Acer Nitro 591G - Delete recovery partition?

Spec-Chum
Spec-Chum Member Posts: 6 New User
in 2015 Archives

Hey all, I’ve been building PCs for many years but this is my first ever laptop and especially my first computer with Windows pre-installed.

 

I noticed there is a 15Gb partition called IMAGES on the 60Gb SSD installed on my Acer Laptop, which is ¼ of the entire drive!

 

Is there any way this can be moved to the installed 1Gb mechanical drive or deleted entirely?  I’ve already made a backup to a USB flash drive but did not get an option to delete.

 

I suspect it may be part of a WIMBoot install, so I think deleting it will just break Windows?

 

I actually always thought WIMBoot was for tablets and could actually be detrimental to a more powerful system.

 

On that note, I do have a Windows 8 DVD that I used to put Windows 8.1 (obviously updates to 8.1 via windows updates).  Is there any way I can use this to reinstall a “normal” windows on my new laptop?  Will it use the key embedded on BIOS? (I assume the key is embedded?)

 

On a more positive note, the laptop is great, plenty powerful and very quick, so no issues there.  And I can finally use the AC in my newish AC router!

Best Answer

  • Spec-Chum
    Spec-Chum Member Posts: 6 New User
    Answer ✓

    Thanks for the reply philetus, don't worry about this now.

     

    I've done some research and it definitely is using WIMBoot so that recovery partition isn't going (and can’t go!) anywhere lol

     

    Certainly explains why I couldn't boot after removing it but the USB back up worked first time, so all good. 

     

    I’ve actually grown to like WIMBoot in principle and I can see it going more mainstream, even on systems that don’t “need” it.  I think it's a good, positive move by MS and I don't say that often. 

     

    Come in “having 2 copies of windows per install” your times up!

Answers

  • philetus
    philetus ACE Posts: 4,759 Pathfinder

    Could you post a screen shot of your Disk Management screen? "IMAGES" sounds like something that belongs to Acer Recovery.

    That would mean the Acer Factory Recovery Is utilizing both HDDs.

    Is your USB backup the Acer Factory Recovery?

    You can boot from a "Live" linux disk and do pretty much anything to your HDDS and also you can boot from your Windows 8 disk to Command Prompt and use diskpart.

    I've seen one instance where the user said the Windows clean install picked up the key and several that didn't.I clean installed Windiws 7 on one that didn't pick up the key.

     

     

  • Spec-Chum
    Spec-Chum Member Posts: 6 New User
    Answer ✓

    Thanks for the reply philetus, don't worry about this now.

     

    I've done some research and it definitely is using WIMBoot so that recovery partition isn't going (and can’t go!) anywhere lol

     

    Certainly explains why I couldn't boot after removing it but the USB back up worked first time, so all good. 

     

    I’ve actually grown to like WIMBoot in principle and I can see it going more mainstream, even on systems that don’t “need” it.  I think it's a good, positive move by MS and I don't say that often. 

     

    Come in “having 2 copies of windows per install” your times up!

  • Spec-Chum
    Spec-Chum Member Posts: 6 New User

    Quick update on this, decided to install Windows 8.1 using the official MS tool that downloads the ISO and it worked fine; didn't ask for the key, so all good.

     

    As a bonus it also saved around 8Gb, so that's all good Smiley Happy

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