Creating a bootable USB from recovery partition

I'm a proud owner of a VPCZ1.

I still have the recovery partition intact. Now I want to remove it and maybe install Windows 8 with an additional 14 gb available. Before deleting the partition I want a bootable replica of it on a 32gb usb which I can plug in and use to reinstall the OEM Windows 7 again (if I want).

As users of this laptop will know the VAIO Care facility (even the latest updated versions) do not allow a recovery USB to created. Only DVD discs are allowed. I am *extremely* against using DVDs. So I am looking for a way to create a bootable USB.

Now I have tried to mount and copy the internal partiton onto the USB and then make the USB bootable by using BOOTSECT.EXE but that hasnt worked. Any other ideas will be appreciated.

 

Maybe try this. I did this a year or so ago and it worked for me (not on a Vaio but it should work the same). Also check the comments below the guide. I hope it does the trick for you!
http://www.7tutorials.com/create-usb-memory-stick-system-recovery-tools
Or you could simply image your drive partition(s). Rather than recover from factory image and have to set it all up again, I prefer to make my own image very soon after I get the system running to my liking, so it's ready to go when needed, with drivers, updates, preferences... But that's not what you asked!

 

How about creating the recovery DVDs and then transferring them to USB drives?

 

If it were as simple as transferring I wouldnt be here.

The USB has to act like a recovery partition and not ask for additonal disks.

 

The recovery partition seems to need software installed on the main (C) drive. E.g. if you format your C drive, the recovery partition stops working. Perhaps there is something there that you need to figure out.

I had backed up my recovery software folder from my original installation and I just looked inside. There are several empty text files there and one of them is called DriveSelect.txt. Try putting your USB drive's drive letter there and see. I don't know the syntax; you'll have to try various combinations (e or E or e: or E: or e:\ or E:\ or "e" or "E"... you get the picture).

 

It might be easier to just clone the whole drive using clonezilla or Macrium Reflect and just use that image to restore should you ever need to.

 

If you do anything to change the Recovery partition it almost certainly will quit working. You can't just remove or resize that partition and then put it back later. But if you have the original Installation/Recovery media on DVD, it's not hard to transfer its contents onto a bootable USB stick (I like Rufus for that). Or see if Sony will send you one.
I still think your best bet is to image the drive. That gives you a full system backup that you can put away safely in case your drive fails or your laptop breaks or is stolen. Update it now and then so you can just plug it in and get back to work in short time.

 

Btw. Windows 10 is going to be a free upgrade for users of Windows 7 and above. Not sure yet how the upgrade setup will establish eligibility, so don't nuke your recovery partition yet - you might have to install Windows 7 and then upgrade to Windows 10, or it might check your bios and look for a recovery partition with a qualifying Windows image... we simply don't know yet. I have changed from HDD to SSD, but I still have my old HDD intact - keeping my options open.

 

Good point! We ALSO might want to be able to revert to previous version if Win 10 hiccups when they roll it out. Because of the lack of clarity regarding how Win 10 auto-upgrade eligibility will be determined, I've stored my original Win 7 drive on the shelf for now (and also a backup image) while I'm trying out Linux applications on a much smaller drive. I don't mind what happens to Win 8.1 on my desktop. If 10 isn't a significant improvement I'm off to join the penguins.

mohdumar wants to install Win 8 in place of Win 7, so there shouldn't be a problem getting the Win 10 upgrade. I'd be surprised if the test for eligibility includes checking for the Recovery partition, since it would rule out those who have upgraded to SSDs. More likely it will check for activated Win 7 or 8 and then download Win 10 like any other update. I think I read that it won't allow upgrade to 10 from a previous upgrade, e.g., Win 7 upgraded from XP probably won't be eligible. I don't know how an upgrade (in contrast to a full install) from Win 7 to 8 would be considered, though. In principle, it seems that either one should be eligible, but if MS checks for an OEM Win key in bios and finds the ID for Win 7, you might have to use that recovery partition (or your VAIO Win 7 installation DVD) to revert from 8 back to 7 in order to get 10. It could get rather convoluted! And it's anybody's guess what will happen when the next version after 10 comes out...
[edit: Oops. I'm sorry, anytimer! I just noticed that I've paraphrased much of what you already said. I wasn't trying to steal your thunder. I'll try to read more than I write in future! My apologies.

 

I figured that the VAIO recovery module simply can't run from a USB in my case. The recovery partition has an empty file called HDD which is detected by the recovery setup to determine how to go about the installation process. The recovery partition has the HDD file but the dvds if made have empty files called RDVD1 RDVD2 etc in the root directory. So most probably the VAIO recovery module detects these and decides it's running from a Dvd, and so will ask for subsequent dvds to be loaded if the setup is run from the first Dvd. Now since I never deal with actual Dvds I had a long time ago created recovery ISOs by fooling VAIO care to use a blank Virtual DVD which was actually creating ISO files. I burned the first bootable ISO to my USB but then copied contents of the recovery drive and only left the HDD file in the USB So the setup is fooled into thinking that it is running from a hard disk and not an optical one. The boot up from the USB was smooth and I initiated the recovery process but after the initial copying of files and rebooting the recovery setup was reading the MOD files from the INTERNAL partition and of course I had to remove the USB in the first place so that the setup process already initiated could continue. So no way a USB could work in my case since VAIO recovery module only seems to have 2 modes of operation . So I let that recovery continue and afterwards I cleaned all of the vaio bloatware and made a full disk image using True Image 2015 which worked when I restored it and was only a 23 gb compressed. So now I am off to install Windows 8 which I know works with drivers because I have installed it before without deleting the recovery partition.

As for what is required for Windows 7 and the recovery partition to work, there is a System Reserved Partition containing bcd boot information for both loading Windows 7 and VAIO care rescue . True Image backed all of this so I was good to go.

 

No apologies needed. I'm glad to have someone thinking along the same lines as me. And yes, if Windows gets too troublesome, I too am headed for penguin land.

 

That's too bad, especially after all your efforts! But now at least you know, and maybe others will read about and benefit from your experience. Since you still have the recovery partition AND the full disk image, you're all set. Just be aware that the Win 10 upgrade _might_ wipe out your recovery partition, so keep that drive image just in case the Win 10 roll-out is problematic and you want to go back to 7. It's cheap insurance!

Excellent! Sounds like you're good to go, and a clean system image if you want to go back.

In retrospect, I'm pretty sure the recovery partition is an OEM-provided feature and not something Windows writes. How it's compressed seems to vary among manufacturers, and of course they all put different bloatware in there (or none!) as well. I've seen instructions for making a custom recovery partition on a non-OEM Windows system. I've not done that, since I prefer to keep an image on an external drive after removing bloatware, adding drivers, a few programs, setting my preferences, etc. to save quite a lot of set-up time after recovery, but I can see the merits of ALSO having the same on the system disk, especially a laptop when I can spare the disk space for it.

Anyway, if Sony added the Win 7 recovery partition on your drive, that would explain why you didn't lose it when you installed Win 8 before. Come to think of it, a couple of years ago I installed Win 8 to replace the OEM-installed Win 7. Later I did a system recovery and was suddenly back in factory-fresh Win 7. That taught me the value of saving an image after all the time I'd spent setting up and updating Win 8.