All Surface devices come with a Windows recovery partition that includes information that allows you to refresh your device or restore the Surface to its factory state.
In case you have any problems with the Surface, you could use the "recovery options" menu command. But if you have a problem that prevents it Surface to boot, or if recovery has been removed from your Surface, then you can download the "recovery image" file you need from Microsoft's official page and create a recovery USB drive to boot your device from there to get access to recovery tools and troubleshooting your Surface.
Today we'll show you how to download a recovery image for your Surface, and how to create and use a USB recovery drive from downloading recovery image.
Caution! USB recovery units are not the same for all Surface models. Only use the USB recovery module that is the right one for your Surface model.
You'll need:
- Download the recovery image files for your Surface model according to the example below
- At least one 8GB USB flash drive for Surface RT and Surface 2 models
- Τουλάχιστον μία 16GB USB μονάδα flash για τα Surface Pro models
Instructions:
1 Go to the Microsoft Web site, and sign in with the Microsoft account you used to register your Sureface. (See picture below)
Click on: Download a recovery image for your Sureface
2. Select your registered Surface for which you want to download a recovery image and click "Continue". If you have not registered your Surface yet, then you can do so in this process. (See image below)
3 Click the “Download”, click “Save” (the example is with IE, do the corresponding Save with your own Browser), and save the ZIP file (recovery image) on your desktop. NOTE: You are about to download a large file (about 6.21GB) which may take some time to complete.
4. Follow the steps on the screen below to create a recovery unit from the recovery image download. For those who have difficulty with the English language, we translate briefly:
Step 1: Put the appropriate USB into the usb port
Step 2: From your desktop click on “O computer my"
Step 3: Right click on the USB drive and select "Configuration"
Step 4: In the configuration window select "Fat32" as the file system and give a name to the Volume Label, such as Recovery and press the "Start" button
Step 5: Click OK to erase all data that USB may have
Step 6: Click OK when the configuration is complete
Step 7: Unzip the file you have already downloaded by right-clicking on the file and selecting "Unzip"
Step 8: Copy all the files you found after unpacking to the USB drive
5. Now you can use this USB recovery unit for your Surface to refresh it or restore it (See image below)
Good luck
Photos and guide from 8forums