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Introducing Windows Recovery Environment (Windows RE)

The Windows Recovery Environment (aka Windows RE) team would use this blog to share information, tricks and tips about Windows RE with support professionals and end-users of Windows. We would also like to use this blog to get feedback from the community.

So what is Windows RE?

Windows Recovery Environment (Windows RE) is a recovery platform based on Windows Preinstallation Environment (Windows PE). Windows RE provides two main functionalities:

1. Automatic diagnosis and repair of boot problems using a tool called Startup Repair.

2. A centralized platform for advanced recovery tools.

We will explain more about these two functions in upcoming posts.

Windows RE is new for Windows Vista and completely replaces the recovery console in Windows XP. You should be able to perform most tasks of recovery console from Windows RE.

How can end-users get access to Windows RE and Startup Repair?

For Vista RC1 release, Windows RE is available on the Windows installation DVD. To access Windows RE, boot using the installation DVD, choose your language settings and hit "Next" and then click on "Repair Your Computer" link at the bottom of the screen. This will launch Windows RE. After choosing an OS to repair, you should see all the recovery tools available in Windows RE.

After Windows Vista releases, Windows RE will be available via other convenient means as well. For example, OEMs may pre-install Windows RE on the hard disk and corporations (SA) can make Windows RE available for network boot via a WDS server.

 

So that's Windows RE in a nutshell. Watch this space for information on how to use Windows RE and Startup Repair to fix unbootable computers.

-Parveen

Published Monday, September 18, 2006 6:17 AM by WinRE

Comments

# Windows Recovery Environment (WinRE) @ Monday, September 18, 2006 2:55 AM

Windows Recovery Environment (WinRE)

STEFANO DEMILIANI

# re: Introducing Windows Recovery Environment (WinRE) @ Monday, September 18, 2006 9:44 AM

Hi, sounds like an interesting prospect. One thing, does this check for hard drives on load, as with WindowsXP setup, it would crash on loading if a hard drive had a corrupt hard drive, and there is no where to access recovery console until it was remedied. Ironically by using a Recovery Console.

Sarkie

# RickMahn.com » Blog Archive » Microsoft Introduces Windows Recovery Environment (WinRE) @ Monday, September 18, 2006 12:15 PM

PingBack from http://rickmahn.com/2006/09/18/microsoft-introduces-windows-recovery-environment-winre/

RickMahn.com » Blog Archive » Microsoft Introduces Windows Recovery Environment (WinRE)

# technoreality.com » Introducing Windows Recovery Environment (WinRE) @ Monday, September 18, 2006 2:43 PM

PingBack from http://vista.technoreality.com/2006/09/18/introducing-windows-recovery-environment-winre/

technoreality.com » Introducing Windows Recovery Environment (WinRE)

# re: Introducing Windows Recovery Environment (WinRE) @ Monday, September 18, 2006 5:12 PM

It's a shame you can run the memory diagnostics from the DVD without vista installed. Surley it's stripped down enough not to effect the diagnostics.

Ytterbium

# re: Introducing Windows Recovery Environment (WinRE) @ Tuesday, September 19, 2006 2:30 AM

I think you should by Bart's PE Builder. We need a _live_ system to recover the registry of the died system. This is a most often case in this world - boot from CD, remove the registry key (change it) and boot the installation... Or start the antivirus from the CD.

chkdsk isn't the only thing which could recover the system.

AlexBu

# Session 0 » Introducing Windows Recovery Environment (WinRE) @ Tuesday, September 19, 2006 6:48 AM

PingBack from http://www.session0.com/?p=23

Session 0 » Introducing Windows Recovery Environment (WinRE)

# re: Introducing Windows Recovery Environment (WinRE) @ Tuesday, September 19, 2006 2:07 PM

Making it available for network boot sounds great. Now, is it only good for repairing a Vista computer or can we use it to fix XP/2000 too?

diegov

# re: Introducing Windows Recovery Environment (WinRE) @ Tuesday, September 19, 2006 6:19 PM

WinRE can only be used to repair Vista computers.

WinRE

# Introducing Windows Recovery Environment (WinRE) - All About the Microsoft Windows Vista Experience @ Thursday, September 21, 2006 9:36 AM

PingBack from http://vista.pcplace.biz/2006/09/18/introducing-windows-recovery-environment-winre/

Introducing Windows Recovery Environment (WinRE) - All About the Microsoft Windows Vista Experience

# re: Introducing Windows Recovery Environment (WinRE) @ Thursday, September 21, 2006 10:19 PM

Sorry to "dissapoint" you but this works on XP machines as well.  Been There Done That.

paxamime

# Where are recovery console commands? @ Tuesday, December 12, 2006 2:54 PM

As mentioned in the first post on WinRE , the recovery console has been deprecated in Windows Vista.

Windows RE Notes

# re: Introducing Windows Recovery Environment (WinRE) @ Thursday, December 14, 2006 1:43 PM

Is there a way to install WinRE to the local drive?

mxsevilla

# re: Introducing Windows Recovery Environment (WinRE) @ Monday, January 08, 2007 6:50 AM

I would like to know how to install winRE on the local drive, and I think many others will find this beneficial, too.  Many times I am out, and it would be convenient not to have to boot off DVD every time, if we can just install winre with Vista on our image.

How can we install it on the local drive?

wosully

# re: Introducing Windows Recovery Environment (WinRE) @ Sunday, February 04, 2007 5:55 PM

I've been using Bart for a while now, and the one big thing missing is an equivalent to RunScanner (a Bart plugin that redirects registry access to inactive hives on HD).

I'm glad WinRE's getting into the mOS game, but it's got a lot of catching up to do.  The philosophy and objectives are different to WinPE, i.e. a maintenance OS isn't just a pre-install environment with knobs on.  See...

http://cquirke.blogspot.com/2006/09/how-to-design-mos.html

...FWIW.

BTW: ChkDsk isn't a recovery tool, it's a file system fixer.  What you're trying to recover just gets in the way, and gets irreversably lost when the file system is "fixed".

cquirke

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