We can't create a Recovery drive on this PC, Required files are missing

If when you attempt to create a recovery drive using a USB drive on your Windows 11/10 computer but receive the error message; We can’t create a Recovery drive on this PC, Some required files are missing, then this post is intended to help you. In this post, we will identify the possible causes, as well as provide suitable solutions that you can try to help remediate this issue.

When you encounter this issue, you’ll receive the following full error message;

We can’t create a recovery drive on this PC
Some required files are missing. To troubleshoot problems when your PC can’t start, use your Windows installation disc or media.

You might encounter the issue due to one or more (but not limited to) of the following known causes;

The recovery partition information is lost: This is known to happen if the user has previously tried to clone the system on another drive.
The winre.wim file is missing from the computer: This file is responsible for holding the Windows recovery files. Without it, creating a recovery drive is no longer possible.
Your current system construct doesn’t have a recovery environment: This is known to occur if the user has upgraded to Windows 10 from an older Windows version.

We can’t create a Recovery drive on this PC, Some required files are missing

If you’re faced with this problem, you can try our recommended solutions in the order presented below and see if that helps to resolve the issue.

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Recreate the recovery environment via Command Prompt
Recover the winre.wim file
Regain the lost recovery partition information
Clone your computer and save it to a USB HDD
Perform a Fresh Start, In-place upgrade repair or Cloud Reset

Let’s take a look at the description of the process involved concerning each of the listed solutions.

1] Recreate the recovery environment via Command Prompt

This solution entails you restore the recovery environment by running a couple of commands in Command Prompt.

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Do the following:

Press Windows key + R to invoke the Run dialog.
In the Run dialog box, type cmd and then press CTRL + SHIFT + ENTER to open Command Prompt in admin/elevated mode.
In the command prompt window, type or copy and paste the command below in that order and hit Enter after each line.

reagentc /disable

reagentc /setreimage /path \\?\GLOBALROOT\device\harddisk0\partition1\Recovery\WindowsRE

reagentc /enable

After you must have executed all commands, restart your PC and try to use the Recovery Drive Creator at the next startup.

If the issue persists, try the next solution.

2] Recover the winre.wim file

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If a user runs a deep cleanup scan with several 3rd party tools or after the user tries to clone the system on another drive, it’s likely the winre.wim file will get lost. In this case, there are two different options that you can follow to recover the missing file. They are as follows:

i) Copy the winre.wim file from a different Windows system

This option requires you have access to a different Windows system that has a healthy winre.wim file.

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Do the following:

On another fully-functional Windows computer, open command prompt in elevated mode.
In the command prompt windows, type the command below and hit Enter to disable the Recovery Environment and make the winre.wim file from available from the hidden recovery to C:\windows\system32\recovery.

reagentc /disable

Next, navigate to the directory below.

C:\windows\system32\recovery

At the location, copy the winre.wim file from that folder to a USB storage drive.
Next, in the same elevated CMD prompt, type the command below and hit Enter to re-enable the Windows Recovery Environment again.

reagentc /enable

Now, move to the affected machine and plug in the USB drive containing the winre.wim file. Then, copy it and paste it in the directory below.

C:\system 32\Recovery

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With the winre.wim file restored, attempt to create a new recovery drive, and see if the We can’t create the recovery drive on this PC issue persists.

ii) Copy the winre.wim file from Windows installation media

This option entails that, to retrieve the winre.wim, insert the Windows installation media of your active OS and mount the install.wim. You will be able to copy the winre.wim file from there and then paste it inside the C:\windows\system32\recovery.

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Do the following:

Insert the DVD/USB or mount the Windows installation media.

Next, navigate to your OS drive (C:\) and create an empty directory called Mount.

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Next, open an elevated command prompt.

In the elevated Command Prompt, type or copy and paste the command below and hit Enter to mount the install.wim file and make the winre.wim file visible inside the new directory that you previously created.

dism /Mount-wim /wimfile:D:\sources\install.wim /index:1 /mountdir:C:\mount /readonly

Note: Your installation media might be on a different drive. In which case, change the drive letter accordingly.

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Now, in File Explorer, navigate to C:\mount\windows\system32\recovery and copy the winre.wim file from there and then, paste it in C:\windows\system32\recovery.

Next, return to the elevated CMD prompt and run the command below to unmount the install.wim. Once this is done, you can safely remove the installation media

dism /Unmount-Wim /Mountdir:C:\mount /discard

Last but not the least, run the following command in the same elevated CMD prompt to enable the Recovery Environment:

reagentc /enable

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Restart your PC and see if you can create a new recovery media. Else, continue with the next solution.

3] Regain the lost recovery partition information

In this solution, if you’re positive that your hard drive contains a recovery partition, you can follow the instruction below to recover the lost recovery partition information to resolve the issue.

Press Windows key + X to open Power User Menu.
Press A on the keyboard to launch PowerShell in admin/elevated mode.
In the PowerShell console, type in the command below and hit Enter.

diskpart

Next, type the command below and hit Enter.

list volume

If you have any volume containing the word Recovery in the output, you’re likely looking at your recovery partition. If so, take note of its volume number.

Next, type the command below and hit Enter. Where X is the Recovery volume number.

select volume X

Next, type the command below and hit Enter again to see on which disk it’s located. Once you see it, take note of the disk number.

detail volume

Next, type the command below and hit Enter to select the Recovery volume.

select disk X

Next, type the command below and hit Enter to list all partitions and inspect them. You should be able to spot a partition that matches the size of the recovery partition volume. It should have an * next to it. Take note of the partition number.

list partition

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You can now close the disk partition tool by typing exit and hit Enter.

After you exit the DiskPart tool, enter the following command and make sure to replace the X and Y placeholders with the disk number and the partition number respectively as obtained above.

reagentc /setreimage /path \\?\GLOBALROOT\device\harddiskX\partitionY\Recovery\WindowsRE

Last but not the least, type the command below to activate the recovery partition.

reagentc /enable

Restart your PC and see if you’re able to create the recovery drive at the next startup.

If this solution was not successful or you don’t have a recovery environment configured on your machine, you can try the next solution.

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4] Clone your computer and save it to a USB HDD

This solution requires you to use a third-party recovery solution to create the equivalent of a Windows-created recovery drive.

5] Perform a Fresh Start, In-place upgrade repair or Cloud Reset

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At this point, if the issue is still unresolved, it’s most likely due to some kind of system corruption that cannot be resolved conventionally. In this case, you can try Fresh Start, In-place upgrade repair to reset every Windows component. Also, if you’re running Windows 11/10, you can try Cloud Reset and see if that helps.

Any of these solutions should work for you!

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