HDD Migration

The easy thing to do, is to use the large hard drive as a secondary drive for storing data files on.

That way, you do not disturb your Windows installation.

The "recommended" process for moving a W2K (or XP) installation to new hardware is to:

Backup your system less the Hardware Abstraction Layer.

Move the hard drive.

Install Windows onto the hard drive.

Restore from your backup.

Chas

Get yourself a Diskimage program like driveimage or ghost. Then put your new disk into the PC as your slave drive. Now use your diskimage program to copy your old partitions to your new disk. Once done, you can remove your old drive, change the new one to the master drive and then reboot. If you can't boot, run a fdisk or similar program from some bootable media and make sure your first primary partition is "active". You may also need to start fdisk /mbr in order to replace the master boot record to the disk. After that you should be able to boot as before from your new drive.

There is a way to move a HD from one computer to another without reinstalling (in-place upgrade or repair installation) or clean installing Windows. This assumes that the first computer does not have any problem with Windows. If there is, the best way is to back up data and to clean install Windows in the second computer.

If the Windows functions fine in the first computer, you need to do the following before moving the HD to the second computer. If you have not backed up your data, do so before you begin.

Do not restart Windows whenever Windows requests.

1. Boot the first computer.

2. Downgrade the IDE driver to Standard Dual Channel PCI IDE Controller. For detail, see below.

3. Uninstall all driver software from ADD/Remove Programs in Control Panel (e.g. video or sound).

4. Uninstall all PCI or ISA devices (e.g. NIC or modem) from Device Manager.

5. Uninstall all chipset devices from System Devices in Device Manager.

6. Shut down the computer.

7. Remove the HD and install it in the second computer.

8. Boot the second computer.

9. Windows will find all drivers it can.

10. Install the motherboard drivers.

11. Install any other drivers that Windows did not.

12. All your programs and data should be intact. All MS Service Pack and critical updates should be intact.

To downgrade the chipset driver, do the following.

1. Highlight the IDE controller (right click) < Update Driver < Install from a list of specific location < Next < Don?t search. I will choose the driver to install < Next < Standard Dual Channel PCI IDE Controller < Next.

2. Do not restart Windows. Go to Step 3 above.

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