Dumb question, but if I was to upgrade my mobo and CPU, can I get away with plugging the existing NVME SSD into the new mobo and it will work (add new drivers etc) or will I need to do a fresh OS install?
Cheers.
Upgrading Motherboard/CPU. Will I Need to Reinstall My OS?
Helmutson on 21/05/2023 - 17:36
Comments
Dropping it into a new PC should just work.
As mentioned above, it might be a good idea to start with a fresh install anyway because:
1. Windows tends to collect junk over time which takes up more hard drive space and makes it slower
2. There might be some issues as the system tries to re-use older drivers. It can usually figure it out but on the rare occasion it might cause lesser performance or some weird behaviourTrying to see if I can get away with an upgrade without wifey knowing. She won't notice a hardware upgrade, but will definitely notice a fresh OS install. Hahaha
Surely if you can bullshit her with the new motherboard you can come up with an excuse why a fresh install was required.
Just say some dude from Microsoft called and said we had a virus.
Backup and restore her user profile….
Blame windows automatic updates…
What will you tell her if she asks why it's noticeably faster. Or when the USB ports on the back are in different positions.
Some casual users don't know about rear I/O lol, just the front panel usb ports
just tell her you downloaded some RAM for free
Just say their was a malware issue, and the OS had to be refreshed.
are you upgrading from same brand to same brand? i.e. asus mobo to asus mobo and intel to intel?
If it is the same then it should be fine. There may be additional drivers to install to get some components/features to work. If different brand, then there can be driver clash and cause bsod.
Depends on OS, Windows 10 and 11 tend to be ok, but not always :/
Also a re-install is a great chance to clean out all the crap you no longer use!
I've done it before, but this was from a AMD B350 Motherboard to a X570 motherboard, with the cpu being upgraded from Ryzen 3000 series to 5000 series.
If you are moving across from AMD to Intel or vice versa, it's probably best to do a clean install to avoid driver issues.
I have moved a Windows drive from Intel to AMD board or vise versa bit of luck invovled for it to work, sugest deleting first as many hardware drivers as yiu can first, suggest by a spare NVME and play around with a cloned copy of your NVME drive
In my experience, doing a fresh windows install with the exact same hardware will leave everyone thinking you upgraded your hardware anyhow. Removing all the bloat that accumulates over time makes such a huge difference to performance.
Out of laziness, however, I have done just a straight swap over on multiple occasions without any immediate problems, however inevitably after a few months I pretty much always end up doing a fresh install because of things like niggling driver conflicts that I just can't shake out of the system.
New motherboard always means fresh install, the windows key is tied to the motherboard itself these days.
I've moved Windows across devices many times, even between Intel and AMD. I've been moving a 2008 Vista install across multiple computer and OS upgrades all the way to Windows 10 on an i9-9900k.
It has worked fine for me, but it's not best practice as I'm sure you know. There used to be (fixable) boot issues with Win 7 and missing storage drivers, but Win 10 onwards seems to work fine with a straight swap. Just make sure you install all the latest drivers for your new hardware right away.
It's a good idea to make a backup image of your OS drive first just in case. You'll have nothing to lose by trying it out!
I've done it a few times without issue either when data cleanup from an old system would take a while or when waiting for replacements for SSDs that have failed. There don't really appear to be any significant issues doing so. For long term installs, I do clean installs.
I have had issues with Windows licensing when changing MBs due to the change of MAC address. Just had to contact microsoft support and they quickly sorted it out
You can generally transfer across fine, but there may be some messing about with the windows license key that you have to do. I did one a month ago and the key reg didn’t transfer over.
This.
As a technician replacing parts all the time, it's very hit and miss whether Windows will reactivate itself (espacially if it's an OEM copy).
HOWEVER
I've never had an issue calling Microsoft and getting it activated as long as you explain the old part was faulty.
How far can you change a PC and still use an OEM license?
It's MAINLY tied to the motherboard from what Microsoft keeps saying every time I speak to my rep, but I've changed complete NUCs (keeping SSD and RAM) and Windows reactivated by itself just fine. So I don't think that's technically true.
Certainly in custom built PCs changing the motherboard generally does trigger a failed reactivation. However, as I've said, a call to Microsoft explaining a failed component i.e. motherboard and they will generally reset the activation for you.
Retail licenses you can basically reactivate without issue as many times as necessary. It's only OEM that's mainly the problem.
Step 1: Backup.
Step 2: Backup again.
Step 3: Swap hardware and hope for the best.
Step 4: Clean install…Seriously though, I've done it plenty of times. Windows tends to freak out for a bit then comes good. Hit and miss if Windows stays activated, but even when it didn't I just told it to go online and it did its thing and then kept on trucking. The last time around I did a B350 to B550, Ryzen 3000 to 5000 and 2060 to 3070 all in one go and it just worked.
A clean install is always going to be … well… cleaner. But not really any more so than just doing a clean install on the same hardware. It should use he correct drivers and the existence of a driver you no longer need shouldn't have any ill effects as long as the machine is using the correct one. Al;though GPU drivers between AMD and Nvidia apparently cause issues, but not a pleasure I have had to deal with.
I'd backup first, then use a reliable cleaner to reduce bloat. After new hardware installed, check all okay at BIOS level.
Once Windows is running, I'd start uninstalling-reinstalling key drivers one at a time. Just to reassure myself they're the best ones for the new h/w and up to date.
Some Windows keys (the cheap ones from key sites) will only work with a single motherboard, so it depends where you got your Windows from.
I've done it, Win10 Intel to amd; the only thing the same was the sata ssd. No issues.
You may have to run ddu from safe mode if you are switching gpu and running https://github.com/lostindark/DriverStoreExplorer/releases or https://sdi-tool.org/ is always good,
With other people mentioning 'backup', your windows drive should always be in a state that you could easily format/migrate to a new drive without any 'oh sh&*' moments.
I have a Ship of Theseus machine that has never had a clean install - well I don't think so anyway.
This one has been around since XP -> Vista -> WIndows 10 -> Windows 11.
It's had both AMD and Intel CPUs
It's had raid cards, IDE and SATA drives, nvme drives.
It's had countless graphics cards from AMD and nVidia.
The oldest things were the case and power supply - but my last MB upgrade required a new power supply, and I thought why not get a case.Anyway the point is, I don't remember having any issue ever. I have taken images of hard drives and moved them to new ones. I have even changed the layout from MBT to GPT and changed from BIOS to UEFI (maybe that required a fresh install?)
The most complicated thing I remember doing was when going from nVidia to AMD and making sure to remove absolutely everything using Display Driver Uninstaller.
I had a look in windows 10 what my installed programs were. The oldest I have is some Visual C++ redistributables from October 2009.
Can do it..
Should take the opportunity to roll out a fresh install.