New computer

[ta79]

I am building a new computer and have bought a new motherboard, and processor and case. I was wondering if it is possible to swap my hard drive from old computer with operating system and data to the new computer, and still be able to boot into the operating system?

[YODA74]

sure you can just follow your board And Processor installation directions .Install your drive you should be set to go.

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YODA74@windows-sucks.com
CCMR (http://www.dreamwater.net/tech/yoda74/index.html)

[ta79]

Thanks YODA

[welshboy]

I tried this when I built my nw computer a few months back and it caused me a few headaches - If you want everything to run as smoothly as possible install the new MB/CPU into the case and the fit your old Graphics Card as your old HD will already have the drivers installed on it.

The main reason why I had problems was because it was a WIN95 HD and I had built an Athlon 1.2Ghz system. I was having windows protection errors all the time while trying to start up. If your old drive has WIN95 installed on it you may well experience the same problems.....I am not entirely sure but I think it had something to do with the MB as all the other components were cannibalised from my old machine and worked fine when I moved them back.

I eventually got around it by installing WIN98 on a new drive I was planning on using, the only reason why I tried the WIN95 drive was because my mother had some urgent work to do and I wanted to minimize the downtime!

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[Paleo Pete]

I would advise against it. The OS, when originally installed, also installs a bunch of motherboard specific drivers, which can cause major headaches if the hard drive is later transferred to another system, or another motherboard installed for whatever reason.

The best way to go is format the drive and start over. In some cases you can remove all motherboard specific items from Device Manager and it will work, but that's the exception rather than the rule. I always format and reinstall if I swap motherboards, in most cases it will work much better, and in some cases the motherboard swap using an existing OS will crash constantly, due to the leftover drivers that won't cooperate with the new motherboard.

Back up any data files you want to save, like pictures, text files, etc and start over from scratch, it's too difficult to remove all traces of the old motherboard and wind up with a stable computer after the swap.

If you want to know why, run regedit and take a look at the HKEY_DYN_DATA\Config Manager\Enum section. It contains entries pointing to lots of motherboard resources. Try finding them all...

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[Steve48]

Ta79,

With all do respest to Pete and Yoda, go ahead and try, but if you have major headaches, then do as Pete said and reformatt and start from scratch!

Good Luck,
Steve