The EFI System Partition (ESP) is a type of partition on a Windows computer that creates several regions on the PC’s hard disk so that information stored on the different partitions can be managed separately by the Windows operating system.
Windows computer uses it because they contain the following four main components:
Boot loaders;
Device drivers;
System utilities;
Data files.
The EFI is most used by systems that adhere to the Unified Extensive Firmware Interface (UEFI). The UEFI firmware works during the process of booting a computer to load files stored on the ESP in order to start installed operating system and system utilities.
It’s the function of the boot loaders to ensure that all the necessary files and utilities have been booted before the completion of the booting sequence. The ESP ensures that all errors encountered during system booting phase are resolved. It does this by working with the boot loader to offer users good experiences during system startup.
EFI system partition is very important in booting the installed OS and system utilities of the hard disk. However, if you’re using a hard disk with EFI system partitions created for the macOS, and you now want to install Windows to replace macOS, then you need to delete the old EFI system partition and create a new one for Windows.
Here is how to delete EFI system partition:
Step 1. First, you need to identify the disk where the EFI partition is located.
Open Disk Management by pressing “Windows key + R”. Type “diskmgmt.msc” and press “Enter”.
In Disk Management, locate the EFI system partition, and close the disk management.
Step 2. Delete the EFI partition with DISKPART tool
Open the elevated command prompt by right-clicking on the “Start” menu. From the pop-up menu, choose “Command Prompt (Admin)”.
Give each of the following commands and click “Enter”.
Diskpart
List disk
Select disk number
Clean
Once the cleaning process is complete, you’ll get a notification saying: “DiskPart succeeded in cleaning the disk”. Click “exit” to close the DiskPart tool, and then close the command window.
Step 1. Boot your PC with Windows installation media. Then, press “Shift + f10” on the first screen to launch the Command Prompt.
Step 2. Run the following commands and click enter at the end:
Diskpart
List disk
Select disk
List partition
Create partition efi
Format quick fs=fat32
List partition
List volume (i.e. the volume letter where the Windows OS is installed)
Exit
bcdboot X:/windows (Replace “X” with the Volume letter of the Windows OS partition).
Step 3. Now, you can remove the Windows installation media and restart your PC.
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Steps to recover lost data:
Step 1. Launch AnyRecover on your Windows PC, and select “Lost Partition Recovery” mode. AnyRecover will scan your hard drive for lost partitions.
Step 2. Select the partition you want to recover, and click “Next”.
Step 3. Select the file type and click “Scan”.
Step 4. Preview the files, select the ones to recover, click the “Recover” tab, and choose the target partition to save the files.
By Taylor Clark , to Hard Drive Recovery
Posted on Nov 02, 2018 ( Updated: Jan 15, 2019 )