Will I encounter many problems if I swap the primary hard drive from one PC for use as the primary in another?

Question

I've not done this before but I'm competent enough around PC hardware to know how to deal with the common problems that arise. However, if this will be doomed to failure I'd like to know before rolling up my sleeves.

Answer 1

There are potential problems if you expect to move the drives without some kind of recovery process. Each hard drive you want to move contains a record of the physical configuration of the PC that it is in. When it is booted up in a different PC, the hardware environment will be changed (unless the two PC's are identical).

It's important that your have full system backups of each drive, in case things go seriously wrong.

Windows is pretty good at detecting hardware changes, so if the changes are not too drastic and you have recent updated versions of Windows, things may go well. Just be prepared for some strange PC behavior.

Now, if you just want to swap hardware and are going to load each PC's backup data onto each "new" drive, everything will be much more orderly. Then it would be just like installing two new drives.

Good Luck

Answer 2

The main issue will be drivers. Make sure the i386 folder has been copied to the hard drive before you move it, so the Windows installation files are available in case your CD drive doesn't work after you move the hard drive over. Other than that, the plug-and-play stuff should take care of redetecting the new hardware. (might also want to copy any necessary drivers for the new motherboard to the hard drive before moving it)

You may also have to reactivate Windows. If you're moving a drive from a Dell or HP/Compaq installed from an OEM CD into a no-name clone box, that may be a problem.

Answer 3

Well...if the computer you are moving it too is a completely different configuration (different motherboard, video card, etc), you will have many many driver reinstalls. I have had problems in the past with driver files getting corrupt when this happens, but not all the time.

I would suggest keeping all the driver disks handy for the new computer and you will most likely be OK.

Answer 4

The only thing that will stop you moving is the motherboard. If you move from one pc to another then there is the possibility that the motherboard will not allow the hard drive to run at all. If you get past the motherboard all the other things, drivers, etc, are easily sorted.

Answer 5

exterior tension. you need to use the two an exterior no longer uncomplicated tension or flash / thumb tension. make specific the gadget you utilize is formatted as FAT32 so the PS3 can recognize it. as quickly as you have have been given it formatted, replica the media to the gadget. Plug it into the PS3, then under Video, spotlight the gadget and faucet Triangle, and decide show All. pick the video/s you pick and replica them to the PS3. or basically watch them quickly from the gadget.

Answer 6

I've heard of problems. It depends on your hardware, that's all I can say. Now, if you had a Macintosh.... You'd have no problems at all. Macs have that nifty "target disk mode". You can boot any Mac from an external drive.

Answer 7

1)yes if winxp/win2k is installed and the motherboards are different in each machine

2)no if both machines have same hardware, mainly motherboard
and xp/win2k

3) most likely not if you have win98, but issues will appear later
mainly dormant hardware hidden from original machine

Answer 8

Theorhetically, no.

though if your hard drive is old and slow enough compared to the processing power of the receiving machine, you might get cheated out of some speed.

Answer 9

Primary as the OS itself? Definitely especially if you dual boot many OSes.

Answer 10

No if both the computers are having similar hardware configuration. At least there is NO HARM if you try.