Surface: move recovery partition to usb and gain back space


Recommended Posts

Freed up 4gb and i'm happy! I did a test boot off the USB drive to verify all is well and just keep the USB stick in the Surface box if I ever need it. MS should definitely post that this functionality is built into the recovery system and completely wizard driven. 4gb is a lot of space to free up and USB sticks are CHEAP.. should just throw in a USB recovery stick in lieu of recovery partition if you ask me :)

Link to comment
Share on other sites

Nice tip. I don't need the space, but why not?!? 4GB is 4GB. Better the USB than your surface local storage.

Link to comment
Share on other sites

Nice tip. I don't need the space, but why not?!? 4GB is 4GB. Better the USB than your surface local storage.

Presumably in the worst case scenario when you're out and about or on a trip and your Surface starts failing to boot - but you can't fix it because you've wiped the recovery partition and left your recovery USB drive at home :p If you have the space to spare, leaving it on there is probably the better option. But if you need the space, it's always a nice option.

Link to comment
Share on other sites

Presumably in the worst case scenario when you're out and about or on a trip and your Surface starts failing to boot - but you can't fix it because you've wiped the recovery partition and left your recovery USB drive at home :p If you have the space to spare, leaving it on there is probably the better option. But if you need the space, it's always a nice option.

If I travel, i'll just bring the usb stick with me.. but I'm often not that far from a MS store where I would make them fix it :)

Link to comment
Share on other sites

From the look of the contents of the stick, it appears to be a clean install, would that be safe to assume? Verses it making a backup copy of your system as it is now when you create the the recovery to USB

Link to comment
Share on other sites

From the look of the contents of the stick, it appears to be a clean install, would that be safe to assume? Verses it making a backup copy of your system as it is now when you create the the recovery to USB

Makes sense because the recovery partition doesnt hold a backup of your current config and the recovery partition would wipe everything back to default if you had to use it for a restore.

Link to comment
Share on other sites

yes, recovery is full wipe when you boot off this recovery media. Most games store their saves on xbox live and most apps use skydrive profiles/saves so when you re-install its not hard to recover.

Link to comment
Share on other sites

This topic is now closed to further replies.
  • Recently Browsing   0 members

    • No registered users viewing this page.