hard drive swap?

[Da Mail Man]

greetings,
.....although i don't think it will work well, or at all, can a 160gb hd be taken out of 1 computer and substituted and put in another (single drive - not as slave) and will anything work? i realize all the hardware differences but, i have a cousin that wanted to see it in writing...thanks again for your help!

 

[PC eye]

You can easily swap ide or SATA drives from case to case. But whether the OS and installed programs will work is another matter. If you are running some Linux distributions you could get a little further there then Windows; XP especially due to the hardware detection and installation logs. Plan on a fresh install of Windows there.

 

[SirKenin]

If you're using XP, the only thing you'll have to worry about is the Busmaster drivers. Change them to the default Microsoft ones. When you put it in the new machine, it will detect all the new devices. You then do a registry edit to unhide the old devices, select View > Show hidden devices in the Device Manager, then you can delete all the old devices, which will be indicated by the faded icons...

And voila!! You've got a perfectly working installation of XP on the new machine. You might have to reactivate it though, but that's no big deal.

 

[Da Mail Man]

You can easily swap ide or SATA drives from case to case. But whether the OS and installed programs will work is another matter. If you are running some Linux distributions you could get a little further there then Windows; XP especially due to the hardware detection and installation logs. Plan on a fresh install of Windows there.

...thanks for the reply...he has a fully functional computer and hard drive with operating system, files, etc., that he wants to place into a faster computer (no linux) with no current hard drive. i suspect that it will not run or work properly...agreed?

 

[PC eye]

...thanks for the reply...he has a fully functional computer and hard drive with operating system, files, etc., that he wants to place into a faster computer (no linux) with no current hard drive. i suspect that it will not run or work properly...agreed?

When saving the drive from the old case here Windows had to have a fresh install in order to get the new activation code. You want XP to have a fresh detection when there is that amount of hardwares plus a clean registry to start off with. Backing up any data and files temporarily will also help for restoration on the new partition.

 

[SirKenin]

i suspect that it will not run or work properly...agreed?

Read my post... I suspect you are trying to tell your friend that it will not work, but that is anything but true. It is guaranteed to work. It doesn't take much brain power to do it, either. I don't know where this stupid Linux idea came from, but all you have to do is change that one driver and it will boot just fine. All you have to do is reactivate it, but that will go without a hitch. Windows will generate a new hash number for his hardware and you can then activate it. You might have to activate it over the phone.

Trust me, this works. If you need a tutorial I will pull up a link to one.

 

[Da Mail Man]

Read my post... I suspect you are trying to tell your friend that it will not work, but that is anything but true. It is guaranteed to work. It doesn't take much brain power to do it, either. I don't know where this stupid Linux idea came from, but all you have to do is change that one driver and it will boot just fine. All you have to do is reactivate it, but that will go without a hitch. Windows will generate a new hash number for his hardware and you can then activate it. You might have to activate it over the phone.

Trust me, this works. If you need a tutorial I will pull up a link to one.

...thanks for the reply!...damn, that was fast!. .........ok, the hard drive being placed into the new computer will acclimate itself to it's new environment and after reactivation, it should work fine(?)..(!)......i didn't know that! .......as my father always said, "ya learn something new every day"......thanks guys!

 

[SirKenin]

Yeah, it will adjust. You might have to pamper it for a while.. A warm blanket. A bottle here and there. Maybe a bedtime story.. But it will make the adjustment fairly quickly. After that you're only steps away from having it litter trained. lol

 

[PC eye]

If you need a tutorial I will pull up a link to one.

I can pull a long list of links that advise against it like the article here.
Advisory:[SIZE=+0] Changing an OEM XP system motherboard to a non-factory replacement motherboard or moving a hard drive with OEM XP preinstalled to a non-OEM system is [/SIZE]not[SIZE=+0] advised. Besides the possibility of being in non-compliance with the OEM EULA, and the practice of OEM's electing to provide a set of restore disks or hidden restore folders on the hard drive to satisfy Microsoft's restore requirement. The lack of a proper bootable XP CD will [/SIZE]not[SIZE=+0] allow a repair install to configure XP to the new hardware. Since the repair install in my opinion is an absolute necessity when changing a motherboard or moving a hard drive with XP installed, I would [/SIZE]not[SIZE=+0] attempt booting into the new configuration when the option to do a repair install is [/SIZE]not[SIZE=+0] an option. If you do make the choice to boot Windows XP without doing the repair install, I highly recommend you either create an image of the hard drive or make sure you have all important data that can not be replaced from other media backed up. http://www.michaelstevenstech.com/moving_xpfrm.html[/SIZE]

 

[Da Mail Man]

..OK, here is the monkey wrench in the whole post...

.......he has a huge hard drive as previously mentioned however, he has 4 partitions and in each he is using win 98se and win mellenium (one or the other) on all 4 partitions.....how bad does that screw things up?

 

[PC eye]

Not anywhere the problem that would be seen with XP and the product activation and improved hardware detection there. You still would have to have the correct drivers for the new system ready to install.

 

[Da Mail Man]

Not anywhere the problem that would be seen with XP and the product activation and improved hardware detection there. You still would have to have the correct drivers for the new system ready to install.

.......A-OK.......I WILL PASS THIS ON AND THANKS A LOT EVERYONE!

 

[SirKenin]

..OK, here is the monkey wrench in the whole post...

.......he has a huge hard drive as previously mentioned however, he has 4 partitions and in each he is using win 98se and win mellenium (one or the other) on all 4 partitions.....how bad does that screw things up?

He's taking that drive out and putting yours in, right? It doesn't screw anything up. Same thing as before.

Then all you have to do is let Windows autodetect your devices, and any that it doesn't just make sure your driver disks are on hand. It's simple. It's almost identical to installing Windows from scratch, just all the programs and everything are left intact.

Trust me. It's easy.

 

[PC eye]

Where do you think they came up with Norton Ghost and Acronis for cloning drives by creating disk images. The idea behind XP was to insure one installation and one disk for each machine since the earlier versions could be cloned too easily if you didn't move drives around.

 

[Da Mail Man]

He's taking that drive out and putting yours in, right? It doesn't screw anything up. Same thing as before.

Then all you have to do is let Windows autodetect your devices, and any that it doesn't just make sure your driver disks are on hand. It's simple. It's almost identical to installing Windows from scratch, just all the programs and everything are left intact.

Trust me. It's easy.

1....he has a mulit partitioned hard drive with win 98se and mellenium on the
partitions.
2....i have a 1.5 ghz computer i am going to give him.
3....he wants to remove his hard drive from his computer and
place in mine that he will recieve.
4....the result is that he will have his hard drive in another computer he has
yet to recieve...understand now?

 

[Da Mail Man]

Where do you think they came up with Norton Ghost and Acronis for cloning drives by creating disk images. The idea behind XP was to insure one installation and one disk for each machine since the earlier versions could be cloned too easily if you didn't move drives around.

...thanks for the reply however, why are we talking about norton and acronis?...i would tell him prior to attempting any change or movement of hardware between computers to image his system with drive image which is what i use....

 

[SirKenin]

1....he has a mulit partitioned hard drive with win 98se and mellenium on the
partitions.
2....i have a 1.5 ghz computer i am going to give him.
3....he wants to remove his hard drive from his computer and
place in mine that he will recieve.
4....the result is that he will have his hard drive in another computer he has
yet to recieve...understand now?

Ohhhhhhh....

That's even easier. I thought you were talking about XP.. 'scuse me while I take another hit...

Ok.. Yeah, Me and 98 are REALLY simple. Just plug it in. The easiest way is to boot right away into safe mode with both OSes. Delete ALL the hardware out of the device manager. Everything. Then, reboot the computer into normal mode. It will redetect everything. Add drivers as required.

No activation, nothing. It is REALLY simple. I've done it many times before.

 

[Da Mail Man]

Ohhhhhhh....

That's even easier. I thought you were talking about XP.. 'scuse me while I take another hit...

Ok.. Yeah, Me and 98 are REALLY simple. Just plug it in. The easiest way is to boot right away into safe mode with both OSes. Delete ALL the hardware out of the device manager. Everything. Then, reboot the computer into normal mode. It will redetect everything. Add drivers as required.

No activation, nothing. It is REALLY simple. I've done it many times before.

.....another hit? hahahhaha!.....a-ok........

 

[SirKenin]

 

[PC eye]

.....another hit? hahahhaha!.....a-ok........

That's typical there! You won't see the hassles there that you would if trying to move an XP drive around. But you will want to get into the device manager right off to get rid the existing drivers to avoid later problems. ME and 98 alike will be hungry for drivers after(ruf! ruf! feed me... feed me..).