Ci7 Posted August 29, 2013 Share Posted August 29, 2013 while trying inplace upgrade , what give? as the title say i am puzzled with that bizarre error anyone encountered it? Link to comment https://www.neowin.net/forum/topic/1173903-win81upgradecouldnt-update-the-system-reserved-partition-error/ Share on other sites More sharing options...
Ci7 Posted August 29, 2013 Author Share Posted August 29, 2013 Link to comment https://www.neowin.net/forum/topic/1173903-win81upgradecouldnt-update-the-system-reserved-partition-error/#findComment-595910849 Share on other sites More sharing options...
Brandon H Supervisor Posted August 29, 2013 Supervisor Share Posted August 29, 2013 system specs? did you run as admin? try in safe mode? Link to comment https://www.neowin.net/forum/topic/1173903-win81upgradecouldnt-update-the-system-reserved-partition-error/#findComment-595910927 Share on other sites More sharing options...
Ci7 Posted August 29, 2013 Author Share Posted August 29, 2013 system specs? did you run as admin? try in safe mode? i7 940 6GB intel SSD 150GB HD6870 ----- yes i did as admin i don't suppose upgrade would work in safe mode Link to comment https://www.neowin.net/forum/topic/1173903-win81upgradecouldnt-update-the-system-reserved-partition-error/#findComment-595910999 Share on other sites More sharing options...
toml_12953 Posted August 31, 2013 Share Posted August 31, 2013 Same problem here. I tried Admin mode. Now I'm going to try logging in as admin. It couldn't hurt to try! Tom L :cry: Link to comment https://www.neowin.net/forum/topic/1173903-win81upgradecouldnt-update-the-system-reserved-partition-error/#findComment-595913737 Share on other sites More sharing options...
Pikey Posted August 31, 2013 Share Posted August 31, 2013 Make sure you only have one drive installed , that might be confusing things! I had to temporarily take a SD card out of my tablet first for instance ... Link to comment https://www.neowin.net/forum/topic/1173903-win81upgradecouldnt-update-the-system-reserved-partition-error/#findComment-595914753 Share on other sites More sharing options...
LittleNeutrino Veteran Posted August 31, 2013 Veteran Share Posted August 31, 2013 When in doubt, wait for the official release. Aergan 1 Share Link to comment https://www.neowin.net/forum/topic/1173903-win81upgradecouldnt-update-the-system-reserved-partition-error/#findComment-595914767 Share on other sites More sharing options...
toml_12953 Posted September 1, 2013 Share Posted September 1, 2013 :woot: I solved my problem (and yours, too, I hope!) the problem was that I was running out of space on the recovery partition. I solved it by going to the Disk Management function in Computer Management, assigning a drive letter to the recovery partition, then deleting all the folders that were for languages other than English. The Win 8.1 install then worked. Whew! After Win 8.1 installed, I removed the drive letter from the recovery partition since it's not needed for anything else. Good luck to you. Link to comment https://www.neowin.net/forum/topic/1173903-win81upgradecouldnt-update-the-system-reserved-partition-error/#findComment-595915323 Share on other sites More sharing options...
Ci7 Posted September 1, 2013 Author Share Posted September 1, 2013 Make sure you only have one drive installed , that might be confusing things! I had to temporarily take a SD card out of my tablet first for instance ... this is a desktop... :woot: I solved my problem (and yours, too, I hope!) the problem was that I was running out of space on the recovery partition. I solved it by going to the Disk Management function in Computer Management, assigning a drive letter to the recovery partition, then deleting all the folders that were for languages other than English. The Win 8.1 install then worked. Whew! After Win 8.1 installed, I removed the drive letter from the recovery partition since it's not needed for anything else. Good luck to you. perhaps worth a shoot edit: except that i don't have recovery partition i have System Reserved (~ 100MB partition) Link to comment https://www.neowin.net/forum/topic/1173903-win81upgradecouldnt-update-the-system-reserved-partition-error/#findComment-595915631 Share on other sites More sharing options...
xendrome Posted September 1, 2013 Share Posted September 1, 2013 When in doubt, wait for the official release. Technically this is the same release that will be "official". The likely issue here is people have "messed" with their installs and installed language packs, 3rd party modifications, etc. And the setup is then unable to detect the proper version to allow an upgrade. I have successfully upgraded 3 systems so far without any issues. Mine were Windows 8 Pro. Link to comment https://www.neowin.net/forum/topic/1173903-win81upgradecouldnt-update-the-system-reserved-partition-error/#findComment-595915649 Share on other sites More sharing options...
Ci7 Posted September 1, 2013 Author Share Posted September 1, 2013 Technically this is the same release that will be "official". The likely issue here is people have "messed" with their installs and installed language packs, 3rd party modifications, etc. And the setup is then unable to detect the proper version to allow an upgrade. I have successfully upgraded 3 systems so far without any issues. Mine were Windows 8 Pro. coming to think about it 8.1 preview could messed up something when it failed in the final phase and rolled back about 2 months ago i have successfully installed it in another PC look like my only option is to start clean -> format when i have some free time it must be it , Link to comment https://www.neowin.net/forum/topic/1173903-win81upgradecouldnt-update-the-system-reserved-partition-error/#findComment-595915667 Share on other sites More sharing options...
toml_12953 Posted September 1, 2013 Share Posted September 1, 2013 System reserved or recovery - it doesn't matter. If you assign it a letter and free up space on it, the install will go through. Link to comment https://www.neowin.net/forum/topic/1173903-win81upgradecouldnt-update-the-system-reserved-partition-error/#findComment-595916577 Share on other sites More sharing options...
Ci7 Posted September 2, 2013 Author Share Posted September 2, 2013 System reserved or recovery - it doesn't matter. If you assign it a letter and free up space on it, the install will go through. i checked inside (and made sure to tick show hidden files) there is only one file worth 1kb :s can't view anything but still there is only 13MB of 100MB free space Link to comment https://www.neowin.net/forum/topic/1173903-win81upgradecouldnt-update-the-system-reserved-partition-error/#findComment-595916791 Share on other sites More sharing options...
rkitover Posted September 13, 2013 Share Posted September 13, 2013 I got it to install using the hints in this thread and some extra work. I'll go through this step by step and hopefully it will help someone. 1. press win+r and type diskmgmt.msc 2. click on your C: drive 3. below the list of drives there will be a partition map, the first partition will be Data or some such, listed at 100MB, right click on it and go to change drive letters and paths -> add -> now choose Y: for the drive letter 4. open an admin cmd prompt, in win8 you can press win+x and choose command prompt (admin), in win7 you have to create a shortcut for cmd.exe, then go to compatibility in the shortcut properties, and choose run as admin 5. type: Y: <enter> in the cmd window 6. run these commands: takeown /f . /r /d yicacls . /grant administrators:F /t attrib -h -s -r bootmgr NOTE: for the icacls command you can use your username instead of administrators, to find out your username type 'whoami' 7. now open explorer (win+e) go to the Y: drive under compuer, go into the Boot folder, and delete all languages other than en-US. Languages are in the form xx-XX. Make sure to shift+delete and not just delete so they don't go to the recycle bin. Empty the recycle bin afterwards just in case. 8. now go back to the admin command prompt, and type this command: chkdsk Y: /F /X /sdcleanup /L:5000 this truncates the NTFS log to 5MB, it can be very very big, not leaving enough space for the install at the end of the output it should tell you that you have at least 50MB of free space on the partition 9. proceed with the windows 8.1 installation 10. once booted into 8.1 and set up, you can go back into diskmgmt.msc and remove the drive letter for the boot partition Good luck! prisaz, MrUp and Gilgameshed 3 Share Link to comment https://www.neowin.net/forum/topic/1173903-win81upgradecouldnt-update-the-system-reserved-partition-error/#findComment-595944605 Share on other sites More sharing options...
Ci7 Posted September 14, 2013 Author Share Posted September 14, 2013 ^ I evently resolved the issue by clean installing and deleting Boot + C partition and reinstaling Windows it work better now , and 8.1 upgrade installer doesn't have any issue as well for all what it worth as well Link to comment https://www.neowin.net/forum/topic/1173903-win81upgradecouldnt-update-the-system-reserved-partition-error/#findComment-595945491 Share on other sites More sharing options...
paul0544 Posted September 14, 2013 Share Posted September 14, 2013 Whilst updating my main machine (Linux, Snow Leopard and Windows 7) to Windows 7 SP1 I had a problem installing the service pack. It would error out after a short time with an error which referred to being unable to mount the system volume. After trying Windows Update and the standalone installer multiple times I realised that the problem was with my drive configuration. I unplugged my OSX and Linux hard drives and it installed without a hitch. I then reinserted those two drives and all was working as intended. Link to comment https://www.neowin.net/forum/topic/1173903-win81upgradecouldnt-update-the-system-reserved-partition-error/#findComment-595945499 Share on other sites More sharing options...
prisaz Posted October 18, 2013 Share Posted October 18, 2013 I got it to install using the hints in this thread and some extra work. I'll go through this step by step and hopefully it will help someone. 1. press win+r and type diskmgmt.msc 2. click on your C: drive 3. below the list of drives there will be a partition map, the first partition will be Data or some such, listed at 100MB, right click on it and go to change drive letters and paths -> add -> now choose Y: for the drive letter 4. open an admin cmd prompt, in win8 you can press win+x and choose command prompt (admin), in win7 you have to create a shortcut for cmd.exe, then go to compatibility in the shortcut properties, and choose run as admin 5. type: Y: <enter> in the cmd window 6. run these commands: takeown /f . /r /d y icacls . /grant administrators:F /t attrib -h -s -r bootmgr NOTE: for the icacls command you can use your username instead of administrators, to find out your username type 'whoami' 7. now open explorer (win+e) go to the Y: drive under compuer, go into the Boot folder, and delete all languages other than en-US. Languages are in the form xx-XX. Make sure to shift+delete and not just delete so they don't go to the recycle bin. Empty the recycle bin afterwards just in case. 8. now go back to the admin command prompt, and type this command: chkdsk Y: /F /X /sdcleanup /L:5000 this truncates the NTFS log to 5MB, it can be very very big, not leaving enough space for the install at the end of the output it should tell you that you have at least 50MB of free space on the partition 9. proceed with the windows 8.1 installation 10. once booted into 8.1 and set up, you can go back into diskmgmt.msc and remove the drive letter for the boot partition Good luck! Sorry for such a quote of a one hit wonderful post. HUGE KUDOS to rkitover !! Some additional hits. #1. If you have you Windows 8 to auto start in a standard user account. Bad idea. Set it to require a login, so the system will use it's login to complete the update. #2. If you have media center and you go to the control pan and turn off your media options. including Media Center, it will still be there. You have the feature and is licensed to your machine, so you can turn it back on. Good idea turn it off before the upgrade. #3 If you are running Ceton Corp InfiniTV software, un install it. You would be best to reinstall it after you are sure all is working properly. Good Luck. These items HELPED ME. Learn by trial and error error error. :-)) Link to comment https://www.neowin.net/forum/topic/1173903-win81upgradecouldnt-update-the-system-reserved-partition-error/#findComment-596032169 Share on other sites More sharing options...
sabity Posted October 20, 2013 Share Posted October 20, 2013 Hi, I tried the solution below, but I cant see in the Y drive the boot folder (actually only a system file and the bootmgr file). I have administrative account enabled. Ticking the hidden files didn't reveal it either. Any suggestions how to erase the languages? Link to comment https://www.neowin.net/forum/topic/1173903-win81upgradecouldnt-update-the-system-reserved-partition-error/#findComment-596037339 Share on other sites More sharing options...
mtrox Posted March 16, 2014 Share Posted March 16, 2014 A reinstall solves a lot, but take hours. rkitover has the solution. Follow his post #14 exactly. He's talking about the system drive the error is referring to. Link to comment https://www.neowin.net/forum/topic/1173903-win81upgradecouldnt-update-the-system-reserved-partition-error/#findComment-596313373 Share on other sites More sharing options...
Steven P. Administrators Posted March 16, 2014 Administrators Share Posted March 16, 2014 The only time I ever received that error was because the reserved system partition was too small (I think 100mb) when it needed to be 250mb. I can't remember how or why that happened though! Link to comment https://www.neowin.net/forum/topic/1173903-win81upgradecouldnt-update-the-system-reserved-partition-error/#findComment-596313379 Share on other sites More sharing options...
BretAB Posted February 4, 2015 Share Posted February 4, 2015 Capture.JPG We recently solved one version of this problem. Here's that discussion: http://answers.microsoft.com/en-us/windows/forum/windows8_1-windows_install/we-couldnt-update-the-system-reserved-partition/a5003ebb-1f3f-40e5-9603-bdcc21d6b6eb?page=2&tm=1423086811341#LastReply Hope that helps. Regards . . . Link to comment https://www.neowin.net/forum/topic/1173903-win81upgradecouldnt-update-the-system-reserved-partition-error/#findComment-596743512 Share on other sites More sharing options...
Elias Ibrahim Posted August 12, 2015 Share Posted August 12, 2015 The solution is quite simple. Go to computer management | Disk Management. Right click on your C drive and mark partition as active Ok and you should be good to go Jesse Nelsen 1 Share Link to comment https://www.neowin.net/forum/topic/1173903-win81upgradecouldnt-update-the-system-reserved-partition-error/#findComment-596972728 Share on other sites More sharing options...
xendrome Posted August 12, 2015 Share Posted August 12, 2015 The solution is quite simple. Go to computer management | Disk Management. Right click on your C drive and mark partition as active Ok and you should be good to go Marking the C: drive as active is going to just cause nothing to boot. since the "System Reserved" partition should be active, not the C: drive. Link to comment https://www.neowin.net/forum/topic/1173903-win81upgradecouldnt-update-the-system-reserved-partition-error/#findComment-596972760 Share on other sites More sharing options...
Elias Ibrahim Posted August 12, 2015 Share Posted August 12, 2015 (edited) That is incorrect. Mine downloaded the update immediately after and started installing (Applying update) upon reboot. Link to comment https://www.neowin.net/forum/topic/1173903-win81upgradecouldnt-update-the-system-reserved-partition-error/#findComment-596972772 Share on other sites More sharing options...
Jesse Nelsen Posted August 19, 2015 Share Posted August 19, 2015 The solution is quite simple. Go to computer management | Disk Management. Right click on your C drive and mark partition as active Ok and you should be good to go This is the only thing that worked for me...thanks so easy and simple! +Elі 1 Share Link to comment https://www.neowin.net/forum/topic/1173903-win81upgradecouldnt-update-the-system-reserved-partition-error/#findComment-596986238 Share on other sites More sharing options...
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