Data-swapping question...

[acrebo]

Apologies if this has an obvious answer, it's new to me!

I'm in the process of putting together a new build to replace my old cheap, broken PC. Now, on my old, cheap broken PC's hard drive is all the stuff that I want to rescue, on an old version of XP.

I will be buying a new 500GB hard drive in this build, so am planning on moving everything I want to keep onto this drive and then format the old drive and use it as the drive to install Windows onto.

Question: Is it as easy as putting both hard drives into the build to start with, boot from the old drive so that it goes onto my old copy of XP, drag and drop everything into a set folder on the new hard drive, and then format and intall Windows on the old drive?

Is there anything I will need to do to my new hard drive beforehand? Create folders, etc?

Many Thanks

 

[acrebo]

Thanks mate, I think that makes sense.

So, once I've installed a fresh copy of Windows on the new drive and then added the second drive (ensuring that the new HD is used to boot up), I can then just drag and drop files across onto the new drive? Or will the old copy of Windows be fine just sat on the old drive, with me still able to access all my files on that drive without difficulty?

 

[acrebo]

That all sounds fine, cheers. I'd expect to have install all programs again - a good to streamline what I actually use!

Thanks for the help