Windows Recovery Environment (RE), as the name suggests, is a built-in set of tools inside Windows that allow you to troubleshoot your computer, including booting into the BIOS, or starting the computer in safe mode. It's a crucial piece of software that has now, unfortunately, been rendered useless (for many) as part of the latest Windows update. A new bug discovered in Windows 11's October build, KB5066835, makes it so that your USB keyboard and mouse stop working entirely, so you cannot interact with the recovery UI at all.
This problem has already been recognized and highlighted by Microsoft, who clarified that a fix is on its way to address this issue. Any plugged-in peripherals will continue to work just fine inside the actual operating system, but as soon as you go into Windows RE, your USB keyboard and mouse will become unresponsive. It's important to note that if your PC fails to start-up for any reason, it defaults to the recovery environment to, you know, recover and diagnose any issues that might've been preventing it from booting normally.
Note that those hanging onto old PS/2-connector equipped keyboards and mice seem to be unaffected by this latest Windows software gaffe.
Therefore, it's not just as simple as avoiding Windows RE, especially for the less tech-savvy of us who wouldn't have control (or knowledge) over what to do. Thankfully, though, as mentioned earlier, Microsoft has said it is "working to release a solution to resolve this issue in the coming days" and that "more information will be shared when it's available." So, not exactly a sense of urgency floating in the air, but we hope this gets resolved soon and not sidelined like the recent SSD fiasco which killed many drives and was never really properly addressed by any sides.
This is also just the latest in the line of ever-present bugs that break the OS with recurring Windows updates. With the same KB5066835 update, Microsoft was forced to release an emergency fix for localhost connections, where you couldn't access your own computer, which is crucial for many devs. Speaking of, IT personnel will also be particularly affected by the Windows RE bug since a lot of sensitive system repairs are tied to that toolkit, and they'd need to be put on hold for now. This issue is currently present in Windows 11 25H2, 24H2 and even Windows Server.
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