My experience with doing this is that it only worked about 1 in 5 times. I've tried it at least 5 times and only once did I get the new PC to boot. After booting I had to spend about 2 hours cleaning up device manager and getting the correct drivers installed. The other times the PC simply wouldn't boot - either it would continually freeze shortly after POST, or it would freeze immediately after POST showing nothing but a blank screen.
So, I would say that it's worth a try, but don't get your hopes up too high. I think your best bet is to go into Device Manager immediately before your final shutdown, and uninstall some of the drivers - such as Display and Audio adapters, and network adapters. Then shutdown and do the move. When you first boot the new PC, if it freezes, try rebooting into Safe Mode (continually tap F8 during boot). Then maybe you can do some more cleaning up in Device Manager. Hopefully it will not choke when it finds all the strange new devices and will install some of the new drivers for you. The product key will be the least thing to worry about - you can deal with that after you get all the drivers installed and the PC working correctly. Sometimes Windows won't even complain that you're on a new machine (especially if you're on an older version of windows), and even if it does a simple call to Microsoft will fix it. Wishing you luck! If you get a chance... post back and let us know how it went. :-) Donk On 6/4/2013 11:16 AM, ger_ila wrote: > Hi, > > just wondering if it's possible to take a hdd, loaded with o/s, from one PC > and use it in another PC, different make, as primary (only) drive. I > understand it's the boot files that present the problem, but how is it > overcome? Obviously the product key would need changing. > > > > ------------------------------------ > > If you have any questions or problems with any aspect of this site, please > feel free to contact me directly [email protected] Please do not post > personal issues directly to the group. > > To unsubscribe from this list, send an email to > [email protected] > > Thank you for using A-1 Computer TechYahoo! Groups Links > > > > ------------------------------------ If you have any questions or problems with any aspect of this site, please feel free to contact me directly [email protected] Please do not post personal issues directly to the group. To unsubscribe from this list, send an email to [email protected] Thank you for using A-1 Computer TechYahoo! Groups Links <*> To visit your group on the web, go to: http://groups.yahoo.com/group/A-1-Computer_Tech/ <*> Your email settings: Individual Email | Traditional <*> To change settings online go to: http://groups.yahoo.com/group/A-1-Computer_Tech/join (Yahoo! ID required) <*> To change settings via email: [email protected] [email protected] <*> To unsubscribe from this group, send an email to: [email protected] <*> Your use of Yahoo! Groups is subject to: http://docs.yahoo.com/info/terms/
