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I attempted to restore the partition restoration version hacker After a month, Windows 10 no longer offers an option to revert to the previous version, although, on PCs pre-installed with W7, W8, or W8.1, a factory image is still present on the PC. Here’s an initial situation on a PC with classic BIOS running W10 installed for over a month:

Evaluation of the situation

Aside from the C:\windows partition that everyone knows, there are three additional partitions:

- A 350 MB system reserved partition that contains the boot files and the advanced mode of W8 (the winre console).
- A 450 MB partition created during the installation of W10 where its own advanced mode (another winre console) was placed
- A backup partition containing factory images (and others that are personal).

The first thing is to take stock of the situation: we open the command prompt by pressing the Windows key and the letter X, then select "Command Prompt (Admin)" from the menu. There, we type: reagentc /info. The worst situation we can encounter is as follows:

C:\WINDOWS\system32>reagentc /info
Recovery Environment (WinRE) and System Reset Configuration Information:
WinRE State: Disabled
WinRE Location:
Boot Configuration Data (BCD) Identifier: 20438f1f-4e6f-11e5-b3e3-902b537c1002
Recovery Image Location:
Recovery Image Index: 0
Custom Image Location:
Custom Image Index: 0
REAGENTC.EXE: operation successful.

Here, we clearly confirm a bad installation of W10: we have no advanced mode possible (winre is disabled) and no recovery image is proposed. We will need to check that these tools exist and ensure they are usable. We will use the diskpart command to assign letters to partitions 3 and 4.

C:\windows\system32>diskpart
DISKPART> select disk 0
Disk 0 is now the selected disk.

DISKPART> select partition 3
Partition 3 is now the selected partition.

DISKPART> assign letter=R
DiskPart successfully assigned the drive letter or mount point.

DISKPART> select partition 4
Partition 4 is now the selected partition.

DISKPART> assign letter=U
DiskPart successfully assigned the drive letter or mount point.

DISKPART> exit

This results in:

Two windows opened, and they offer us the content. I see a recovery folder on R, and on U, a series of folders including Image which might contain my factory image. Since the files might be hidden, I will perform my search in the command prompt using the dir /a command: the /a option displays hidden files.

C:\WINDOWS\system32>r:

R:\>cd recovery

R:\Recovery>dir /a
The volume in drive R is System Reserved
The serial number of the volume is F484-7A3D

Directory of R:\Recovery

29/08/2015 16:36 <DIR> .
29/08/2015 16:36 <DIR> ..
29/08/2015 15:03 <DIR> WindowsRE
29/08/2015 16:36 <DIR> Logs
0 file(s) 0 bytes
4 Dir(s) 148,688,896 bytes free

R:\Recovery>cd WindowsRE

R:\Recovery\WindowsRE>dir /a
The volume in drive R is System Reserved
The serial number of the volume is F484-7A3D

Directory of R:\Recovery\WindowsRE

29/08/2015 15:03 <DIR> .
29/08/2015 15:03 <DIR> ..
02/06/2012 16:39 3,170,304 boot.sdi
29/08/2015 15:03 979 ReAgent.xml
26/07/2012 10:02 165,178,257 Winre.wim
3 file(s) 168,349,540 bytes
2 Dir(s) 148,688,896 bytes free

A Winre.wim file is indeed present in the folder in question. That’s the one I’m interested in. I will now search for the W8 restoration image on partition U:

C:\windows\system32>u:

U:\>cd image

U:\Image>dir /a
The volume in drive U is Backup
The serial number of the volume is 7490-B8DC

Directory of U:\Image

09/10/2015 17:27 <DIR> .
09/10/2015 17:27 <DIR> ..
26/07/2012 11:08 2,050,401,501 install.wim
1 file(s) 2,050,401,501 bytes
2 Dir(s) 3,563,745,280 bytes free

The install.wim file is indeed present on this partition. The factory image is still present. The size of 2GB can be explained by the fact that I am using an original file, not a real manufacturer image.

2. Repairing reagent.xml

We now need to make Windows 10 aware of where the advanced boot is located and how to retrieve the factory image of Windows 8. We will use the reagentc command.

We associate the winre.wim file from partition R with the system so that it knows how to find the advanced mode. This command will also allow for the creation of a repair key later.

C:\Recovery\windowsRE>reagentc /setreimage /path R:\Recovery\WindowsRE\winre.wim
Directory set: \\?\GLOBALROOT\device\harddisk0\partition3\Recovery\WindowsRE

REAGENTC.EXE: operation successful.

We check that there are not multiple versions of Windows in the factory image (which is common), and we will choose the right one based on the index returned.

C:\Recovery\windowsRE>dism /get-wiminfo /wimfile:U:\Image\install.wim

Deployment Image Servicing and Management Tool
Version: 10.0.10240.16384

Details for image: u:\Image\install.wim

Index: 1
Name: Windows 8 Pro
Description: Windows 8 Pro
Size: 8,217,582,634 bytes

The operation was successful.

I had a W8 Pro, so it’s indeed index 1 that I need. We define the factory image as the element to be used for future repair.

C:\Recovery\windowsRE>reagentc /setosimage /path U:\Image /index 1
Directory set: \\?\GLOBALROOT\device\harddisk0\partition4\Image

REAGENTC.EXE: operation successful.

We enable reagentc, which will create a reagent.xml file in the c:\windows\system32\Recovery folder and in R:\recovery\windowsRE

C:\Recovery\windowsRE>reagentc /enable
REAGENTC.EXE: operation successful.

We finish with a verification of all this to ensure everything went well.

C:\Recovery\windowsRE>reagentc /info
Recovery Environment (WinRE) and System Reset Configuration Information:

WinRE State: Enabled
WinRE Location: \\?\GLOBALROOT\device\harddisk0\partition3\Recovery\WindowsRE
BC Data Identifier: 20438f21-4e6f-11e5-b3e3-902b537c1002
Recovery Image Location: \\?\GLOBALROOT\device\harddisk0\partition4\Image
Recovery Image Index: 1
Custom Image Location:
Custom Image Index: 0

REAGENTC.EXE: operation successful.

The factory image is correctly selected as the recovery tool, and WinRE (the repair console, that is, the advanced menu) is correctly defined as the boot tool.

3. Creating a repair key

It’s time to create a tool (a USB drive) that will allow us to reinstall W8 directly. We type recovery in the search box:

The program to create a recovery key is offered directly. We follow the instructions and check "Back up system files to the recovery drive" and confirm everything:

The key is created without issue. All that remains is to boot from it to reinstall W8 or W8.1. As for automatic activation after the rollback, I was unable to verify this as my installation is a test setup, not a real pre-installed PC, so I can’t check it. However, according to the M$ site, it seems it will not pose a problem until July 2016.

I also add that this procedure was tested in August with a Toshiba on another forum, and the requester confirmed to me that it worked perfectly for him too.

Note: If you do not restore your system immediately, do not forget to remove the temporary letters R and U:

diskpart
select disk 0
select partition 3
remove letter=R
select partition 4
remove letter=U