New Mobo- do I even need to repair XP?

goldenbeers

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Mar 1, 2012
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Hello techsperts.

appologies in advance for my n00bness.

here's my situation:

I've got a new motherboard and processor, years apart from my old one.
I have a disk image of my old hard drive - for simplicity's sake lets just say that my old HDD is inaccessible.

the disk image seems to be fine and xp boots no problem. upon loading xp finds a whole bunch of new hardware and tries to install drivers and tells me i need to activate windows, etc. so i'm using the mobo manufacturers driver installation programs and it's all going well...

here's my question:

if i have all my new hardware installed and running, and everything seems as it should, do i still have to run a windows repair?

I ask because I know the text book procedure is to boot from the set up disk, select 'install xp' and then when prompted hit 'R' for repair. i'd rather not repair because last time i did, i found that i lost my custom right click functions (including antivirus options) and who knows what else i lost..

 

gb777

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Dec 30, 2011
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I've done what you're talking just recently but on a larger scale. I've got multiple os's on my machine. The W2k can't port over to the new one. 1 XP work fine. 2 other XP's worked but have some driver conflicts and had to be repaired.

If your os is working be happy and don't worry about it until you find something doesn't work then try to find a fix for that problem. Don't know who says std op would be to do a repair but I'd only do that when I can't find a solution to a problem.
 

It's better to run the repair, because it configures all the new hardware. Also load all the latest drivers.
Disable the antivirus before doing any of that.
 

goldenbeers

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Mar 1, 2012
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thanks to you both for your answers, so far all seems ok but i have some pro audio drivers that arn't playing nice. first time i tried to install these drivers i got blue screen, but then they seemed to install on restart. but my main audio application is not running right at this time. i'm leaving my options open at this point..

as to the question of 'who says its std op to run a repair' the answer is, it's microsoft who say that. http://support.microsoft.com/default.aspx?scid=kb;en-us;824125
 

goldenbeers

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i tried this before my latest image copy ( acouple of days ago) if it configured my hardware it certainly did not install or ask to install the new hardware drivers. i had to do that manually... well i tried to, suddenly on restart instead of 3 days to activate, it jumped to no days. and it still wasnt in a fit state to let me activate. so i was stuck in a catch 22 situation.. couldnt install drivers because i couldnt activate, couldnt activate because i didnt have my drivers installed...

thats when i gave up and copied the drive image again. another 6 hours wait..

..this time however i was able to get xp off its knees and activate from just the image.. hense my reluctance to go for the repair option... yet
 

gb777

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Remember also, when you do a repair, you'll have to reinstall any ms spks and fixes you've put in. It can turn out to be as much work as trying to find solutions to the problems.
 

goldenbeers

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Mar 1, 2012
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yes i agree. but my situation was that i tried to repair before i activated. i assumed bill gates wasn't lying when he told me i had 3 days to activate. but he was lying. so i was stuck and unable to activate.. that's why for the next try i just tried to get the image working and when it was, i activated without repairing. which is where i am now. i may yet have to run a windows repair and then install all the drivers and xp updates again. i'm going to give it a few days to see how stable my sytem is. right now it's not looking bad.. not great either..
 

goldenbeers

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well i got my system running ok.. all apart from my pro audio drivers which i need. badly. i tried everything to get my audio cards running. nothing worked so i'm trying the windows repair. which kind of makes this thread redundant. the amount of crap i've gone through is crazy. part of me thinks my new mobo just wont play with my audio drivers. which sucks because they're dropping xp support. no new drivers.
 

goldenbeers

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Mar 1, 2012
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well i think i can provide the answer now for anyone who comes across this thread in the future:

no you don't have to repair windows. either way it's a painstaking uphill struggle. spending hours trying to get windows on its feet again catch 22 after catch 22 after a repair only to find that it didnt make any difference to my audio driver problem.