How to recover a Unified Extensible Firmware Interface (UEFI)-based computer using System Recovery 2013

Description

The System Recovery Disk from System Recovery (SSR) 2013 lets you recover the computers that use the Unified Extensible Firmware Interface (UEFI) standard. However, consider the following points when you recover UEFI-based computers:

• You must start UEFI-based computers using the 64-bit version of System Recovery Disk.
• When you boot a UEFI-based computer, ensure that the system drive and the boot drive are located on a GPT disk. Similarly, when you boot a BIOS-based computer, your system drive and boot drive must be located on an MBR disk.
• You cannot restore backups of the boot partition and the system partition of UEFI-based computers to BIOS-based computers. Backups of UEFI-based computers must be restored to GPT disks. Similarly, you cannot restore backups of the boot partition and the system partition of BIOS-based computers to UEFI-based computers. Backups of BIOS-based computers must be restored to MBR disks.

Note: While you recover your computer using System Recovery Disk, the firmware type of the backup is displayed. Depending on the firmware type of the backup, restore the backups to the appropriate disks, either GPT or MBR.

• If your computer supports both UEFI and BIOS firmware, and you backed it up in UEFI mode, you must start the computer using UEFI firmware.
• When you recover UEFI-based computers, do not select the following options on the Edit target drive and Options panel in the Recover My Computer wizard:
  • Set drive active (for booting OS)
  • Restore master boot record

These options are applicable only for MBR-style disks. They are not applicable to GPT-style disks.

• When you recover UEFI-based computers, you must restore the EFI System Partition first if it does not exist.
• When you recover UEFI-based computers, an empty MSR partition is created if it does not exist.
• You cannot recover the boot volumes and the system volumes of UEFI-based computers to dynamic disks.