Recreate Recovery Partition in Windows 10/11

I wanted to put this somewhere if others needed it, they could get to it easier. I had a Windows VDI that I deleted the recovery partition to increase the hard drive space. With the update earlier this year failing, I was wanting to fix it, and not just skip it.

Recreate Recovery Partition in Windows 10/11

Overview

This guide details the steps to create a Recovery Partition in Microsoft Windows 10/11.

Sources

(https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=hlNtLcFqfOo&t=261s)

(https://www.tenforums.com/performance-maintenance/211034-recreate-winre-files-new-recovery-partition.html)

Steps to Recreate WinRE Files on a New Recovery Partition

1. Shrink Volume in Disk Management

1. Press the Windows key and search for “Disk Management”.
2. Right-click on C: (or the boot and primary partition).
3. Select Shrink Volume…
4. In “Enter the amount of space to shrink in MB”, input 1024.
5. Click Shrink.

2. Create New Simple Volume

1. Right-click on the new volume.
2. Select New Simple Volume.
3. Click Next.
4. Click Next.
5. Select Do not assign a drive letter or drive path.
6. Click Next.
7. Format this volume with the following settings:

• Volume label: System Reserved.

8. Click Next.
9. Click Finish.

3. Locate or Restore Winre.wim

1. Open File Explorer and navigate to C:\Windows\System32\Recovery.
2. If Winre.wim is not visible:

• Open Command Prompt in administrator mode.
• Run reagentc /info. If enabled, run reagentc /disable.
• If still not visible, go to the next step.
• In File Explorer, at the top, right-click on View, check Hidden items.
• Click on Options, then the View tab, and uncheck Hide protected operating system files (Recommended).

3. If Winre.wim is still missing:

• Obtain a new copy of WinRE.wim.
• For a USB Windows image:
  • Go to Sources and right-click on install.esd.
  • Use 7-zip to Open Archive.
  • Navigate to folder 1, then Windows\System32\Recovery.
  • Copy the files to C:\Recovery\WindowsRE.
• For a Windows ISO:
  • Extract the files and follow the same steps as for the USB.

4. Configure the New System Reserved Partition

1. Determine the Partition Style:

• Go back to Disk Management.
• Right-click on disk 0 (or the disk with the OS).
• Select Properties, then Volumes.
• Note the Partition Style (GPT or MBR).

2. Open Command Prompt in administrator mode and enter the following commands:

• diskpart
• list dis
• sel dis 0
• lis par
• sel par 3 (select the newly created partition)
• det par (verify the correct partition is selected)

3. Set the Partition ID:

• If MBR: set id=27
• If GPT: set id=de94bba4-06d1-4d40-a16a-bfd50179d6ac

4. Verify the Partition Type Change:

• det par
• exit

5. Enable the Recovery Environment:

• reagentc /enable
• Verify with reagentc /info that the Windows RE location is on the correct partition.