Restoring recovery partition

I have a client who has Windows 10 running in a VM. He set the virtual boot drive size too conservatively, and now the update package for 1903 won't fit in the available space.

I successfully added more space to his virtual drive, but when I went to grow the C partition to encompass the new space, I discovered that there was a recovery partition inbetween them preventing it. I tried some tools to move the recovery partition to the head end of the drive to get it out of the way, but none of them would even offer to do it. I gather that partition and/or the C partition has some kind of property that says it's unable to be moved.

I found many places on the web advising me to just blow the recovery partition away to accomplish this task. I would be willing to do that if there were a way to recreate a recovery partition at the end of the new drive. It's there for a reason, after all.

Can this be done?

Well, that's half the answer. Now, how do I get the recovery partition back once I have merged the space?

Why are you so set on having a recovery partition? ESPECIALLY in a VM environment? There is nothing the recovery partition will do that simply booting from a Windows 10 USB flash drive (or an ISO in the case of a VM) can't do.

Kyhi said:

you do not need the Recovery "Partition" windows will work just fine without it.. But you can reset the Recovery "Environment" by typing in cmd prompt(admin)
reagentc /enable

Thanks, while I know the recovery partition may not be necessary, I wanted to keep it and remove old ones left by Windows update but I found that just moving cause the recovery to be disabled and I could not determine how to re-enable it.
By first disabling it, as you indicated, and then moving things, I could use the reagentc /enable command successfully.

Thanks again.

NavyLCDR said:

Why are you so set on having a recovery partition? ESPECIALLY in a VM environment? There is nothing the recovery partition will do that simply booting from a Windows 10 USB flash drive (or an ISO in the case of a VM) can't do.

Well, that's a fair observation. If that's true, I won't mind blowing it away.

I wanted to preserve it because I had no idea what would break in Windows if I got rid of it. It's a belt and suspenders caution.

Most of the work I do is on macOS. Removing the restore partition on a Mac will surrender significant functionality, like the ability to force-reset passwords, perform certain disk maintenance and recovery operations, and reinstall a damaged OS with no working network connections. Also, I had somewhere gotten the impression that the recovery partition constituted some of the information store used by the sfc /scannow procedure. But if it's as worthless as you maintain, I'll just remove it and not worry about it.

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Kyhi said:

you do not need the Recovery "Partition" windows will work just fine without it.. But you can reset the Recovery "Environment" by typing in cmd prompt(admin)
reagentc /enable

What does the recovery "environment" offer that I would miss having, assuming the absence of a restore partition?