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Can I upgrade my cpu/MB/Ram without a clean install?

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Is there a way to wipe most/all of my drivers (if needed), swap out my old MB/cpu/ram for the new one that will arrive in a couple days?

I know the best answer is s clean install, but I just did this ~1 month ago when I decided to go with a 96GB SSD boot drive and upgraded to windows 7. It takes weeks for me to get everything running the way I want. Thanks for you time!

I can provide specifics if that helps.

More about : upgrade cpu ram clean install

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Motherboard Master
CPUs Master

Most of the time you have to do a clean install, unless the new board uses the same chipset. I can do my clean install in about three hours with an ssd. Good luck.
Motherboard Master
CPUs Master

Make that a close chipset. I recently changed from an H67 board to a Z68 without any problems. Most of the time when you try to install a different Motherboard it will load a difference set of drivers for the new board and keep the old ones and slow down the system unless you clean them up.

Christian Wood
Intel Enthusiast Team

Probably have to reactivate Windows again anyway with a board change.
i would go ahead and wipe the drives. It always acts freaky when you try to install over top of the old. I suppose you could open up the device manager and sit there and uninstall everything dealing with the board before you swap it out. Uninstall each thing , shut the box down and swap.
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IntelEnthusiast said:
Make that a close chipset. I recently changed from an H67 board to a Z68 without any problems. Most of the time when you try to install a different Motherboard it will load a difference set of drivers for the new board and keep the old ones and slow down the system unless you clean them up.

Christian Wood
Intel Enthusiast Team



How do I "clean them up" (the drivers)? Seems to be running good, but could probably be better?

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Motherboard Master
CPUs Master

You can easily migrate practically any Windows XP/Vista/7 to a radically different MOBO/CPU/RAM/Etc. OS - if your MOBO can support it you can move it.

Simple - go the MOBO's website, and download ALL of the drivers for your OS and installed them. The needed drivers load from Windows and the unneeded simply don't load. edit: Review the Device Manager to verify there's no {! or ?} and if there are simply get the driver and load it. Piece of cake.

Make sure the old/new AHCI or IDE settings per BIOS are the same, you can run Fix It -> http://support.microsoft.com/kb/922976

Where it 'can' get tricky is if you have multiple HDD/SSD then 'Drive Letters' MUST match-up before & after. If they don't then you'll need to manually change the Driver Letter(s). The Primary/OS drive will be 'C:'

Yep, you'll have to reactive.

Good Luck! :) 
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