If I were to piece together a new PC, would my original HDD (with win 7) work?

[pikingrin]

I'm toying with the notion of upgrading to a new PC simply for the sake of having a larger case and fitting more internal HDDs. If I were to, say, get another mobo that supported the CPU that I have, put the CPU into the new mobo and swapped the boot drive to the new case, would windows still be on there - would it boot up normally or would I have to jump through hoops to make it work?

I'm working with a mini ATX case/mobo and I have room for 1 internal HDD. The one that came with the (budget) system was 500gb and everything else is on 2 external HDDs. OS and Cubase, as well as VST plugins, are on the HDD - libraries on 1 ext and song files on the second ext. My OCD is kicking me in the butt right now with the cables and mess that entails my external drives.

 

[DM60]

So the short answer is yes. If it is an OEM version of the OS, you may have to re-register the OS. I think I have done this and usually, online, it is not an issue. You also need to have your new MB drivers at the ready and get them installed.

I have done this many times over the years. You will probably run into a few issues, but still better than a new install (IMO).

 

[ecc83]

Compared to DM60 (and most of the others here!) I am a computer caveman but I too have swapped drives in various MOBOs over the years and had few problems, certainly Win 7 seems far less fussy than XP (I am STILL having issues with my legacy XP pro machine!) .

But get VERY organized ! I speak from BITTER experience. Before you start look at all the "stuff" on the machine in Device Manager and make sure you have all the drivers, especially (IMExp) those for Ethernet Controllers and Graphics. Whatever you do about Internet connection when finished you will need to run all the updates. Do you have the install disc for the MOBO? If not download all its software NOW! I assume you have the Windows W7 code? If not "Belarc Advisor" will find it for you.

Look up on't'int' as to how to burn boot discs and repair discs. Run "Speccy" and get a printout of everything it finds so you have names and numbers.

Go into "manage" from Computer and see if there is a Recovery partition on the original hard drive. If there is you are pretty fireproof but do remember that Recovery (not Restore) puts you back to Factory Gate status, so only to be used in extremis!

Sorry for the ramble and probably selling Granny eggs but I have been there, lost the hair, got the scars.

Have fun!

Dave.

 

[Pinky]

It's hit/miss just swapping the drive without doing some sort of new hardware / OS prep on it. Can't hurt to try, but if windows can't communicate with the new motherboard and you get a BSOD then you're stuck scrambling to find a utility to do that prep for you.

You could try running the driver install for the new motherboard BEFORE making the swap, so Windows has the drivers preloaded (some drivers won't load unless it detects the hardware, so this may not work). This would allow windows to install the new motherboard at first startup.

There's also running a repair install of windows.

Repair Install - Windows 7 Help Forums