any recovery. However holding down Shift and touching Restart will lead me to a menu from where I can choose> Continue / Troubleshoot / Turn off your PC.

Choosing Troubleshoot will open another menu with Refresh your PC / Reset your PC / Advanced options to choose from.

Choosing Refresh your PC will start a boot sequence and, after the Acer Logo with a Preparing... message under it, a new screen will ask me for the recovery key. I retreived the key from my Microsoft account and after that I entered the password of the account and the device asked for the installation media. Only thing I could do was to connect the HDD from where I installed the Win 8.1 pro few days ago. It went further explaining me what will hapen after pressing Continue but, at this point I figured out that not the old OS from the Recovey partition will be reinstalled but the new one, and I aborted the process.

Choosing Reset your PC will ask for Windos installation or recovery media and will lead to reinstalling the new OS from external HDD.

From Advanced options menu only System Restore and System Image Recovery may sound like doing something I need. But System Restore will bring the sistem to a state before a restore point was recorded i.e. under the same copy of OS I want to get rid of.

System Image Recovery is reporting that no system image could be found on this computer and invites me to attach the backup hard disk or DVD. Alternatively it let me search for a system image on the network or on other devices attached to the computer. Obviously I can't point to the Recovery partition.

The partitions of the internal disk are like this:

400 MB - Recovery partition

100 MB - EFI system partition

128 MB - Reserved (reported only by Diskpart)

47.14 GB - NTFS Primary partition

450 MB - Recovery partition

10.00 GB - Recovery partition

All are healthy and not touched (apart of the Primary one)

So the problem remains: how can I access the recovery image from the recovery partiton?

W511 shipped with 8.0 (back in 2013 when I purchased it) but I don't recall if it was Home or Pro. However I've installed now Win 8.1 Pro and it's working but still no sign of being able to take the updates wich was the problem that started all these troubles. After 34 hours it is still saying "Checking for updates" and I just shutted it down.

Maybe any other ideas. Please !

billsey

The 10.0GB partition is the one that would hold your recovery image, but it sounds as if it's not available any longer. Refresh and Reset will take Windows back to a known state, but will not take you back to factory default as shipped by Acer.

You have more than the normal set of partitions, so I'm thinking that one of the OS upgrades (or clean installs) took the space for the main partition and repartitioned it to hold what are close to duplcates of the original partitions, while leaving the originals intact. I'm guessing the first two and last are from the original install, the 128MB and 450MB are then overriding the functions of the originals, hence the lack of recovery option from the UEFI boot. I'm really not sure it's feasible to try and get the UEFI boot to recognize the different UEFI image that has the code for recovery in it.

Now, there are plenty of options for trying to get Windows Update working. I'd start by clearing out the contents of the SoftwareDistribution folder and running the Windows Update FixIt that Microsoft has. Between them they'll often clear out what's blocking and allow updates to continue. Google them for more detailed instructions. There is also a logfile you can wade through that quite often gives a hint as to the offending update, and a manual update of just that one can also help get past the blockage. And finally there are some updates that have been released since W10 shipped that are as large as the original OS. They will often take at least overnight to download and install, and it's not too unusual on older machines to see times in the 18-24 hour range (hopefully not failing at the last instant with out of space messages!).

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