What Is Windows PE & How To Make a PE Rescue Disk

Very useful in an emergency situation

Windows PE (or Windows Preinstallation Environment) is a scaled-down version of Windows. This custom environment is useful in an emergency, letting you run Windows commands or custom, third-party tools to resolve issues with your Windows installation or, in a worst-case scenario, to recover your files.

There are several third-party Windows PE rescue disks that you can download and use, likeHiren’s BootCD PE. If you’re wary about trusting a third-party solution, especially with potential piracy issues, you can build your own usingWin10XPE. Let’s walk you through how to create your own Windows PE rescue disk.

Creating a Windows PE Rescue Disk

To create a Windows PE rescue disk, you’ll need a recent copy of the Windows 10 installation media. Microsoft providesWindows 10 ISOsfor download, but you’ll need tochange your browser user agentto Chrome OS or Android first to be able to download the file from the Microsoft website.

Win10XPE turns your custom Windows PE environment into an ISO file. Once the build process is complete, you can flash the ISO file contents to a USB flash drive usingRufus.

Etcher is a popular alternative to Rufus, but this has known problems with flashing Windows 10 ISOs to flash drives. In this case, it’s better to use Rufus.

Copying Windows PE To a USB Flash Drive

To flash your custom Windows PE ISO to a USB flash drive, you’ll need to have downloaded the latest version of Rufus. It doesn’t require installation, so just launch theRufus.exefile once it’s downloaded.

Once the Rufus flashing process has completed, reboot your PC with your flash drive plugged in. The custom Windows PE environment should then boot, allowing you to begin recovering your Windows installation.

Using The Windows Recovery Environment (WinRE)

If you’re looking for a built-in solution, Windows 10 users can use the Windows Recovery Environment (WinRE) instead. While WinPE is customizable, WinRE is a set-in-stone solution that includes tools to repair your file system, restore Windows to a previous backup, restore Windows to factory settings, and more.

The benefit of the Windows Recovery Environment over the Windows Preinstallation Environment is all Windows 10 users have the WinRE tool installed already.

You can also boot into the Windows Recovery Environment by aborting the Windows 10 start-up process at least twice. Once WinRE has loaded, you might need to clickAdvanced Options> Troubleshootto access the various included recovery tools.

If your Windows installation is beyond repair, then you may need towipe and reinstall Windows 10instead.

Ben Stockton is a freelance technology writer based in the United Kingdom. In a past life, Ben was a college lecturer in the UK, training teens and adults. Since leaving the classroom, Ben has taken his teaching experience and applied it to writing tech how-to guides and tutorials, specialising in Linux, Windows, and Android. He has a degree in History and a postgraduate qualification in Computing.Read Ben’s Full Bio

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What Is Windows PE & How To Make a PE Rescue Disk#

Creating a Windows PE Rescue Disk#

Copying Windows PE To a USB Flash Drive#

Using The Windows Recovery Environment (WinRE)#