Author Topic: Hard Drives and New MOBO (Read 2001 times)

SKBG Seadog · « **on:** November 05, 2003, 09:27:14 PM »

When I change my MOBO will I loose all the data on my HDD? My OS is Win XP home.

zmeg · « **Reply #1 on:** November 05, 2003, 11:07:17 PM »

As long as you connect everything correctly so that you don't have a hardware related crash XP will make all the necessary system updates, you wont even have to reload windows. Dont forget to update all your drivers after XP finnishes its setting updates.

flakbait · « **Reply #2 on:** November 06, 2003, 01:07:59 AM »

I swapped motherboards out on my system last year and didn't lose a thing. As a matter of fact, the only thing I had to change was the vid drivers and load VIA's drivers. Everything else Windoze did by itself, but mine was a pretty major swap-out. I went from a no-name Dell mobo to an MSI with a VIA chipset, so Winblows was finding all sorts of stuff to fetch updates about. If you're changing out one mobo for another with a similar chipset (old VIA board to a new one) then it'll prolly just update a few minor things.

-----------------------
Flakbait [Delta6]
Delta Six's Flight School
Put the P-61B in Aces High

bloom25 · « **Reply #3 on:** November 06, 2003, 01:27:53 AM »

Sometimes with computers there's a question of "can you" and "should you." Personally I never swap out motherboards (especially with different chipsets and/or cpu types) without a Windows reinstall. Windows 98 is pretty forgiving and you can usually do it without too many problems. Win2k and XP are different. There's a pretty fair chance if you try to just swap out the MB without reinstalling Windows 2k/XP you'll get a nice bluescreen during bootup for ACPI related issues. Even if it works, there's still some things to be aware of:

1. If you are switching CPU types (say P3 to P4 or Athlon to Athlon XP) you will NOT be able to make use of any new instructions added in those processors. This would be a potentially large performance hit, especially in the case of switching a P3 to a P4. Windows detects these instructions during the install process and loads certain key system libraries accordingly.

2. Often not reinstalling Windows results in a less stable system.

My advise would be to get good backups (on CD-R or whatever you've got) of anything you really need before proceeding...

DAVENRINO · « **Reply #4 on:** November 06, 2003, 03:17:53 AM »

Bloom,
Do you really think I "should" reinstall XP Pro when I upgrade my MSI Nforce board to the A7N8X Dlx. I am going from an XP 2100 to a Barton 2500 and GF 4400 to ATI 9800XT. Also, switching to Mushkin PC3500 Black CAS 2. I am already using the reference 2.45 mobo drivers and was thinking bout going to the 3.13 drivers. I will do the ATI install after everthing else is working.
Thanks,
Dave AKA DJ229

airguard · « **Reply #5 on:** November 06, 2003, 05:31:43 AM »

since you uppgrade from a nforce card to another You can try without reinstalling, just remove the nvidia (graphic card) drivers properly last time before you shut down the pc before installing the new stuff.
wait until after the hardware switch before you install 3.13 mobo drivers.

and you prolly have to reactivate winxp aswell, after the change.

ps ! a good backup is alway smart to do before doing stuff like that, not likely it would go wrong but just in case.

SKBG Seadog · « **Reply #6 on:** November 06, 2003, 12:08:38 PM »

Thx for the info all. What I had in mind is to to update my comp to the new P4 3.2 or better with a Invida 5900 256m video card, 450 watt power supply.

What I'm running now is P4 1.7 ghz ,250watt power, Gforce3 64 meg x4 AGP. OS Winn XP Home.

SKBG Seadog · « **Reply #7 on:** November 06, 2003, 12:14:19 PM »

Are Abit or Asus MOBOs any good ? I like the Intel MOBOs. For P4 ATX

DAVENRINO · « **Reply #8 on:** November 06, 2003, 01:35:08 PM »

Quote

Originally posted by SKBG Seadog
Are Abit or Asus MOBOs any good ? I like the Intel MOBOs. For P4 ATX

No personal experience but good reviews for Asus P4C800 Deluxe.

Airguard,
Thanks for reply, I am pretty sure it will work ok. I will also use Driver Cleaner 2 when i switch the video cards. Yes I have everything backed up to a second drive and CDs.
DJ229 - AIR MAFIA

Skuzzy · « **Reply #9 on:** November 06, 2003, 01:49:51 PM »

ASUS and ABit are both good companies. But like any electronics company, they have good and not-so-good products, and you will occasionally get a DOA from them.
I use both, depending on the configurations of the motherboard I look for. I am getting a bit concerned with ASUS lately. Seems they are bent on stuffing everything they can onto the motherboard and driving the price up.

Roscoroo(work) · « **Reply #10 on:** November 06, 2003, 03:08:26 PM »

I think everyone is sort of watching Asus .. are they riding on there reputation ?? or are all the mbs still top of the line .

I myself havent had any mb failures with Asus,
my old SP-97V (oced 486 k-6 to 500mhz )still runs great 6+yrs now. and I own 2 other Asus mb's no problems with those either

Gigabite is a different story for me, ive got three of those that have failed. (some have good luck with these others dont)

Iwill's im not shure of, ive got a xp333 raid board that keeps toasting cpu's ...(ive had it tested 2x's and they say its ok)

Abit's / soyo's are a top line mb's also .(my 3ghz is a soyo)
I dont have much experience w/ Abits yet , but ive seen alot of great reports on most of there stuff.

I also have two Ecs mb's with no problems with those either.
(along with building 5 other ecs mb machines they are all running fine)

when I chose a MB I always stay with one thats 6 mo's old since it came out and I read all the reviews and bbs threads on that paticular mb .(remember some of the stuff users report are operator/combo error's)

mrblack · « **Reply #11 on:** November 06, 2003, 03:13:03 PM »

Roscoroo(work) · « **Reply #12 on:** November 06, 2003, 03:54:07 PM »

Quote

Originally posted by mrblack
ABIT

He's not just a member ,,, he bought the company

beet1e · « **Reply #13 on:** November 09, 2003, 05:10:43 AM »

I have two Maxtor drives in my current PC, and one (80GB) in the new PC. While I'm waiting for my new Radeon 9800 Pro to arrive (first one is being returned as faulty) I've been trying a few installation scenarios.

What I plan to do is use the Maxtor "MaxBlast 3.6" software to copy the partitions from my existing PC drives onto the new 80GB drive, which I've partitioned. I'll then put that 80GB HDD in the new PC, and reinstall Windows. I've got W-Me for games like Aces High, and W2000 Pro for everything else. The W-Me should be a simple reinstall, but then there'll be all the usual updates - is there a Service Pack for W-Me? I'll then reinstall W2000P on the non-gaming partition, and then install SP4 for W2000P, SP1 for IE-6, plus any other updates. I had it working yesterday, but for W2000P there are two install modes, and I chose the wrong one.

At some point, it asks if you want a fresh install, or a repair to an existing installation. I think I should have chosen Repair - because the other choice resulted in the old installation (registry etc.) being cleared out, so I lost all my apps even though no data was lost.

BTW, I tried Bloom25's tips for copying the .CAB files down while installing W-Me - worked well. I also tried booting off the W2000P disk, but got "Error Loading OS". Had to go the 4xDiskette route.

Was an entertaining day yesterday, getting to know my new rig. The fun part was reading all the MS hype that comes up while installing W-Me. "...like its predecessor, WMe brings the ability to run cutting edge technologies..."

Skuzzy · « **Reply #14 on:** November 09, 2003, 11:38:47 AM »

You do realize that AH will work fine with W2K or XP? I have been using W2K for AH for quite some time now.