HRESULT 0x80042401 (VSS_E_ASRERROR_DISK_ASSIGNMENT

Status / error code:

Category:

Constant name:

Source:

Facility:

Operating System:

Description:

ASR cannot assign suitable targets to every critical disk.

Could be also:
Constant	Type	OS
VDS_E_INITIALIZED_FAILED	HRESULT	Windows

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VDS_E_INITIALIZED_FAILED	VDS_E_INITIALIZE_NOT_CALLED

VSS_E_ASRERROR_DISK_ASSIGNMENT_FAILED

VSS_E_ASRERROR_DISK_ASSIGNMENT_FAILED is the failure HRESULT 0x80042401 (signed decimal -2147212287, unsigned decimal 2147755009). Its severity bit is set, the facility field is 4 (FACILITY_ITF), and the facility-specific code is 0x2401.

ASR cannot match recovery disks to the backed-up critical disks. Automated System Recovery has reached the target-disk assignment stage and cannot build a complete one-to-one mapping from the critical disks recorded in the backup to usable disks on the recovery computer.

AllStat records the official condition as: “There are too few disks on this computer or one or more of the disks is too small. Add or change disks so they match the disks in the backup, and try the restore again.” This wording should be interpreted at the VSS/ASR stage described below, not as a generic disk or COM failure.

Where VSS_E_ASRERROR_DISK_ASSIGNMENT_FAILED appears

This result belongs to bare-metal restore planning, before the restore engine can safely recreate every critical disk layout. The decisive inputs are the number of critical source disks, their recorded sizes, the candidate disks visible in Windows RE or Windows PE, and any exclusion rules applied by the recovery workflow.

Likely causes

Fewer eligible target disks are visible than the number of critical disks described by the backup metadata.
One or more visible disks are smaller than the corresponding critical source disk, even when their marketing capacity appears similar.
A suitable disk has been excluded, left offline, or classified as unusable by the recovery environment.
Controller presentation or firmware ordering causes the expected target to be absent from the candidate set.

Evidence to capture before changing storage

Record the critical-disk count and required size for each source disk from the recovery metadata.
Capture list disk output in the recovery environment, including disk number, status, size, free space, partition style and dynamic/basic indication.
Preserve the recovery exclusion list and note whether USB, SAN, clustered or virtual disks are present.
Log the proposed source-to-target assignment rather than only the final HRESULT.

Diagnostic sequence

Compare counts first; no amount of repartitioning can compensate for a missing target disk.
Compare exact byte capacities, not rounded labels, and identify the first source disk that has no equal-or-larger candidate.
Check whether a suitable disk is offline or explicitly excluded before replacing hardware.
Verify that the recovery environment loaded the correct storage-controller driver and sees the same topology after a rescan.

Recovery and retry

Add or expose enough disks, replace undersized targets, or remove an accidental exclusion. Retry only after the candidate set changes. Do not erase a disk merely because it appears first in DiskPart; confirm the complete assignment and protect disks that contain data outside the recovery plan.

What this HRESULT does not prove

This HRESULT does not say that partition creation has already failed and does not identify a corrupt backup. It reports that ASR cannot produce a valid assignment with the disks currently eligible for use.

Difference from nearby VSS results

VSS_E_ASRERROR_RDISK0_TOOSMALL singles out the firmware-active recovery disk. VSS_E_ASRERROR_CRITICAL_DISKS_TOO_SMALL describes the broader count-and-capacity requirement for all critical disks, while this value is specifically the failure to complete assignment.

Practical example

A backup contains two critical disks of 512 GB and 1 TB. Windows RE sees one 2 TB disk and one 500 GB disk. Total capacity is sufficient, but the 512 GB source has no equal-or-larger second target after the 1 TB source consumes the 2 TB candidate, so ASR returns this result.

Guidance for backup software and telemetry

A requester should expose the required and observed disk inventories in diagnostics. Treating the code as a generic “not enough space” message loses the assignment constraint that makes the failure actionable.

A useful support record includes the operation phase, backup set or restore session identifier, recovery-environment version, firmware mode, exact disk identities, source and target capacities, online/exclusion state, and the first related VSS or storage event. Preserve identifiers needed to distinguish the affected devices while applying the organization’s normal redaction rules to customer-specific labels and paths.

Official Microsoft references

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