Do you HAVE to re-install Vista when changing out the motherboard?

[Cykoth]

Hey there,

I'm switching motherboards. I'm tired of the crap I'm getting from my Asus Striker II Formula 780i, and am going to a more stable P35 Intel chipset board from Gigabyte. I've got an existing installation of Vista 32-bit on my harddrive.....do I HAVE to reinstall Vista? Or before I make the changeout can I remove motherboard specific devices in the device manager, so that the OS will install new components from the new board.

Any thoughts?

Cyko

 

[driftwood07]

im not sure but i think that with it being the same socket there is a chance it will work without any action besides just swapping them.

 

[gingerstewart55]

Ummmm.........no. I pulled a Vista Ultimate install from an Intel X975 mb and moved that hard drive over to an Asus X38 motherboard...and not one issue at all.

But then again, despite all the naysayers, I've been doing this sort of thing for years.....moving OS installs from chipset to chipset.....and have never had an issue. Without exception, the OS has rightly recognized the new chipset and installed whatever drivers were necessary for proper functioning.

Most drastic was moving from an NF4, socket 939, motherboard w/an AMD Athlon 64 x2 cpu to the abovementioned Intel X975 motherboard w/a C2D cpu. Again, not a single problem. Just make sure you have the driver CD handy in case you need specific drivers, like for the LAN or sound or whatever.

Of course, this flies in the face of what most will say.....that you MUST do a reformat and fresh install of Windows, no matter the flavor. Personally, based on years of experience doing just what I described above, I think that advice is pure BS.....

 

[Pantlegz]

While I don't doubt you've had luck with not having to reinsatall windows, I'm one of the not so lucky. Socket A -> AM2 had to reinstall and AM2 NF4 -> C2D 780i also had to reinstall

I know it's not always, but it's also not never( I think that works). you may have to reintall, but you may not. I honestly don't know what the deciding factor is, maybe it's how much MS loves you.

 

[themisfit610]

It will generally work, but ask yourself, do you really want all that leftover crap from your old chipset sitting around?

I never even bother with thinking about it.

Keep your data on a separate partition from Windows. Backup your Firefox profile. Blow the whole damn thing away and start over again.

New machine = new OS install, every time for me.

You don't have to, and it might work just fine, but if it doesn't that's time wasted.

Besides, a good reformat and reinstall is good for you. It keeps you on your toes

~MiSfit

 

[Regalk]

Originally posted by: gingerstewart55
Of course, this flies in the face of what most will say.....that you MUST do a reformat and fresh install of Windows, no matter the flavor. Personally, based on years of experience doing just what I described above, I think that advice is pure BS.....

You still need to clean out all the ghosted devices afterwards to get a pseudo clean install so not entirely BS. And it is best to reinstall drivers afterwards (e.g. Chipset and video) even though you already installed those under the old install.

 

[j0j081]

lol I went from a socket 754 setup to my rig below without doing a clean install. it worked pretty decently but then just did one anyway since it had been a while.

 

[gingerstewart55]

Originally posted by: Regalk

Originally posted by: gingerstewart55
Of course, this flies in the face of what most will say.....that you MUST do a reformat and fresh install of Windows, no matter the flavor. Personally, based on years of experience doing just what I described above, I think that advice is pure BS.....

You still need to clean out all the ghosted devices afterwards to get a pseudo clean install so not entirely BS. And it is best to reinstall drivers afterwards (e.g. Chipset and video) even though you already installed those under the old install.

You just uninstall all the mb devices just before you shut down for the last time...DUH! No ghosted devices left......you do have to do some prep work...DUH!

 

[Puffnstuff]

I've moved windows installs many times to mb's with different chipsets but here's what I've done. I always remove the chipset & graphics drivers and any proprietary software before I shut down to make the swap. Then I have a disk handy with the new mb drivers and software so when it boots up I can install the drivers. I did however have an issue when moving from nf4 to my current 650i mb and had to do a repair install from the windows cd to get it going again. When I know that I'm going to do a system overhaul I just do a clean install and rebuild my system to minimize the chances that something will go wrong but that's just me. I had to do a clean install to move to vista 64 anyway. Weigh your options and choose what is best for you and don't worry about what others might say and goodluck.

 

[Gillbot]

Is there a sysprep utility for vista?

I think there is, see here: http://technet2.microsoft.com/...57491033.mspx?mfr=true

 

[taltamir]

Do you have to reinstall? well, it depends on the old and new motherboard.
Some can just be replaced.

You could also go through a difficult process to prepare for a swap that will allow you to switch to any mobo... But its a good idea to reformat every now and then anyways. It doesn't take THAT long to reinstall...
Just back up your stuff and do it.

 

[Cykoth]

Nice replies all!

Well, I'm going to try it. I removed all Nvidia software first. Then I removed what MB device drivers I could.....when I tried to remove the Sata drive components, Vista simply re-installed them immediately. So I left them alone. I also left alone my graphics card drivers as I still using all the same peripherals as in my previous board. I'll have all my drivers ready to go, so I don't feel I'll have any problems. It's always just good to run things like this by folks of like mind out there And if I have to re-install, oh well. It's a pretty fresh install anyways.


Thanks Again!

Cyko

 

[Slugbait]

Originally posted by: taltamir
Do you have to reinstall? well, it depends on the old and new motherboard.
Some can just be replaced.

Actually, it's most, especially in this situation. WPA collects a lot of info for initial activation, two of which are the proc type and its serial number. Also, the hard drive, optical drive, display adapter and RAM amount...I assume none of this is changing, so reactivation should go off without a hitch.

But its a good idea to reformat every now and then anyways. It doesn't take THAT long to reinstall...

Oh, yes it does. No one can use their computer for anything other than Notepad and Solitaire after that initial first couple of hours of "re-install". You're first spending time installing all the drivers, then downloading criticals, then deleting all those $NT_ folders and SoftwareDistribution files, then there are all the custom shell settings, then custom system settings, then the utilities get installed, then your apps, then customizing the apps settings, restoring your favorites/PST, then the games, then downloading enormous game patches, then the performance tweaks, etc, etc...the last time I did a full system build, I only had a couple of hours a day to work on it, and the machine didn't get mostly finished for about two weeks.

It's a good idea to drop a clean image every now and then. The image will already have most of what you want in your build (detailed above), and takes about 10 minutes. Personally, I store a TXT file on a different drive detailing every little thing I've done, so if I have to drop an image, I have a very short "to-do" list for what's left that I would want in my build.