Windows 10: To restore this computer, Windows needs to format the drive that the Windows Recovery...

I had a system with two USB drives plugged in. There was a restore disk on one USB drive and a recovery image on another USB drive.

I had already restored my notebook- but not from a system image.

I was trying to overwrite the notebook restore with a system image restore and got the title message. I Googled and found advice saying that Windows backup and restore is buggy- don't use it. Not exactly helpful, which is why I am writing this.


I decided to make sure that I was running the USB system and discovered that the message was telling me (correctly) that though I had a bootable USB plugged in the system was not running from it.

It had booted using the C drive and the C drive would get zapped by the restore. Restore would fail if it was allowed to run, so it was not allowed to run.


There is on-line help regarding how to select the boot device. I cannot remember how I found it but I remember that there was a blue page listing available boot options (my USB was plugged in and findable as one option) and I chose the Boot device I wanted. It was this screen that told me that the system had booted from the C drive.


When I booted from the USB restore disk the subject message disappeared from System Image Recovery. One note though- be sure that when you get the option of removing disks from the formatting stage you do remove your boot disk. My boot USB was ticked for formatting till I removed it.

:)

 

Sony laptop Windows 7 formatting

Depending on your model of laptop you may have a recovery CD that will revert your computer back to the way it was when you first bought it.

It's also possible that there is a recovery partition on your primary drive which you can use to restore the computer to the way it was when you bought it. If so you should see a "press key to restore" type message when booting the computer.

It's not quite the same as using a Windows disc but it may be all you have available. I suggest checking the laptops manual for recovery features.

 

How to format on Windows 7

just format from the installer on the windows 7 DVD. the options there when you choose which drive to install on.


i suggest partiotining the drive, i run with a 60GB C: drive, but then move my user folder to the D: partition - so that when i format/reinstall, my desktop/my docs, etc, dont get lost.

 

Recovery Drive

Hi,

Thank you for posting your concern. In some cases, this could happen if you created a system restore point on your computer. Windows will use the recovery drive to revert to the previous time where your computer is working properly, or where you created
it. Please don't attempt to put any files in the recovery drive or the restore process will fail. To give you more suggestion and helpful information, we would like to more about your computer. Please answer the question below:

• Did you make any changes to your computer before this issue occurs?
• Have you install Windows Update before getting the Recovery drive?
• Which version of Windows are you using? To check it, follow the steps through this
  link.
  

In the meantime, you can check the files inside the recovery drive and confirm if there are essential files that you need.

We'll be waiting for your response.