Reinstalling Windows 7 on a new HDD

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AllanJC

Honorable
Jan 8, 2014
5
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10,510
Hey guys, my hard drive is slowly but surely dying. People have suggested cloning the HDD to the new one, but honestly there's so much junk on this one (old drivers, programmes that I don't even remember installing 5 years ago, etc) that I'd rather start fresh anyway, and just bring whatever I want from this one over to the new.

I had a look for my disc I got when I bought the computer (custom built from a small local company that's long gone) and the box says "OEM System Builder Pack, Intended for system builders only" and I was wondering if its possible just swap to the new hard drive, put the disc (Windows 7 Home Premium 64-bit. Includes service pack 1) in, boot from disc in BIOS, and put in the product key and have a fresh install. Is that wishful thinking?

And should this work and I get it installed on the new hard drive, would there be any issues putting the old one back in while it still has the OS on it just to pull some files from it?
Any advice is much appreciated, I'd rather get it right first time than just buy the OS again :p thanks
 
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SuperSoph_WD
Great job, Allan! :)
Actually, cloning a failing hard drive with bad sectors on it is a really bad idea, so you are definitely on the right track with the clean install of Windows.
Since you will be using the same computer, you won't need a new genuine Windows OS. The operating system is tied to the motherboard, so you won't face any issues activating it from the new hard drive. However, you should definitely make sure you got any other secondary SATA HDDs unplugged from the motherboard, otherwise you might encounter an OS confusion.
Once you have the OS up and running from the new hard drive, plug back your old one and see what data you would be able to salvage from it! Make sure you back it up and then make sure you get the HDD out...
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SuperSoph_WD

SuperSoph_WD

Glorious
Jul 30, 2014
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Great job, Allan! :)
Actually, cloning a failing hard drive with bad sectors on it is a really bad idea, so you are definitely on the right track with the clean install of Windows.
Since you will be using the same computer, you won't need a new genuine Windows OS. The operating system is tied to the motherboard, so you won't face any issues activating it from the new hard drive. However, you should definitely make sure you got any other secondary SATA HDDs unplugged from the motherboard, otherwise you might encounter an OS confusion.
Once you have the OS up and running from the new hard drive, plug back your old one and see what data you would be able to salvage from it! Make sure you back it up and then make sure you get the HDD out of your system. If it's really failing, it might cause you some system performance issues because the PC would still be trying to read the data from the drive, making it more sluggish.

Always make sure you keep at least two copies of your files stored on different locations (on-site as well as off-site)! This is the surest way to avoid any potential data loss in the future!

Good luck! Let me know if you have more questions! :)
SuperSoph_WD
 
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