Two Computers

Here's the situation: we have two computers in the same room. One of them my sister's, the other is mine. My sister's computer is far superior to mine and I want to know whether I can switch the Hard drive from my inferior computer to the better one and vice versa. Both computers are running XP and are connected to the same internet connection.

1) Is it possible?
2) Will I lose any information if I switch them?
3) Will I have to install anything again?
4) If someone knows how to do it will they give me clear instructions?

1) Is it possible?

Yes

2) Will I lose any information if I switch them?

Probably not (see 4.)

3) Will I have to install anything again?

Probably not (see 4.)

4) If someone knows how to do it will they give me clear instructions?

Make sure you have an XP installation CD to hand (you'll need it)
swap the drives over

boot up either machine and they'll blue screen on you
as they have different components (hard disk - of course, but also motherboard, graphics, sound, processor, etc. - basically everything will be different) and so won't work at all

boot up with the XP installation CD into the recovery mode (or repair mode, or whatever it's called)
from here XP should scan your hardware, make any changes and reboot

Do this with both machines

if all works OK, you'll have 2 working machines with the disks swapped over

You may have to reactivate both XP's as well
maybe - don't know - be prepared to do so in any case

Re: The need to reinstall applications

95% of software will work fine
but some apps (high end stuff, usually) won't
as they record hashes of your hardware and send them to the company to prevent piracy
different hash = different hardware = pirate copy = cripple software

I'm talking about things like CAD packages, 3D modelling, proprietary server apps, that sort of thing
it's probably not an issue at all, but just thought I'd mention it

What do you mean by reactivate?

Quote:

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Originally Posted by goldney

What do you mean by reactivate?

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XP may put you back on the 60-day trial
as the hardware will have changed (see above Re: hardware hashes)
so you may have to reactivate XP over the net

And how would I reactivate?

Quote:

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Originally Posted by goldney

And how would I reactivate?

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it'll guide you through it, but essentially
goto windows update, click the button, and pray it likes you

http://www.snoopy.force9.co.uk/xp-activate1.png

http://www.snoopy.force9.co.uk/xp-activate2.png

http://www.snoopy.force9.co.uk/xp-activate3.png

Sorry to sound like a total n00b but where do I find the Windows Update button?

Quote:

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Originally Posted by goldney

Sorry to sound like a total n00b but where do I find the Windows Update button?

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Oh, it'll find you

If XP want's reactivating (it may not, of course, it may be fine)
it'll bug you to activate every 15 mins or so

Ah thanks for all the help Ynot.

no probs

You might also want to make sure you don't need SATA for the newer one (and don't have it in the older computer)

It might be as simple as letting windows detect all the new hardware and discard all the old ones from your device mangler.

Quote:

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Originally Posted by arby

You might also want to make sure you don't need SATA for the newer one (and don't have it in the older computer)

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What would SATA be?

Also, what if I no longer have the CDs used to install Windows?

PATA (Parallel ATA) & SATA (Serial ATA) are different connectors for hard disks

http://www.ngcsu.edu/Adminsrv/Infote.../sata-pata.jpg

As you can see, they're physically different

What Arby's saying is make sure the drives you want to swap are either the same connector, or that you have the ability to add SATA to the older machine if necessary (expansion card)


As for the windows CD, borrow someone's, or torrent yourself a replacement
should work OK

Thank you so very much.

Quote:

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Originally Posted by Replicon

It might be as simple as letting windows detect all the new hardware and discard all the old ones from your device mangler.

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you'll never get as far as booting windows
it'll blue screen straight away
hence the need to run the CD recovery

I've done this many times (our work servers had the same set of SCSI harddisks through 3 sets of hardware)

lol @ mangler typo, btw

You think that was a typo? ;)

What causes it to blue screen over some changed hardware? If I were to change a video card, it would just detect it... same for most peripherals... so why not all peripherals? I guess that's not fair, because it doesn't include things like the motherboard, which is kind of central to it... but why would it blue screen? I believe you if you say you've done it many times, but... That doesn't sound very robust to me... I mean, it IS windows, but still :p

cause the OS will have information stored about how to access all the components when control is transfered from the BIOS
When you change components, this information will be wrong

the BIOS initialises all the motherboard components and attached peripherals in the most basic mode of operation, then hands over control of everything to the OS. The OS can then take all the components and switch the control to something more advanced and offload (amoung other things) basic I/O from the CPU to the motherboard's firmware.

- BIOS initialises motherboard, components & peripherals (inc. harddisks) in the most basic mode (any and all computation is done by the CPU), and hands over to windows
- Windows receives control, sees the motherboard & harddisk and says "I know this board & disk, I can get a better throughput using UDMA instead of PIO mode, but I need help from the motherboard in order to do this, lets initialise this special motherboard command, and offload disk access to the mobo firmware. Brilliant it worked, lets continue loading myself."

Change motherboard, and...

- BIOS initialises motherboard, components & peripherals (inc. harddisks) in the most basic mode (any and all computation is done by the CPU), and hands over to windows
- Windows receives control, sees the motherboard & harddisk and says "I know this board & disk, I can get a better throughput using UDMA instead of PIO mode, but I need help from the motherboard in order to do this, lets initialise this special motherboard command, and offload disk access to the mobo firmware. Crap, the motherboard sent back something I don't understand. SPLAT

So there seems to be a quite a risk involved... maybe I shan't do it and will get someone else to do it for me. Most computer people will be able to do this I assume. It's probably best I don't mess around with this seeing as I don't even know what my hard disk looks like...

But still thanks for the help (again).

Flash the BIOS.