Idiocy win7

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16 Jun 2014
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408
So what are the chances a win7 install will sort itself out if I change the motherboard, processor and memory on it?

Or am I hoping for a pipe dream?

It just needs to run a few days till I can get my hands on a small SSD
 
Should be fine

I'm sure i've swapped stuff in the past on Win 7 and it worked ok after

Win 8.1 is better at this sort of thing mind but i'm pretty sure that unless your unlucky you won't need to format
 
grrr activation could wait a day or so right?

Unless I am wrong I seem to remember you get a few weeks to activate it ....

From the MS site :-

"You have 30 days after installing Windows to activate it online or by telephone. When Windows is activated, you'll be able to use every feature of Windows"

I am assuming this also applies to re-activation after any HW change that triggers it.
 
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I think after a hardware change on an already activated license you get 3 days to reactivate.

You "should" be ok swapping the board etc. It is more likely to be successful if you move from intel chipset to intel chipset. More likely to have issues moving between different chipset vendors.
 
The main problems occur because of the HDD controller chipset. As said if you go from an Intel chip to Intel chip, generally the drivers have the extra required for the new chip.
Going between different manufacturers can lead to a blue screen error on start. You can get around this by changing the HDD controller in device manager back to the Windows default. this is compatible with all chipsets, and when you swap, Windows will just upgrade this to the correct one when you install the drivers.
Here is one method to do it.
Here is another that depends on O/S version.
 
Some I've had never work, just crash or BSOD.

Others I've just booted into safe mode, removed devices and drivers and then added the new ones. It's then worked perfectly from then on.
 
Some I've had never work, just crash or BSOD.

Others I've just booted into safe mode, removed devices and drivers and then added the new ones. It's then worked perfectly from then on.

Would agree - often does not seem any rhyme or reason :confused:

Would get ready for the worse and hope for the best :)
 
Thanks so much guys! I think board boards have the same HDD controller from intel on them. (swapping an asus p5b-deluxe for a gigabyte ep45-ud3)

Only 3 days to reactivate would be a drag, there is no problem obviously it is just that when my ssd arrives I'll be reinstalling on to that and I hate calling microsoft that often..
 
sysprep is taking a very very long time... should I not worry?
How long is very long? Probably yes. But give it a while.

I'm hoping I don't have to reinstall when I change mobos this weekend. I will likely do one anyway but it would be nice to test the new watercooled setup in an existing install before wiping.
 
3 days to activate... and it survived... not sure the other install will jumping from a gigabyte ga-ep45-ud3 to z97 chipset gigabyte board.. lol It also failed to sysprep..
 
XP and Win 7 will transfer over so long as you remember to remove/sort out motherboard chipset drivers beforehand, and as long as its Retail copy. OEM transfers simply fail to boot in my experience.
 
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