Recovery Parition Problem - Windows 10

Question

Recovery Parition Problem - Windows 10

Dave Cooper 20

I had an issue where I needed to do a complete, clean re-install of Windows.

I have a partition on the disk of 1.5GB which used to have the Recovery Partition (ex. Win7) and it seems to have got itself wiped clean.

DISKPART> list partition

Partition ### Type Size Offset

Partition 1 Primary 1500 MB 1024 KB

Partition 2 Primary 368 GB 1501 MB

Partition 3 Primary 561 GB 369 GB

where partition 1 is/was the Recovery Partition / partition 2 is the main boot drive (C:) / partition 3 is a data partition (D:).

reagentc /info

Windows Recovery Environment (Windows RE) and system reset configuration

Information:

Windows RE status: Enabled

Windows RE location: \?\GLOBALROOT\device\harddisk0\partition2\Recovery\WindowsRE

Boot Configuration Data (BCD) identifier: c9ee99fe-7550-11f1-b3c8-8e48bc8cb9e7

Recovery image location:

Recovery image index: 0

Custom image location:

Custom image index: 0

REAGENTC.EXE: Operation Successful.

The WINRE.WIM file (plus boot.sdi (3.170,304), ReAgent.xml (1,116) and winre.wim (621,394,879) sits on C:/Revovery/windowsre (as a hidden folder). In C:\windows\system32\recovery has one file: ReAgent.xml 1,116 bytes.

The new "recovery partition" on harddisk0\partition1 has 490,394,272 of used space - which presumably is clearly nothing to do with winre.wim. Given a drive letter of Z: it shows:

Volume in drive Z is RECOVERY

Volume Serial Number is [Removed PII]

Directory of Z:\

01/07/2026 14:44 <DIR> $RECYCLE.BIN

30/06/2026 20:43 <DIR> Boot

30/06/2026 20:27 429,968 bootmgr

07/12/2019 10:08 1 BOOTNXT

30/06/2026 15:36 8,192 BOOTSECT.BAK

30/06/2026 14:42 <DIR> Recovery

01/07/2026 14:40 <DIR> System Volume Information

sql

       3 File(s)        438,161 bytes

       4 Dir(s)   1,081,925,632 bytes free

Volume in drive C is SYSTEM

Volume Serial Number is [Removed PII]

A listing of C:\ shows:

Directory of c:\

08/07/2026 15:21 <DIR> $Recycle.Bin

16/07/2026 12:17 <DIR> Boot

16/07/2026 11:16 430,760 bootmgr

07/12/2019 10:08 1 BOOTNXT

01/07/2026 14:28 8,192 BOOTSECT.BAK

17/07/2026 10:20 <DIR> Config.Msi

30/06/2026 14:43 <JUNCTION> Documents and Settings [C:\Users]

03/07/2026 11:13 8,192 DumpStack.log

17/07/2026 19:14 8,192 DumpStack.log.tmp

17/07/2026 19:14 5,057,937,408 hiberfil.sys

17/07/2026 19:14 1,946,157,056 pagefile.sys

08/07/2026 15:30 <DIR> Recovery

17/07/2026 19:14 268,435,456 swapfile.sys

16/07/2026 10:32 <DIR> System Volume Information

sql

       8 File(s)  7,272,985,257 bytes.

       6 Dir(s)  300,577,370,112 bytes free

How do I correctly configure the (correct) Recovery Partition (partition 1) and enable it to boot (when needed) instead of that set of files on the C: drive? Do I need to delete partition1 and recreate it and how does it get configured correctly as a Recovery Partition to boot from when needed?

Hopefully I'll not need to do another re-installation of Windows.

Thanks in advance, Dave.

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Hello Dave Cooper,

Since you have already got a 1.5 GB partition and WinRE is definitely working. I don't think that you will need to reinstall Windows. This usually happens when Windows cannot find the reinstallation folder when reinstall. If you want to check, you can assign a letter to it and then check for Recovery\WindowsRE.

For now, you can move WinRE to partition 1 and re-register it. Please follow these steps:

Open "PowerShell" as administrator.
Type:
1. diskpart
2. select disk 0
3. select partition 1
4. assign letter=R (The letter can be anything you want, just make sure that the name stays consistent through the commands)
5. exit
Make the correct directory for WinRE.
1. mkdir R:\Recovery
2. mkdir R:\Recovery\WindowsRE
Type reagentc /disable to disable WinRE.
Copy the contents of C:\Recovery\WindowsRE to R:\Recovery\WindowsRE
Type reagentc /setreimage /path R:\Recovery\WindowsRE to register the new location.
Type reagentc /enable to reenable WinRE.
Hide the partition:
1. diskpart
2. select volume R
3. remove letter=R
4. exit
If you want to make sure, you can check with reagentc /info.

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