Gaming Windows 7 SP1

[Hakoda]

I'm running a genuine Windows 7 Ultimate x64 my AMD based system. I triple boot Win 7, OS X & Ubuntu on the same system using Charmeleon bootloader and I believe that may be the culprit here. Error 0x800f0a12 states that Windows 7 cannot access this special 200MB partition. I've formatted my system dozens of times using non-Windows based partition utilities and I've never come across this partition.

I've tried enabling automount & restarting so that maybe it would mount the partition and continue but no avail so far. Got any suggestions?

I guess I could create a backup of my Ubuntu & OS X partitions & use the standard Win 7 bootloader and then erase them until the the update is complete. Then once completed, reapply the backups to the harddrive.

Updates:

So far the update is stuck 0% download but my internet connection is live...
Decided to download it manually from Microsoft.

 

[twiztidsinz]

From the sounds of it, you don't have the 100/200MB* recovery partition that Windows 7 is looking for.
The partition is created by the Windows 7 install process and contains files needed to recover/repair a system. If you formatted with anything other than the Windows 7 install, then it's not going to show up.

Unless noted, Service Packs are 'roll ups' of updates -- essentially everything you get can be downloaded via Windows Update.


*Seems 200MB is standard, but mine is 100MB... possibly 100MB for 32bit, 200MB for 64bit.

 

[Hakoda]

How are you checking? And if its gone how can I recreate it? I don't recall ever deleting such partition.

EDIT: I just checked my dad's computer running Win 7 Ultimate. He has a "System Reserved" partition thats 100MB in Disk Management that I definitely don't have.

EDIT 2: According to this tutorial, the "System Reserved" partition is just an empty NTFS partition 100MB big. Is that true? I can follow that tutorial and see how it goes.

EDIT 3: Well the "System Reserved" partition definitely needs data, not an empty partition.

 

[Deleted User]

How are you checking? And if its gone how can I recreate it? I don't recall ever deleting such partition.

EDIT: I just checked my dad's computer running Win 7 Ultimate. He has a "System Reserved" partition thats 100MB in Disk Management that I definitely don't have.

EDIT 2: According to this tutorial, the "System Reserved" partition is just an empty NTFS partition 100MB big. Is that true? I can follow that tutorial and see how it goes.

Not necessarily. My Dell-Alienware laptop has a 100MB partition too. if I tap F8 while booting up I can launch into an advanced repair/recovery menu. There may be a special keyboard combination to unlock or access the features provided by this partition. Mostly though, it's on pre-built or pre-configured systems.

I've been having a lot of trouble applying this service package as well. I'm dual-booting UbuntuX64 and Windows 7x64 just using the regular Grub2(?) loader. Though, apparently, the installation is complete. It took a heck of a long time. I had to run a 300MB hotfix, (Windows6.1-KB947821-v10-x64). Hopefully everythings working well now. Hotfix worked, install doesn't work. Bleh.

 

[DeMoN]

Just great. Now I'll have even less space on my 64GB SSD.

 

[twiztidsinz]

How are you checking? And if its gone how can I recreate it? I don't recall ever deleting such partition.

EDIT: I just checked my dad's computer running Win 7 Ultimate. He has a "System Reserved" partition thats 100MB in Disk Management that I definitely don't have.

EDIT 2: According to this tutorial, the "System Reserved" partition is just an empty NTFS partition 100MB big. Is that true? I can follow that tutorial and see how it goes.

EDIT 3: Well the "System Reserved" partition definitely needs data, not an empty partition.
I see it using Disk Management.

The partition is NOT empty however no files are shown. After assigning a drive letter to it, it shows as having 71.8MB free of 99.9MB.
In addition to the data on the partition it MUST be the first partition of a drive and must start at the very beginning (sounds redundant, but it means there can't be any unused space before the first partition). As far as I know, nothing other than the Windows Installation can create this partition, however you may be able to clone it from another system (Just a GUESS as a POSSIBLE solution, I have ZERO reason to think it would work).


QUOTE(DeMoN @ Feb 23 2011, 12:14 AM) Just great. Now I'll have even less space on my 64GB SSD.

Your "64GB" drive is really 64,000,000,000bytes or: 62,500,000 Kilobytes // 61,035 Megabytes // 59.0 Gigabytes
I'd be more upset about the "missing" 5GB thanks to the different numbering systems (1,000 vs 1,024) than the 100MB partition.

 

[Hakoda]

Okay so now a quick question:

If I run my Win 7 installation CD while in my current Win 7 setup, it will allowing to "upgrade" my system as if I was running Vista. Now really it would just reinstall the OS files but keep my system settings intact. Will this procedure recreate the "System Reserved" partition?

 

[Deleted User]

Probably, I did a fresh-install of Windows followed by Ubuntu recently and I still have the 100 MB partition afterwards. As twiztidsinz said it's rather silly to worry about a 100MB recovery partition; though, if you do find a way to get rid of it you'll probably want to download & burn an iso copy of this.

http://neosmart.net/blog/2009/windows-7-system-repair-discs/
^ This is pretty much what the 100MB partition does use-wise, but this is still a handy tool to have on file. Note for moderators: this is ONLY the recovery disc, it does NOT contain a Windows OS.

 

[Jiggah]

All the 100MB partition contains is the bootloader information. It redirects to a repair folder on your MAIN partition, so it doesn't even actually handle repairs. The 100MB partition is not needed or necessary. If you did an install without it then those files will be found in the root of your main drive. You can repair the bootloader stuff by using a Win 7 disc, using the repair option then using the BOOTREC command to do a fixmbr (will delete Chameleon), fixboot, and rebuildbcd.

 

[raulpica]

Check with a partition manager if you actually HAVE that system partition.

You might end up having it, and just being Win7 that can't find it (happens to me everytime), in that case, assign a letter to it, and make it visible, and it should work.

 

[Hakoda]

Check with a partition manager if you actually HAVE that system partition.

You might end up having it, and just being Win7 that can't find it (happens to me everytime), in that case, assign a letter to it, and make it visible, and it should work.

I checked using Disk Management & EASUS Partition manager. The System Reserved partition does not exist. I'm baffled really.

 

[twiztidsinz]

Okay so now a quick question:

If I run my Win 7 installation CD while in my current Win 7 setup, it will allowing to "upgrade" my system as if I was running Vista. Now really it would just reinstall the OS files but keep my system settings intact. Will this procedure recreate the "System Reserved" partition?

The problem with that is, I don't think it wouldn't create the partition needed. If I recall, correctly, the Recovery Partition isn't needed and can be skipped -- if you 'trick' Windows into installing without it, possibly through upgrade but there is a way to do it with a Linux bootdisk and formatting/partitioning the drive through that (I don't recall the details, but it should be easy to search).

However, I would try to clone the partition first...
Not sure how you would go about doing this exactly, but you'd need to move your primary partition up roughly 100MB (100MB + space for partition 'padding' or whatever it's called, for example, a 500MB partition is slightly smaller than 500MB) which would be difficult in itself as there's most likely data written in the first 100MB that would need to be relocated.
I would free up the first ~150MB if possible, then make a 100MB partition (then I think you can 'expand forward' any unused space with a Linux partition tool).

Alternatively, now that I think of it, it might be simpler to make drive images of your Windows/Linux installs and back them up to a secondary drive, format with Windows Install like you're going to do a fresh install of 7 and let it set your partitions then restore your old Windows drive image, shrink your main partition then add your Linux partition back.
Of course, you'd need to fix the Windows bootmanager so that Linux is bootable, or switch to GRUB or something.

 

[Hakoda]

Okay I need some help. The "upgrade" needed to reboot during the step where it transfers all my files and programs back. I let it reboot and now the system is unstable. By that I mean the initial bootmenu has two options "Windows 7" & "Windows Setup Rollback". The normal OS option results in a freeze at the Windows 7 logo after a couple of seconds and the rollback option results in a blue background like the setup but no menu comes up and it will restart after a couple of seconds.

Suggestions?

 

[Jiggah]

All you had to do was set the Windows partition active under the Disk Management and it would have solved the issue. At this point, I'm not sure where you're at.

 

[_Chaz_]

I'm running a pirated Windows 7, and I got it downloaded (still not sure what it fixed, but whatever).

 

[Hakoda]

All you had to do was set the Windows partition active under the Disk Management and it would have solved the issue. At this point, I'm not sure where you're at.

The SP1 requires that partition which I didn't have. I decided to run the "upgrade" function off the installation disc in hope that it would create the partition. I didn't have the chance to try what you said. Wish I saw it in time. According to Ubuntu, my personal files are fine. I just need the freakin' OS stable now.

System restore is not available and the "Repair your computer" function from the bootloader gives me the same result as "Windows Setup Rollback".

I feel like I should just do a clean install.

 

[jumpman17]

Where can I download this service pack? Normally Microsoft has exe files on their site but all I can find is a stupid iso file for a disc.

 

[Joe88]

Where can I download this service pack? Normally Microsoft has exe files on their site but all I can find is a stupid iso file for a disc.

http://www.microsoft.com/downloads/en/deta...1b-3a9b77cdfdda

you need to have a valid install and needs to pass WGA to download the .exe's

I suggest just doing to through windows update due to small download size since I think it scans your computer for current updates and only downloads what it needs instead of every update ever released, I only needed to download a 61MB update for my 32bit machine and a 81MB update for my 64bit machine

both have had all current updates installed

 

[jumpman17]

I saw those, but they say Windows 6.1 which is Server 2008 isn't it?

EDIT: I use the exe files when I'm updating computers at work, otherwise it takes all day to download the service pack on our crappy internet connection.

EDIT 2: Looks like Windows 7's internal number is 6.1....weird.

 

[YayMii]

EDIT 2: Looks like Windows 7's internal number is 6.1....weird.

They actually did that to retain compatibility with Vista drivers. Because they didn't want that driver fiasco to go down again.

Anyways...
Holy crap I didn't even know the SP1 was available already... I'll go ahead and download it.