USB Recovery upgrade 8.1 Surface RT

[frankst237]

Question about USB Recovery Drives. After installing updates on Windows 8.1 on a Surface RT should I create a new recovery drive - will the new one have all the new updates in it to minimise post recovery update time if I had to use ? This is asked after I had to do a refresh using a recovery drive and then installing loads of updates on to the RT via Windows Update. Would a 'new' recovery drive be better than the old?

 

[jr9]

The recovery drive tool isn't a backup. It gives you access to tools that can help fix your PC if it doesn't have recovery tools installed by the OEM or a recovery partition. This tool gives you access to tools like Refresh/Reset PC or tools like cmd if you cannot get into Windows to use these tools.

If you are looking for a backup that makes an up to date backup of your entire Windows installation, that is called a system image and those are created in "Create a System Image backup". The more recent the backup, the fewer updates you will have to perform in the event recovery needs to take place. It essentially takes a perfect snapshot of your system that can be used later. You could then boot to your USB recovery drive and select the system image backup and it will restore using that image you created.

 

[frankst237]

The recovery drive tool isn't a backup. It gives you access to tools that can help fix your PC if it doesn't have recovery tools installed by the OEM or a recovery partition. This tool gives you access to tools like Refresh/Reset PC or tools like cmd if you cannot get into Windows to use these tools.

If you are looking for a backup that makes an up to date backup of your entire Windows installation, that is called a system image and those are created in "Create a System Image backup". The more recent the backup, the fewer updates you will have to perform in the event recovery needs to take place. It essentially takes a perfect snapshot of your system that can be used later. You could then boot to your USB recovery drive and select the system image backup and it will restore using that image you created.

 

[frankst237]

Hi jr9, apologies but I didn't make it clear enough - I do understand the concept of a recovery drive and that it isn't a total back up - I wondered if it updated itself in any way after updates.

It isn't possible to do a System Image (as far as I can find out) on the Surface RT because no back ups (like Acronis etc.) are written for the ARM processor and there doesn't seem to be any tool built into the Windows RT 8.1 OS on the machine. This would be the BEST option but I don't believe there is a tool that does the job.

If anyone has any better ideas than mine then they would be gratefully received.

Thanks, Frank

 

[jr9]

Yes, the RT version of Windows is limited and I forgot how limited it was. I haven't used RT myself a lot but I'm surprised to see it lacks the system image tool. If this was a Surface Pro that had fully functional Windows and a normal CPU then it would be a different story I suppose.

I can't think of a way to clone the drive unless you can find a cloning tool that will work on ARM. I don't think there is one as there really isn't a demand for such a tool. ARM based computers generally are backed up in only ways like to the cloud these days or USB (with things like File History). For this particular Surface RT, my only suggestion would be to just use File History and if the OS needs to be reinstalled then Reset/Refresh and let it update.

It's unlikely you'll ever need to perform a full image restore operation as you would a normal PC. It doesn't run normal programs so you don't need to worry about software messing up the OS in a way that reset wouldn't be fixed by a refresh or reset. I don't even think any malware you'd normally come across would work on ARM. If the storage on the tablet became inaccessible then the tablet is finished anyways as it used NAND.