Existing XP OS Hard Drive Into New Barebones Computer?????

V

vadaddy

New Member
I have a new bare bones computer with motherboard, processor, and power supply. I would like to move my existing computer installation to the new computer without having to re-install everything. If I install my existing hard drive into the new system can I expect it to boot?
 
sure will! in fact i took my old HDD with win95 (1 gig HDD hehe) and installed it as a master drive w/o a slave drive on my computer now and it booted into 95! lmao i was quite shocked!
 
Yes and no... Old harddrives with anything less than 98(and probably ME) will boot no problem. However, 2000 and XP are much more hardware dependent and won't work. You might get a partial boot, but I feel quite certain you'll get a blue screen of death before the desktop.
 
I understand both your replies. I was afraid I would run into this with XP. Have another question???

If I do a fresh XP install on the new machine what is the best way to get my existing programs, games, XP documents folders, etc. ... to the new hard drive and be associated with the new XP registry??????
 
The_Other_One you think he could uninstall drivers for all his hardware and just use native windows drivers and then change the harddrive?
 
actually, i took a hd from my home machine (w/xp on it) and dropped it into a computer at school that had been running windows 98... I added some RAM and it booted perfectly... xp detected all the "new" hardware on the school's machine and installed the necessary drivers on the first boot... I'm not trying to argue with The_Other_One, just stating my experiences.
 
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Iv'e done it with XP 3 times it worked fine, Expect it wants you to reactivate it because it thinks it on a new PC becuase a;l the hardware is different, but besides that XP worked fine for me. :/
 
oh hehe sry for the bad advice i thought that if an old one would work the new ones would def work :S
Click to expand...
They *may* work so you're not entirely wrong ... but whether they work or not ... you'll really be strongly advised to reinstall anyways (anything after 2000 that is)

I understand both your replies. I was afraid I would run into this with XP. Have another question???
Click to expand...
What hardware do you have? XP will run on surprisigly old hardware

If I do a fresh XP install on the new machine what is the best way to get my existing programs, games, XP documents folders, etc. ... to the new hard drive and be associated with the new XP registry??????
Click to expand...
You can screw around with registry exporting and reloading but thats tedious ... for the most part you'll need to reinstall

The_Other_One you think he could uninstall drivers for all his hardware and just use native windows drivers and then change the harddrive?
Click to expand...
Doable but it depends if the machine allows you to boot up the first time (and it it does then generally you are ok anyways)
 
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