Upgrading Mobo, RAM, and CPU but keeping old HDD for now. Regarding Windows 10...

[jaredharmeyer33]

I am finally upgrading my first (and only) PC that I built around 5 years ago. I closely followed a guide while doing it, so I'm not super familiar with the process. With that build I used a Windows 7 OEM install, and later when windows 10 came out, I did the free upgrade.

I have read other threads that stated that I should be able to transfer the Windows 10 OS to the new build using my Microsoft account. But since I plan on using the same HDD for now, will that affect the process? Would I need to format my HDD? Or should I just buy a new HDD?

Thanks.

 

[smorizio]

as posted by the lead mod with a bomb in his sig. if you dont do a nuke and pave of the old drive when you install it on a new mb windows is going to puke all over itself do to the different chipsets of the mb. if you have a lot of stream games you can move them to another drive and then reinstall steam and point steam to your game folder on the new drive or backup. with windows 10 and thee digital keys now. microsoft does let you deactivate one pc and then use the same key on another pc. micosoft has a few pages of how to do this. if you dont have any data you need on the old hard drive. then it a simple as making a new windows media creation usb stick with an 8g usb stick and the tool from ms web page. boot from the ubs stick on the new pc build go into advance mode and wipe all of the partions off of the old hard drive and starting fresh. on the usb stick make a folder called drivers and place the newest drivers from the net onto the usb stick. most mb have a driver cd with them but the drivers can be out of date on the disk.

 

[jaredharmeyer33]

as posted by the lead mod with a bomb in his sig. if you dont do a nuke and pave of the old drive when you install it on a new mb windows is going to puke all over itself do to the different chipsets of the mb. if you have a lot of stream games you can move them to another drive and then reinstall steam and point steam to your game folder on the new drive or backup. with windows 10 and thee digital keys now. microsoft does let you deactivate one pc and then use the same key on another pc. micosoft has a few pages of how to do this. if you dont have any data you need on the old hard drive. then it a simple as making a new windows media creation usb stick with an 8g usb stick and the tool from ms web page. boot from the ubs stick on the new pc build go into advance mode and wipe all of the partions off of the old hard drive and starting fresh. on the usb stick make a folder called drivers and place the newest drivers from the net onto the usb stick. most mb have a driver cd with them but the drivers can be out of date on the disk.

Do I have to make a Windows USB stick in order to transfer? I thought it was tied to my account.

 

[Peter Martin]

no, do this to transfer it first before new install or tear down of old PC
https://www.groovypost.com/howto/transfer-windows-10-license-new-pc/