[SOLVED]I stupidly formatted /dev/sda1, now I can't access windows.

alpabet · 2014-10-12 01:14:56

My laptop came with windows 8.1 and while in the installation process of Arch Linux, I reformatted /dev/sda1 thinking that it is alright. I left the other partitions untouched and I see one labeled as Recovery, and Restore. I assume that the recovery partition is used for making the recovery disk, but I dont know how to do that in another os.

Last edited by alpabet (2014-11-15 23:12:07)

nomorewindows · 2014-10-12 01:16:12

The recovery partition will bring it back to the factory reset. About all you can do now. It will also most likely wipe Arch out in the process. You could use ddrescue or photorec or testdisk something like that if you have any important files, but then it'll just be all litterred.

Last edited by nomorewindows (2014-10-12 01:18:05)

alpabet · 2014-10-12 01:40:05

nomorewindows wrote:

The recovery partition will bring it back to the factory reset. About all you can do now. It will also most likely wipe Arch out in the process.

I could deal with that but my problem is that I need have to make a recovery disk out of that partition since gummiboot is the only boot option in the BIOS.

scryan · 2014-10-12 02:02:57

alpabet wrote:

nomorewindows wrote:
The recovery partition will bring it back to the factory reset. About all you can do now. It will also most likely wipe Arch out in the process.
I could deal with that but my problem is that I need have to make a recovery disk out of that partition since gummiboot is the only boot option in the BIOS.

Shot it the dark but does the recovery partition show up on the boot menu if you try to select something other then your default boot option (pressing F12 or whatever key it is for you bios).
One would think that would be the point of the recovery partition yes? So you can boot from it and recover?

You may have to seek out a windows forum, as this isn't really a linux question, you need to know how to use windows recovery tools.

TheSaint · 2014-10-12 11:34:21

Quick formatting may be recovered by testdisk.

frostbittenking · 2014-10-12 11:49:38

If you can't recover it via testdisk, you need to do something like this: http://msdn.microsoft.com/en-us/library … 21%29.aspx. Created such an image myself to recover a laptop for an acquaintance. Since Windows 8 they do it kinda stupid. Some manufacturers don't even provide the means to burn an image from the recovery partition, not to mention to provide a rescue dvd. If you format Windows 8, you are fucked, except you know what you are doing (creating a pe image with the WAIK, burn it on a cd/dvd and restore the image from the recovery partition with the right tool on the dvd -> imagex).

nskool · 2014-10-12 19:36:12

In most of the laptops, the recovery partition may not allow you to create a disk, instead will allow to recover the partition directly (There's usually a hotkey for that e.g. F11 on most HP laptops). This will restore your laptop back to the way it was when you bought it. After recovery, make sure you create a recovery disk(disks). Since your laptop came pre-installed with windows 8.1, wiping /dev/sda1 would mean you've wiped the partition that provides you means to windows repair options. I guess you can safely use a friend's recovery disk to re-install Windows. The key to your Windows is usually present in the motherboard. Its best if the disk is a recovery disk of the same laptop company.
P.S. I don't think the RE (Recovery Environment) partition (/dev/sda1) itself allows you to create a recovery disk. Recovery Disk is a provision by the manufacturer and not Windows explicitly. Windows RE is what provides with you these options-Boot repair, reset, refresh, cmd prompt etc.
If you have a recovery partition(present usually at the end of your HDD, nearly about 12GB), you can recover your entire system using a hotkey (there's usually bound to be one). BTW, which laptop do you have?
Also, since it's just /dev/sda1, obtaining a legit windows disk and using (repair) from it might also just do the job. You might not have opt the factory reset option.

Last edited by nskool (2014-10-12 19:39:36)

alpabet · 2014-10-13 06:21:29

TheSaint wrote:

Quick formatting may be recovered by testdisk.

The partition I formatted is also the partition I used for /boot, so should I try to recover the files instead?

frostbittenking wrote:

If you can't recover it via testdisk, you need to do something like this: http://msdn.microsoft.com/en-us/library … 21%29.aspx. Created such an image myself to recover a laptop for an acquaintance. Since Windows 8 they do it kinda stupid. Some manufacturers don't even provide the means to burn an image from the recovery partition, not to mention to provide a rescue dvd. If you format Windows 8, you are fucked, except you know what you are doing (creating a pe image with the WAIK, burn it on a cd/dvd and restore the image from the recovery partition with the right tool on the dvd -> imagex).

I don't understand what I should do with the link you gave but the Windows 8 partition is still there.

nskool wrote:

In most of the laptops, the recovery partition may not allow you to create a disk, instead will allow to recover the partition directly (There's usually a hotkey for that e.g. F11 on most HP laptops). This will restore your laptop back to the way it was when you bought it. After recovery, make sure you create a recovery disk(disks). Since your laptop came pre-installed with windows 8.1, wiping /dev/sda1 would mean you've wiped the partition that provides you means to windows repair options. I guess you can safely use a friend's recovery disk to re-install Windows. The key to your Windows is usually present in the motherboard. Its best if the disk is a recovery disk of the same laptop company.
P.S. I don't think the RE (Recovery Environment) partition (/dev/sda1) itself allows you to create a recovery disk. Recovery Disk is a provision by the manufacturer and not Windows explicitly. Windows RE is what provides with you these options-Boot repair, reset, refresh, cmd prompt etc.
If you have a recovery partition(present usually at the end of your HDD, nearly about 12GB), you can recover your entire system using a hotkey (there's usually bound to be one). BTW, which laptop do you have?
Also, since it's just /dev/sda1, obtaining a legit windows disk and using (repair) from it might also just do the job. You might not have opt the factory reset option.

Ok. I'll try to do that.

frostbittenking · 2014-10-13 07:33:20

The Problem with the suggestion of nskool is that this is not always an option. I had a Laptop, which couldn't be restored via f11 or some other shortcut in the bios boot menu. You could only do a factory reset via Windows 8's internal factory reset feature, which still required a bootable Windows 8, which is totally stupid. If you kill Windows 8 on this Laptop, you'll be fucked.
Hence, my link with an explanation how to create a recovery disk, with which you can restore Windows 8 from the recovery image (unfortunately, you need a working Windows box for this).

alpabet · 2014-10-27 06:19:45

Sorry for the late reply. I have been busy with class and I suck at time management, and my Dorm still has no internet.

frostbittenking wrote:

The Problem with the suggestion of nskool is that this is not always an option. I had a Laptop, which couldn't be restored via f11 or some other shortcut in the bios boot menu. You could only do a factory reset via Windows 8's internal factory reset feature, which still required a bootable Windows 8, which is totally stupid. If you kill Windows 8 on this Laptop, you'll be fucked.
Hence, my link with an explanation how to create a recovery disk, with which you can restore Windows 8 from the recovery image (unfortunately, you need a working Windows box for this).

Well I also couldn't restore it via the shortcut key because for some reason it would'nt work anymore if you made changes to the partition table. Anyway from what you said, after the process would I have a clean install of Windows? Should I make the recovery disk in a Windows 8.1 machine or would a Windows 8 machine suffice?

clfarron4 · 2014-10-27 09:39:06

alpabet wrote:

Could I make the recovery disk in a Windows 8.1 machine or would a Windows 8 machine suffice?

You should make a recovery disk that is the same version of Windows that was on the machine, ideally tailored to that particular vendor (you know, vendor specific stuff and license keys etc). So, if it had Windows 8.1 on a HP machine, you should at least create a Windows 8.1 disk, hopefully for a HP machine.

frostbittenking · 2014-10-27 11:29:05

That is not necessary. The recovery image is still there (I think so, as far as I understand what happened), it is just that you shot the installed mechanism to restore the image.
As I already steated, the way to reinstall recovery images today is totally stupid, you have no safety net. Partition Table/ Windows unrecoverably shot -> recovery procedure shot.
The recovery disk with the necessary tools to restore the image to the disk, is vendor agnostic (as long as it is a wim image). It just (don't know the specifics) extracts the wim image from the hidden recovery partition. You can create the recovery cd/dvd from any reasonably new Windows box. Probably even Windows XP. You just need a Windows, where you can install the WAIK. Ask away, if you need more specifics. Might be a bit annoying and slow, but you probably could create this even in a Windows VM inside Arch (XP, 7, 8, 8.1 guest system).

alpabet · 2014-11-15 23:10:05

Late reply again. I already got Windows to boot again.

I wasn't able to try frostbittenking's method since I didn't have any extra cd's at the time.
Here's what I did:

1. I got a copy of Windows 8.1 from http://www.microsoft.com/en-us/evalcent … rprise?i=1 and then I burned it to a cd (which was my last so I was unable to try frostbittenking's methods)

2. I followed the instructions here https://neosmart.net/wiki/recovering-wi … Bootloader

By this point I saw that there is an entry for windows in the BIOS boot menu but it does nothing, so I

3. Used startup repair in the installation disk, and I saw Windows 8.1 Single Language (which was my windows os) as the options to repair.

After repairing, Windows finally booted back. Of course, I can't boot back to Arch but it was fine since I broke it trying random ways to fix boot so I just did a reinstall. But I think it could be fixed with a boot repair.

Thanks to all who replied to this stupid man.

Arch Linux

#1 2014-10-12 01:14:56

[SOLVED]I stupidly formatted /dev/sda1, now I can't access windows.

#2 2014-10-12 01:16:12

Re: [SOLVED]I stupidly formatted /dev/sda1, now I can't access windows.

#3 2014-10-12 01:40:05

Re: [SOLVED]I stupidly formatted /dev/sda1, now I can't access windows.

#4 2014-10-12 02:02:57

Re: [SOLVED]I stupidly formatted /dev/sda1, now I can't access windows.

#5 2014-10-12 11:34:21

Re: [SOLVED]I stupidly formatted /dev/sda1, now I can't access windows.

#6 2014-10-12 11:49:38

Re: [SOLVED]I stupidly formatted /dev/sda1, now I can't access windows.

#7 2014-10-12 19:36:12

Re: [SOLVED]I stupidly formatted /dev/sda1, now I can't access windows.

#8 2014-10-13 06:21:29

Re: [SOLVED]I stupidly formatted /dev/sda1, now I can't access windows.

#9 2014-10-13 07:33:20

Re: [SOLVED]I stupidly formatted /dev/sda1, now I can't access windows.

#10 2014-10-27 06:19:45

Re: [SOLVED]I stupidly formatted /dev/sda1, now I can't access windows.

#11 2014-10-27 09:39:06

Re: [SOLVED]I stupidly formatted /dev/sda1, now I can't access windows.

#12 2014-10-27 11:29:05

Re: [SOLVED]I stupidly formatted /dev/sda1, now I can't access windows.

#13 2014-11-15 23:10:05

Re: [SOLVED]I stupidly formatted /dev/sda1, now I can't access windows.

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