Desktop HD won't boot when cloned onto Laptop HD

[dark ride]

Hi Guys,

I'm in the process of attempting to clone my office desktop computer to my laptop as an upgrade. I have been doing taxes and bookkeeping for many years and would rather not have to reinstall all of my programs and setup all of my settings. I made a backup image using my external hd and xml driveimage. I was able to restore it using the previous OS, but now it won't boot. I did a repair install and it copied all the files but was unable to complete the install. When it boots up it loads the Windows XP screen and the bars scroll across for a bit then reboots. If I try to boot into safe mode, it says Windows XP Setup cannot run in safe mode. I used the disable automatic restart feature to get this error code. I have run both fixmbr and fix boot from the recovery console to no avail. Any help would be appreciated. Thanks!

Technical Information:

STOP: 0x0000007E (0xC0000005, 0xF7664650, 0xF796342C, 0xF7963128)

 

[ktownmike]

My guess you have an oem license that will not work for this purpose.

 

[dark ride]

Is there a way to fix this? I was able to successfully clone this drive before, but it was from one hd to another within the same computer(Upgraded to bigger HD).

 

[ex_bubblehead]

As you've just learned the hard way. Windows does not like to be moved between differing platforms. This is because of various low level drivers that bind themselves to the hardware during installation. If you insist on using this cloned drive you will have to perform a fix install of Windows on the new hardware. However, this will roll all Windows updates and service packs back to whatever level is on the DVD. And as has already been pointed out if it's an OEM license this is not legal.

 

[dark ride]

The desktop I built myself with parts and installed the OS. The only difference between cloning the drive and installing a fresh copy of XP is the headache of having to install all the software and settings, which would be a nightmare indeed. I have attempted to perform the repair install but that is where it is getting hung up. Should I use a program like nlite to slipstream service pack 3 into it? The disk I'm using is SP2. Any help or ideas solving this would be appreciated. Thanks!

 

[ex_bubblehead]

In BIOS set the HD interface mode to 'legacy' or 'ATA', not 'AHCI' Out of the box XP does not do well with AHCI (personal experience).

 

[dark ride]

It doesn't appear that my laptop has that ability, there isn't an option to set anything in regards to the HD mode.

 

[ex_bubblehead]

In that case you're going to have to obtain AHCI drivers for your laptop and either slipstream them into a new install CD or use the old 'F6' trick during install to get AHCI support. Now there's always the possibility there is no support for XP on that particular laptop and so drivers may not even exist.

 

[dark ride]

I've performed a clean install using this exact same disk on the laptop before, so I'm thinking its not a driver issue, at least not the hd? I've been wrong before...

 

[dark ride]

Anyone?

 

[Hawkeye22]

Is there a way to fix this? I was able to successfully clone this drive before, but it was from one hd to another within the same computer(Upgraded to bigger HD).

An OEM license is tied to the motherboard so although it worked when replaced in the same system, it most likely won't work in a new system.

 

[dark ride]

What do you mean by an OEM license? How and when does it tie itself to the motherboard? Does it sync with the motherboard on install? Thanks!

 

[Hawkeye22]

When you ran windows for the first time it made you go through activation. This ties it to the motherboard. Unless you built that desktop computer yourself and used a retail copy of windows, it most likely came with an OEM version of windows.

OEM versions of Windows 7 are identical to Full License Retail versions except for the following:

- OEM versions do not offer any free Microsoft direct support from Microsoft support personnel

- OEM licenses are tied to the very first computer you install and activate it on

- OEM versions allow all hardware upgrades except for an upgrade to a different model motherboard

- OEM versions cannot be used to directly upgrade from an older Windows operating system

 

[dark ride]

Thanks for the replies! Where there is a will there is a way and I was able to make it work, the registry wasn't cooperating with the new system. Once I fixed it, and ran a repair install, all is well.

 

[Neil_O]

Thanks for the replies! Where there is a will there is a way and I was able to make it work, the registry wasn't cooperating with the new system. Once I fixed it, and ran a repair install, all is well.

I am having exactly the problem you describe. What changes did you need to make to the registry to get this to work?

Thanks

 

[dark ride]

Oh boy, what did I do back then? I remember installing XP on a second partition, which was part of my plan anyway. I remember following a process designed to restore a corrupted registry using the backup registry files from the new install of XP. There were five files, but in order to keep the information I wanted intact, I could only use three of them I think. The transplanted OS does work, but I wouldn't do it again personally. I was never able to get the display drivers to work correctly, I had to disable them otherwise the computer would just spontanously shut the monitor off. Guessing there is some remnant of the first pc's display drivers conflicting with the laptop's display drivers. I have tried everything to no avail. Since this isn't a problem when using the second partition, I can only assume it must have something to do with the registry of the first.