Recovery Partition Issue

As I do with all of my new computers, when I first got it I immediately partitioned the drive to isolate the OS from my media etc. For one reason or another, I tested out the recovery partition (pressing ESC on startup and going to recovery). Now,I get an error that the system cannot access the recovery partition. After looking up online I found that a solution is to mark the partition as "active" and reboot but this option wont even show up in disk management!

Any else having a similar problem and/or found a solution? I think it's completely crazy that any partitioning causes this.

Note: I'll get the error code when I get home.

 

The recovery partition is a seperate partition from the OS. If you look under My Computer, do you see the recovery partition? It will show up in windows explorer. If it isnt there, and you dont even see it under disk management, then you most likely removed it when you re-partitioned your drive.

Secondly, before doing anything, did you first create the HP Recovery Disks as recommended in this thread? http://forum.notebookreview.com/hp-compaq/432564-hp-laptop-out-box-guide-2-0-windows-7-a.html

If you did, you should be able to use those. If you didn't, you will likely need to get a recovery disk direct from HP.

 

It is viewable under disk management and My Computer. In fact, I can even browse it under disk management. However, I read that if you partition the drive at all it "deactivates" the recovery partition. I also read that you need to simply "Mark partition as active" but I do not have this option when I right click the recovery partition. Unfortunately, I didn't make recovery disks...

 

There can only be one Active Partition per physical disk, and the current Active Partition is your boot partition. Where did you get the information about deactivating the recovery partition and it needing to be marked Active?

This is what I understand about the HP Recovery Partition:

1. Needs to have a drive letter assigned to it.
2. Needs to be a primary partition.
3. Part of an extended partition.

Regardless, you can order a recovery disk from HP since you didn't create the recovery media. I think its 15.00 or some similar amount. The recovery disk will not only allow you to do a restore of the factory default OS, it will allow you to re-create the recovery partition if you so choose.

Good luck.

 

Here's the link where I got the info.

Recovery partition is there but recovery won't start - HP Support Forum

Here's a print screen of my disks. It seems it's not "extended anymore", I guess?

 

Was the disk "dynamic" before you added the extra partition? The HP notebooks I've seen have all been "basic" disks.

Here's a link that could help: HP recovery partition and dynamic disk! - HP Support Forum.

If you convert the drive back(?) to "basic", you'll have to remove one of the existing partitions (no more than 4 partitions on a basic disk) before you can add your "media" partition. If you're unsure about doing this, I have a post about it here that might be a starting point: http://forum.notebookreview.com/hp-...7-new-hp-dv6tqe-partitioning.html#post7695985

Good luck.

 

Looks like I'll be deleting the HP Tools partition. I just glanced but quickly read that is had something to do with the BIOS. Would deleting it have any negative effect?

 

Since I've never deleted the HP Tools myself and tested, I can't be sure but I believe the two things affected are bios updating and HP diagnostics.

It is my understanding that when the 'Tools' partition is present, a bios upgrade writes the new bios files to, and archives the current bios to, the 'Tools' partition, completing the upgrade from 'Tools' partition on reboot. This also allows, I believe, the upgrade to be rolled back from the 'Tools' partition. Whether a bios upgrade can be completed without the 'Tools' partition, I just don't know.

Also, I believe that the HP Diagnostics that run before the OS is booted are run solely from the 'Tools' partition.

 

Hopefully someone can answer the questions zzyz raised. I will be converting over to a SSD within a couple of days and I am thinking of running a clean install as opposed to cloning. If I did this, I would not have the HP Tools or Recovery Partition. I am now worried that I wouldn't be able to update my BIOS without the Tools Partition. And for that matter, run HP Diagnostics (whatever that does). If anyone has suggestions as to the best way to migrate to an SSD that would be much appreciated!

 

Looking back through info I collected when I first got my dv7t last year, I found this video: Bios 09.06.11.avi - YouTube. It's worth viewing all the way through. It suggests that the UEFI/HP_Tools partition folders can be moved to a thumbdrive and the diagnostics run from there (still not clear about bios upgrades though).

In any case, if you're doing a clean install of Win7 to a new SSD you should be able to recreate the HP_Tools partition on the SDD by cloning it separately, or just copying the contents (keeping the same file/folder structure). Just be sure that the partition you create for it is FAT32 and is the same size as the original. You could create this partition during the Win7 instal or afterwards; which way is best depends a lot of what your goals are (e.g., do you still want a 'media' partition on the SSD).

 

Thanks for the info. Instead of starting a new thread, I might as well ask my next question here. Without the recovery partition accessible on startup, I was still able to create the recovery disks. However, when I try to install them on my SSD it goes through all four disks but I eventually get a "UIA failed three times" error. Is it not possible to use the disks on a significantly smaller hard drive?

On a hopefully irrelevant note, at the time of making my disks my partition was the full ~600GB. So if I keep getting this error I am going to resize the C: partition to around ~100GB and remake the disks. Otherwise, I need to find a Windows 7 disk to install from.

EDIT: Recovery discs wouldn't work after multiple attempts so I downloaded a clean Windows 7 Home Premium and installed that. Got all of my drivers and HP software from the SWSETUP folder.