Why is my C:\Recovery folder empty? (trying to create Recovery Disc)

I would not pay to reinstall the Asus crapware which is especially poorly written considering they have such good hardware. Instead I'd do what most tech enthusiasts do to get a vastly superior install and Clean Reinstall - Factory OEM Windows 7.
Everything needed is in the blue link. Delete all partitions during the booted install since none existing will work afterwards anyway.

You'll get and keep a perfect install to the exact extent you stick with the tools, steps and methods in the tutorial.

If you decide to go with the crappy Asus factory install then be sure to Clean Up Factory Bloatware . If you're otherwise happy with your current install then after cleaning it up you can save a Win7 backup image externally to use in place of Recovery. When ready we can even help you delete Recovery and annex its space into C or your data partition.

The Restore image on the system hard drive will take you back to install status. If you do a Backup useing the windows 7 utility it will store a disk image of your current state. If you create an ISO of you system you can burn it to a disk. To create on a usb stick you have to use diskpart and then put the iso on a correctly formatted USB stick. There are some tutorials on these forums... You can also make a recovery disk that has restore tools. Lastly sometimes booting into a boot option menu will let you boot from the usb stick and it might work that way.

What Greg said is what I did recently and after clean install and taking a little time to set up system the way I like it and install graphics and othe software. My ASUS is running great without the crapware offerd by ASUS. What I have figuerd out is that most of the Asus software is fake. It just monitors what windows and Intel allready do anyways. And it lets you set some alarms. My system is running great with no Asus software and only a USB3 driver and Graphics and SOund drivers and thats it. The one thing I might do is install Asus Suite 11 And only install the tempiture sensor called Probe. It does install 3 services that report from the bios to the program so you can see CPU temps. These services can be set to only start manuly. I dont recomend any thing else. No fan control or EPU . EPU dosent do anything that Intell Speed step is not allready doing... It just confuses windows. I whould instal another tempiture monitor but all the free ones come bundled with hidden software. If anyone know of a good one let me know.

Check in your BIOS to see if there is a BIOS level temperature control that will shut down the PC if it overheats. Then you don't need to worry about it unless you detect that there is excess heat, in which case I install Core Temp to the System Tray with Protection alert to put system into Hibernation if it exceeds Max temperature.

If you feel that temp monitors are valuable that come with the Asus program then you can install it to see if it interferes or slows Win7 at all. I do this with a Lenovo program for Power Management so I can see Volume level on the screen and throttle the battery charge to 75% while running on AC to preserve battery life. I don't detect it slows anything or interferes in any way.

Wow, thanks everyone for the great responses. I actually already tried to create my own recovery install by downloading one of these Windows 7 Direct Download Links, Official Disk Images from Digital River but after finally downloading all 3gB and transferring to the USB, Windows told me it wasn't compatible with my computer. I don't necessarily want a clean install, just wanted to create a recovery disk, in case anything went wrong.
There have been a few problems with failed Windows Updates recently, which (I think) I've traced to a corrupt folder in the dotNet framework. This got me nervous about the integrity of my system, which is why I've started the process of building a recovery disk. I'm not actually bothered by the pre-installed crapware, but I don't like to see corrupt files!

Rich, that Purchase link says they've discontinued the service, unfortunately.

I've sent Asus support a message to see if they can help, but I don't expect much of a response.

Is this an appropriate place to look for help with the failed Windows Updates?

thanks again!

Download Win7 Home Premium x64 SP1 English Official ISO download and write it to flash stick using Windows 7 USB/DVD Download Tool, unless you have an EFI install in which case you'd write the stick using Option One in UEFI Bootable USB Flash Drive - Create in Windows.

To determine if you have an EFI install, look at Disk Management to see if there is an EFI System partition vs. a System Active "System Reserved" partition which indicates a normal install.

While there post back a screenshot of Disk Management - Post a Screen Capture Image so we can look it over to see that it is correct.

Otherwise do a scan for infection using Malwarebytes and SuperAntiSpyware, then check the System File integrity using SFC /SCANNOW Command - System File Checker, establish a Clean Boot and go over the logs from the Troubleshooting Steps for Windows 7.

Hi gregrocker

thanks again for the response. I already downloaded that ISO and wrote it to the flash drive (using Rufus) and booted into it, but Windows told me it wasn't compatible with my computer. I'm downloading it again, and will follow your linked instructions word for word.

I've attached my Disk Management screen grab. It looks like I have an EFI install.

I already tried the SFC /SCANNOW and it stopped at 71% (with the message 'Windows Resource Protection could not perform the requested operation'), which I think is related to the disk corruption (of 2 folders in C:\Windows\Microsoft.NET\Framework\v2.0.50727 ).

I'll try the rest of your suggestions, and report back.
Thanks!

Hi again gregrocker.

I thought I'd report back what I've found. Still going through the troubleshooting steps, but already have found an issue.

Ok, the good news is that I've created and tested the flash stick recovery. I think the key part that I was missing was the part about it being an EFI install.

I installed and ran both Malwarebytes and SuperAntiSpyware, no problems reported.

The not-so-good news is that I ran SFC /SCANNOW and it stopped at 71%. Here's the results from sfcdetails.txt (extracted from CBS.log).

Code:

2014-09-10 17:07:15, Info                  CSI    00000009 [SR] Verifying 1 components
2014-09-10 17:07:15, Info                  CSI    0000000a [SR] Beginning Verify and Repair transaction
2014-09-10 17:07:15, Info                  CSI    0000000c [SR] Cannot repair member file [l:22{11}]"autochk.exe" of Microsoft-Windows-Autochk, Version = 6.1.7601.17514, pA = PROCESSOR_ARCHITECTURE_AMD64 (9), Culture neutral, VersionScope = 1 nonSxS, PublicKeyToken = {l:8 b:31bf3856ad364e35}, Type neutral, TypeName neutral, PublicKey neutral in the store, hash mismatch
2014-09-10 17:07:15, Info                  CSI    0000000e [SR] Cannot repair member file [l:22{11}]"autochk.exe" of Microsoft-Windows-Autochk, Version = 6.1.7601.17514, pA = PROCESSOR_ARCHITECTURE_AMD64 (9), Culture neutral, VersionScope = 1 nonSxS, PublicKeyToken = {l:8 b:31bf3856ad364e35}, Type neutral, TypeName neutral, PublicKey neutral in the store, hash mismatch
2014-09-10 17:07:15, Info                  CSI    0000000f [SR] This component was referenced by [l:202{101}]"Microsoft-Windows-Foundation-Package~31bf3856ad364e35~amd64~~6.1.7601.17514.WindowsFoundationDelivery"
2014-09-10 17:07:15, Info                  CSI    00000012 [SR] Could not reproject corrupted file [ml:520{260},l:46{23}]"\??\C:\Windows\System32"\[l:22{11}]"autochk.exe"; source file in store is also corrupted
2014-09-10 17:07:15, Info                  CSI    00000014 [SR] Verify complete
2014-09-10 17:37:00, Info                  CSI    00000009 [SR] Verifying 1 components
2014-09-10 17:37:00, Info                  CSI    0000000a [SR] Beginning Verify and Repair transaction
2014-09-10 17:37:00, Info                  CSI    0000000c [SR] Cannot repair member file [l:22{11}]"autochk.exe" of Microsoft-Windows-Autochk, Version = 6.1.7601.17514, pA = PROCESSOR_ARCHITECTURE_AMD64 (9), Culture neutral, VersionScope = 1 nonSxS, PublicKeyToken = {l:8 b:31bf3856ad364e35}, Type neutral, TypeName neutral, PublicKey neutral in the store, hash mismatch
2014-09-10 17:37:00, Info                  CSI    0000000e [SR] Cannot repair member file [l:22{11}]"autochk.exe" of Microsoft-Windows-Autochk, Version = 6.1.7601.17514, pA = PROCESSOR_ARCHITECTURE_AMD64 (9), Culture neutral, VersionScope = 1 nonSxS, PublicKeyToken = {l:8 b:31bf3856ad364e35}, Type neutral, TypeName neutral, PublicKey neutral in the store, hash mismatch
2014-09-10 17:37:00, Info                  CSI    0000000f [SR] This component was referenced by [l:202{101}]"Microsoft-Windows-Foundation-Package~31bf3856ad364e35~amd64~~6.1.7601.17514.WindowsFoundationDelivery"
2014-09-10 17:37:00, Info                  CSI    00000012 [SR] Could not reproject corrupted file [ml:520{260},l:46{23}]"\??\C:\Windows\System32"\[l:22{11}]"autochk.exe"; source file in store is also corrupted
2014-09-10 17:37:00, Info                  CSI    00000014 [SR] Verify complete

I'll keep going with the Troubleshooting post.

PS what a fantastic resource this website is!