Creating Recovery USB with different outcomes...

After having received delivery of my new Lenovo X240 with a preinstalled copy of Win8 on its HDD the first thing I did was install a 128GB m2 SSD and use "Paragon Migrate OS to SSD" to migrate Win8 to the SSD. After Win8 was up and running on the SSD I updated to 8.1 and also ran all the other available updates. I then created a recovery drive using a USB stick. During this process the entire content of the recovery partition (roughly 8GB) was copied to the USB stick as well. A few days later I decided that I would prefer to use a different USB stick to create the recovery drive, yet when I went through the entire process again using the other USB stick the content of the recovery parition was not included anymore. Can anyone explain this to me? Can I simply copy the source folder with the content of the recovery partition from the recovery drive I created first to the second one? Would it be recognized if I ever needed to restore Windows from this drive? Any ideas? Many thanks!

Not sure that would work. What I would do is image all partitions on the drive except the recovery partition (unless that is the active partition). With an image of the system, you never need the recovery partition.

Imaging with free Macrium - Windows 7 Help Forums

I then created a recovery drive using a USB stick. During this process the entire content of the recovery partition (roughly 8GB) was copied to the USB stick as well. A few days later I decided that I would prefer to use a different USB stick to create the recovery drive,

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You can only make Recovery USB with Recovery partition ONCE.

Also after updating to Windows 8.1, the Windows 8.1 Repair Tools will not use the Windows 8 Recovery Partition.
Windows 8.1 Update Leaves OEM Owners With Broken Restore Function | GadgeTell


You can Order Lenovo Recovery Disks from here:
https://www.lenovorecovery.com/Extranet/Home.aspx

Can I simply copy the source folder with the content of the recovery partition from the recovery drive I created first to the second one?

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That should work.

You only make Recovery USB with Recovery partition ONCE

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Is that some kind of lenovo limitation? Not very helpful. I think HP used to do that.

Many thanks for all your answers! Much appreciated!

"Not sure that would work. What I would do is image all partitions on the drive except the recovery partition (unless that is the active partition). With an image of the system, you never need the recovery partition."

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Thank you for pointing that out. I guess I could use Windows’ own system imaging tool to do that as well?

"You can only make Recovery USB with Recovery partition ONCE."

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Okay, that explains it. Thank you! How ridiculously annoying, and of course not pointed out anywhere.

"Also after updating to Windows 8.1, the Windows 8.1 Repair Tools will not use the Windows 8 Recovery Partition."

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Good to know. Fortunately I’ve got the recovery partition saved on a USB drive already.

"You can Order Lenovo Recovery Disks from here:"

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Thanks! I’ve got to say, I’m not pleased with this situation at all. Lenovo didn’t give me a choice to order my notebook online without a preinstalled copy of Windows 8 and now they are basically asking extra money for recovery media instead of already providing it with the original delivery. Not very customer friendly at all! I experienced some hiccups when migrating Win8 from the HDD where it had been preinstalled to the M.2. SSD I put in after delivery. For now the system is running relatively smoothly but there are some minor problems that may convince me to eventually wanting to do a fresh install. I’m not sure if it’s a good idea to rely on my recovery USB stick for that…