Asus UX32A - Upgraded to Win 8, now I want to use recovery partition but can't?

Hello everyone,

I'll try and keep this short.

I got a UX32A a while back, and after a short while I upgraded to Windows 8 from 7. Most recently, I bought a SSD to go in the laptop, so I'll no longer be needing my original HDD. I wish to perform a factory reset on the HDD with the built-in recovery partition ASUS provided.

The steps to take is to press F9 at boot, go into Windows Recovery (EMS Enabled), and then the ASUS manager will take things from there, letting you restore according to how you want.

However, when I press F9, it takes me to some weird Windows 8 recovery manager, with seemingly no ability to go into the ASUS recovery tool. It just let's me do a glorified system restore, and that's it.

Is there any way to get to this recovery partition at all, or will I have to re-install Windows 7 manually?

Thanks.

 

I have a different Asus but the only way I know how to boot into recovery is to use the advanced startup settings before I reboot. F9 didnt seem to work though if I can't boot I guess I am screwed.

The Windows 8 recovery allows you to either reset or refresh your PC. Won't the "Reset" use the ASUS recovery partition to restore you to OOTB OEM state?

Sorry - I just reread your post and noted that you upgraded your pc. Mine came with Windows 8 installed so it may be different.

 

I gave up on the original idea of using the recovery partition. Having to resort to installing Win 7 manually, only to find more trouble.

I'm not sure what Win 8 did to my HDD, but now Windows 7 won't install at all, saying that the drive is GPT type.

So far I'm in the middle of using GParted to re-format the partitions I want to use and then give Win 7 another try.

This truly is a pain in the as the UX32A has no disk drive, and I only have one capable USB Pen for all this, so a lot of re-formatting and creating bootable disks!

If this doesn't work, I'll just have to wipe everything and start over without the ASUS partition and thus lose my warranty.

 

Windows 8 one upgraded probably deleted the original Asus recovery partition when it upgraded the drive to a GPT partition. This does mean a factory install of Windows 7 if that is where you are going with this. I have to ask thogh is that where you are going to end up? I mean you have the Windows 8 upgrade, so were you just giving up in that to move back to Windows 7 on then SSD?

I ask because if you are keeping Windows 8 it might be easier to just clone your install to the new SSD. It counts on what you are trying to end up with...............

 

You can convert GPT to MBR (or vice versa) using diskpart from a command prompt. It should only have converted the volume and not the entire drive if all you did was upgrade.