Reset and Refresh Command-line

Question

During the Keynote it was mentioned that you can use a command-line tool to set a new baseline for the reset and refresh backup stuff. Is that documented someplace?

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Jeffrey S. Patton Assistant Director of IT School of Engineering Computing Services University of Kansas 1520 West 15th Street Lawrence, KS. 66045-7621 | http://patton-tech.com

Answer 1

Hi Jeffrey,

The command below will create a new 'Refresh Point'

You can run “recimg.exe -CreateImage C:\RecoveryImage” from an elevated command prompt. It will store the image under C:\RecoveryImage (or wherever you specify)

*Note* You will need to create the desination folder before running the above command.

Thanks

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Michael

Answer 2

How do you make this the default baseline to do a refresh from? This was stated in the keynote, do I need to store the wim in a specific folder, with a specific name?

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Jeffrey S. Patton Assistant Director of IT School of Engineering Computing Services University of Kansas 1520 West 15th Street Lawrence, KS. 66045-7621 | http://patton-tech.com

Answer 3

How do you make this the default baseline to do a refresh from? This was stated in the keynote, do I need to store the wim in a specific folder, with a specific name?

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Jeffrey S. Patton Assistant Director of IT School of Engineering Computing Services University of Kansas 1520 West 15th Street Lawrence, KS. 66045-7621 | http://patton-tech.com

I think you just have to create the folder (RecoveryImae e.j.p.) and run the command, It will be capture the Windows image into a .WIM file, you don't need the install.wim file from your media in that scenario.

Answer 4

The implication during the keynote was that you could set a new baseline for a machine to be restored from. Does simply running this command cause this to happen? I'm asking because as I plan for the next release of Windows within the school I see this as a very nice replacement for our standard wipe and re-install when a machine gets a virus.

It seems if I can set a baseline after all the apps are installed, and a machine gets a virus or malware I could potentially restore back to that point when the virus wasn't there.

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Jeffrey S. Patton Assistant Director of IT School of Engineering Computing Services University of Kansas 1520 West 15th Street Lawrence, KS. 66045-7621 | http://patton-tech.com

Answer 5

The implication during the keynote was that you could set a new baseline for a machine to be restored from. Does simply running this command cause this to happen? I'm asking because as I plan for the next release of Windows within the school I see this as a very nice replacement for our standard wipe and re-install when a machine gets a virus.

It seems if I can set a baseline after all the apps are installed, and a machine gets a virus or malware I could potentially restore back to that point when the virus wasn't there.

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Jeffrey S. Patton Assistant Director of IT School of Engineering Computing Services University of Kansas 1520 West 15th Street Lawrence, KS. 66045-7621 | http://patton-tech.com

Hi, I am trying it right now!
But, yes... when you have installed and configured all your apps an settings you just run this command and It will be set a baseline from your current OS, like a OEM point.

So whatever you want, you just have to run Reset and It will back your system to that point.

I am going to try!

I think this is awesome!

Answer 6

So I run reset from within the control panel and it will pull up my new baseline? or is there a reset commandline as well?

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Jeffrey S. Patton Assistant Director of IT School of Engineering Computing Services University of Kansas 1520 West 15th Street Lawrence, KS. 66045-7621 | http://patton-tech.com

Answer 7

So I run reset from within the control panel and it will pull up my new baseline? or is there a reset commandline as well?

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Jeffrey S. Patton Assistant Director of IT School of Engineering Computing Services University of Kansas 1520 West 15th Street Lawrence, KS. 66045-7621 | http://patton-tech.com

Just run Reset from Control Panel in the screen start and It will do the hard job ;)
I have not tried it yet, It takes a lot of time in order to create the Reset point, but according to BUILD it should be work in that way.

Answer 8

The 'Reset' feature will remove all files and applications - like a clean install of the Operating System.

The 'Refresh' feature will use the new baseline wim created.

 

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Michael

Answer 9

Ok, I used the wrong term thanks, does the refresh just know that i created a new baseline?

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Jeffrey S. Patton Assistant Director of IT School of Engineering Computing Services University of Kansas 1520 West 15th Street Lawrence, KS. 66045-7621 | http://patton-tech.com

Answer 10

The 'Reset' feature will remove all files and applications - like a clean install of the Operating System.

The 'Refresh' feature will use the new baseline wim created.

 

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Michael

But when I run reimg am I creating a Reset point? or.. is there a different command in order to create a Reset point?

Thanks!

Answer 11

The recimg -CreateImage command only works with Refresh, doesn't impact the Reset feature.

The Reset feature relies on the Installation Media as this is more intended to clean the machine of all personal files and installed applications.

 

 

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Michael

Answer 12

So, is there a command-line refresh? I still don't think that I understand how the recimg + refresh works when you manually create a baseline.

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Jeffrey S. Patton Assistant Director of IT School of Engineering Computing Services University of Kansas 1520 West 15th Street Lawrence, KS. 66045-7621 | http://patton-tech.com

Answer 13

Hi Jeffery,

Once the command line has been run to create the new image (install.wim) when you use the 'Refresh' feature in Control Panel it should automatically use the new .wim file.

Thanks

 

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Michael

Answer 14

Can anyone please explain how is this different from sysprep? Doesn't sysprep already let you capture the state of your system as a baseline generalized WIM image?

Answer 15

Can anyone please explain how is this different from sysprep? Doesn't sysprep already let you capture the state of your system as a baseline generalized WIM image?

Yes, but Sysprep is only for generalize your image, you cannot capture, in order to capture you have to use ImageX.

Refresh make this automatically, you have not to take care about command line options, just for create the image. 

Answer 16

Yeah sorry I meant Imagex when I said Sysprep. Btw is this new image created by recimg already generalized?

Answer 17

When I do this (running as the account named "Administrator") it fails. Here is what I see:

 

 

C:\Windows\system32>whoami
t500-w8\administrator

C:\Windows\system32>recimg.exe -CreateImage C:\RecoveryImage

RecImg Tool v1.0 - Captures WIM Image

***** Running WIM Capture. Press [ESC] to cancel *****

    WIM File - C:\RecoveryImage\install.wim
    OS  Path - C:

Phase PBR_WIM_CAPTURE_PHASE_INITIALIZING started.
50%
Phase PBR_WIM_CAPTURE_PHASE_INITIALIZING completed.

Phase PBR_WIM_CAPTURE_PHASE_CREATE_SNAPSHOT started.
100%
Phase PBR_WIM_CAPTURE_PHASE_CREATE_SNAPSHOT completed.


FAILED. HRESULT - 0x8007010b


C:\Windows\system32>

To make sure it was not a permissions issue, I granted Full Control to Users and used icacls to mark the directory with integritylevel High. I get the same result regardless.

 

Answer 18

Error 0x8007010b means the directory is invalid. Do you have this directory in your Windows 8?

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"A programmer is just a tool which converts caffeine into code"

Answer 19

Error 0x8007010b means the directory is invalid. Do you have this directory in your Windows 8?

Yes, the directory exists. Chkdsk reveals no errors. 

Answer 20

Run Process Monitor in background and filter all SUCCESS values out. Now look for error messages

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"A programmer is just a tool which converts caffeine into code"