Hey MSI Enthusiast. Greetings..
Today, i am going to share the working solutions to the common problems faced by MSI users when it comes to MSI Factory reset/ Recovery. Since this post tries to address multiple problems, this going to be a little long post. bear with me..
I have MSI Prestige 15 A10SC, it had chinese windows 10 Home edition when i bought it. But now i have win 11 pro. I have changed the msi recovery image to latest win 11 manually. And MSI Factory Reset is still working with latest recovery image of win 11. Follow this post to learn on how to do it.
If you have one of these common problems then this post might help you
- 1. Accidently deleted Recovery partition (BIOS_RVY)
- 2. Get error " The recovery procedure from RecoveryDVD has not been successfully finished..."
- 2. F3 MSI factory reset option missing.
- 3. Multiple recovery partitions present like 900MB, 500MB, 300MB...
- 3. Want to use F3 msi factory reset but afraid that recovery files are old windows
Even if you are one who prefers clean install by windows bootable USB, rather than MSI F3 Factory reset because you think that factory reset will take you to older bloated windows, then i believe this post will be also helpful to you, because i am going to show you on how to manually change the factory reset files to latest windows so that you can get the latest reset of windows 11 rather than old windows 10. I think its better to have recovery on the go rather than USB, because it fast, only takes 4 minutes to reset. USB is for last resort only.
Don't underestimate MSI recovery software, its really useful. It is like "the power of sun in palm of your hand".
I am going to give you probable explanations and logic, and show how to do it. This is going to be a little long post so bear with me please.
PROBABLE CAUSE
-If you have accidently deleted Bios_Rvy partition, then don't worry. you don't need old backup files because i will show you how to manually create recovery partition and add latest image of your current windows which can be restored by f3 msi factory reset.
-If you get 2nd error, even if your recovery partition is intact then the most probable cause is the location of BIOS_RVY partition on your ssd.
-If f3 recovery option is missing, and has multiple small recovery partitions, most probably this is because you probably have clean installed windows by old traditional
DESTRUCTIVE method from USB by formatting C drive and installing. Never do that, Please understand the logic behind it.
LEARN LOGIC
A/C to Microsoft, for GPT disk partition, it should be in following order. ( i am talking about partitions, not volume)
-[system-MSR-windows-winre], and then you can have other partitions like D, E ,F...
See UEFI/GPT-based hard drive partitions
When we first buy MSI laptop, its in the same order.[system-MSR-windows-Winre tools-BIOS_RVY] check the attached image.
View attachment 157856
But as most of us like to shrink single C drive and create other partitions, this mess up the order and now your new partitions order will be like [system-MSR-windows-D-E....-Winre tools-BIOS_RVY]
View attachment 157857
Now this causes problem, when there is a major feature update, windows will create new winre partition next to C drive and orphan the older "Winre tool", where older recovery file was that contains f3 MSI factory reset option, resulting in loosing the F3 factory reset option. why windows does that? check
MICROSOFT GPT PARTITION
So make sure that winre/ winre tool partition is just next to C. if not then manually do that. google it and you can do it yourself.
If you get the error " The recovery procedure from RecoveryDVD has not been successfully finished...", then its probably because BIOS_RVY partition is not the last partition. I had this problem, i made my partitions in order [system-MSR-windows-Winre tools-BIOS_RVY- D-E-F] which resulted in that error. Later i realized that BIOS_RVY partition should be the last one for MSI recovery dvd software to detect it. later i manually changed it which made it work again.
View attachment 157858
MANUALLY CREATE BIOS_RVY IF DELETED (and update it to latest image)
If you already have BIOS_RVY partition, then you don't have to follow this step.
If you have deleted that partition then, no worries, you can create a partition yourself. And apply the latest image of current updated windows .SWM file. you don't need older bloated files.
you can use mini tool or other partition tool or CMD if you are comfortable with it.
- Shrink the end partition, e.g. mine was F partition. shrink it and created 15GB partition. Name that partition "BIOS_RVY"
- create a folder named "RecoveryImage"
View attachment 157859
- Now you have to put the image of the system which you want to set as recovery image. Follow next chapter.
(I clean installed win 11 by mounting iso file, then running setup file and remove everything. This way i was able to retain my MSI factory reset option from that win 10. [ Non destructive method to clean install windows]
Installed drivers and few basic software. Ran ccleaner and windows default cleaner, deleted unwanted files. [ to make the captured image smaller as possible]
Now when i thought the best state of my pc. i did following ..)
REPLACE FACTORY IMAGE WITH LATEST ONE
If you already have BIOS_RVY partition, then follow this chapter to update the image to the latest one, or you can use the existing one if you like. You should assign a letter to access that partition from cmd, it will loose its letter when restarted, so its safe to assign a letter for temporary access.
Use "DISM++" software, its portable and small in size, to capture the image. ( you can use cmd if you want)
it will capture in .wim format (system backup)
convert that wim file into .SWM using same software. (SD/WIM Conversion)
View attachment 157861
when executing the conversion, it will ask for the size, select 4GB, it will break that .wim file into multiple .swm files.
The file should be named "install". you will get multiple files like install.swm, install1.swm, install2.swm..
Copy all those files to "RecoveryImage" folder in BIOS_RVY Partition.
View attachment 157860
If you already have BIOS_RVY, just assign a letter, it will be temporary, and delete/backup to another location all the install.swm files there and paste/replace the newly created files.
you don't have to follow next step. Next step are for those who are manually creating BIOS_RVY partition.
Now either use diskpart command or use partition software to change the partition to recovery partition.
if you use cmd, diskpart, use
set id="de94bba4-06d1-4d40-a16a-bfd50179d6ac"
gpt attributes=0x8000000000000001
if you prefer partition software, google it on how to do it.
Thats it.
F3 RECOVERY OPTION
This step is very important, it will further save you from loosing the current f3 msi factory reset option, if you already have it, and prohibit windows from further creating useless smaller multiple recovery partitions for winre.
first check if your winre is in 4th partition or not by running command "reagentc /info" in cmd. If not then change it. How? Either google it or ask me in comments, i will try to assist you.
View attachment 157862
If you still have MSI factory reset option intact from windows 10, it will not work even if its there. you have to use
F3_Recovery_USB by MSI once to update the current f3 option to make it workable in win 11.
If you don't have recovery option then you have to use that F3_Recovery_USB files from
F3_Recovery_USB website to proceed with recovery option.
Aslo don't forget to rename C drive to "Windows".
THATS IT. IT will work..
But make sure that your partitions are in order. Check the image to see my partition order. it should be in order for it to work.
View attachment 157863
I have tried myself so i am sharing this experience here.
Please BACKUP YOUR OPERATING SYSTEM in case something goes wrong.
But i am sure it will work ,if your first four partitions i.e. [system-MSR-windows-winre] are together and last partition is BIOS_RVY.
I hope this will help you. If you find it helpful. Please share it with others in need. Sharing is caring.
am so fed up with this.. can you please help me
