bcdedit.exe is not recognized... Win 8.1

Solution 1:

Open an elevated command prompt.

You can use this to see if bcdedit is damaged:

sfc /VERIFYFILE=C:\windows\system32\bcdedit.exe

If the file is fine you will get an output like this:

Windows Resource Protection did not find any integrity violoations.

If the file is damaged you can try to replace from backups using:

sfc /scannow

If for any reason that fails you could always try downloading the Windows 8.1 Enterprise trial, install it in a virtual machine, and copy the bcdedit.exe from it.

Solution 2:

This could also be due to running a 64-bit OS, in which case you need to access BCDEDIT from C:\Windows\Sysnative\bcdedit