Recovery Console

Windows Recovery Console is a command-line recovery tool available for Windows 2000, Windows XP, and Windows Server 2003. Its resources are present in the installation media of this versions, where it can be run from. It was oriented to computer administrators that wanted to easily recover a Windows installation through command-based tools to fix issues on them.

History
The first release of Windows Recovery Console was made available alongside Windows 2000 on 17 February 2000. It is not installed by default with the rest of the operating system, but the user can boot the computer into the installation media and then pressing R to access it. Another way in which it is possible to start it is to install the resources to the Windows partition. To do it, insert the installation media, open the Run command and, assuming D: is your drive letter, type the following command:. This command will start the installation of the Recovery Console into the hard disk. At first, it will show a message to the user that he/she can install the Recovery Console as a boot option, and that he/she can access it at anytime through the Startup Menu. Then, it will run Dynamic Update to download the latest files at Microsoft. However, the user can skip this and install the local resources in the media through a Cancel button.

Since it is a command-line interpreter, it contains an interface that is very similar to Command Prompt's, and it contains the basic commands from it, such as ,  , and  , that are designed for troubleshooting.

Windows XP and Server 2003's Recovery Consoles are not much different from 2000's, but they added some new commands, such as.

Replacement
With the release of Windows Vista on 30 January 2007, Windows Recovery Console was replaced by a new tool: Windows Recovery Environment (WinRE), which provided more advanced options that replaced those from Recovery Console. For instance, Startup Repair on WinRE replaced  and , while other commands such as   could still be run from a native Command Prompt window. WinRE also had the ability to run other diagnostic tools like System Restore, which were already on supported Recovery Console versions (except Windows 2000 and Server 2003) but not available for execution.

Commands
There are some internal commands that can be used in the Recovery Console:


 * (introduced in Windows XP)
 * (introduced in Windows XP)
 * (introduced in Windows XP)
 * (introduced in Windows XP)
 * (introduced in Windows XP)
 * (introduced in Windows XP)
 * (introduced in Windows XP)
 * (introduced in Windows XP)
 * (introduced in Windows XP)
 * (introduced in Windows XP)
 * (introduced in Windows XP)
 * (introduced in Windows XP)
 * (introduced in Windows XP)
 * (introduced in Windows XP)
 * (introduced in Windows XP)
 * (introduced in Windows XP)
 * (introduced in Windows XP)
 * (introduced in Windows XP)
 * (introduced in Windows XP)
 * (introduced in Windows XP)
 * (introduced in Windows XP)
 * (introduced in Windows XP)
 * (introduced in Windows XP)
 * (introduced in Windows XP)
 * (introduced in Windows XP)
 * (introduced in Windows XP)
 * (introduced in Windows XP)
 * (introduced in Windows XP)
 * (introduced in Windows XP)
 * (introduced in Windows XP)
 * (introduced in Windows XP)

Apparently, there is also a  command, according to   and some documentations from Microsoft. However, it actually doesn't exist.