Can't access old HDD after hardware upgrade

Nicholas_74

Commendable
Jan 6, 2017
3
0
1,510
I just upgraded my PC by changing out motherboards, RAM, and my processor. I currently use an SSD for my OS and I have an older 1TB HDD that has games stored on it. The HDD used to have windows installed on it prior to an intermediate upgrade that involved getting my new SSD and moving windows to there. I have since lost my copy of windows and had to buy a new copy to perform a clean install on my SSD to get my new hardware to work properly. The problem I face now is that during the transfer period, the older windows account transferred its activation back onto the HDD for some reason. My PC won't access the HDD for the game files I stored there and I believe that has to do with an active version of windows being on there, and it is different to the one I am using now.

I am now wondering if there is a way to erase that active version of windows without the product key, as I have lost it. Any help with this would be greatly appreciated.
 
Solution
When both the SSD and the old HDD are connected, are you sure you are booting from the SSD? Maybe check In BIOS Setup the settings for boot order. Make sure it uses the SSD, and does NOT attempt to boot from the old HDD at all.

After that, in Disk Manager what does it show? I really should show the old HDD since it can use it in some cases. But it may be in the lower right half of that system, with no drive letter assigned to it. If so, RIGHT-click on its Partition and assign it a letter name. Back out of Disk Management, and maybe reboot to ensure that Windows has that new setting in its registry. Then maybe that drive will show up.

Paperdoc

Polypheme
Ambassador
Your problem may not be what you think it is.

You have a new Windows installed cleanly on your SSD. Now you want to run games from the old HDD. But I would bet you did not re-install the games themselves.

Windows has a set of system files called the Registry where it stores all kinds of info. When you first install any software package, the installtion process writes important details about that new software into the Registry. Windows cannot run that application software without those details. What you did by installing a clean new Windows on your SSD is create a new empty registry on the SSD that has NO information about anything on the old HDD. Basically, you need to re-Install each application software package (including each game) so that the new Registry gets the entries it needs to use those packages. Now, in doing that you probably want to be sure they are placed on the larger storage device - the old HDD - to save space on the SSD. You MAY also have to contact the software maker's Tech Support people for how to re-use your license to do this. You already own the right to use that software, but the Install process for each package may not be able to handle this without some help. You also will need advice, I suspect, on how to preserve and restore for each game the user files that contain where you are in those games.
 

Nicholas_74

Commendable
Jan 6, 2017
3
0
1,510
The problem is the old hard drive does not appear under the connected drives. When I boot off of my new OS, my system cannot read that drive. i read some forums stuff about this issue, but all I found was that since there are two separate OS' running, the system won't be able to read that drive, so it omits it from the drive count. I know that it's not merely a SATA connection issue because when I unplug the SATA cable from my SSD and restart the system, I am able to boot off of that hard drive.
Also I have a new 3TB HDD that I am going to install the games that won't fit on my SSD and old HDD that has steam and Terraria installed on it, and it still doesn't see those files in the old drive.
 

Paperdoc

Polypheme
Ambassador
When both the SSD and the old HDD are connected, are you sure you are booting from the SSD? Maybe check In BIOS Setup the settings for boot order. Make sure it uses the SSD, and does NOT attempt to boot from the old HDD at all.

After that, in Disk Manager what does it show? I really should show the old HDD since it can use it in some cases. But it may be in the lower right half of that system, with no drive letter assigned to it. If so, RIGHT-click on its Partition and assign it a letter name. Back out of Disk Management, and maybe reboot to ensure that Windows has that new setting in its registry. Then maybe that drive will show up.
 
Solution