Changing motherboard WITHOUT reinstalling windows?

[Thomas Hejl Pilgaard]

Hello.

My brother has fried a chip on his motherboard:
http://blades.dk/pub/865Gone.jpg

The motherboard is an MSI 865G Neo2 PLS.

He can't find the card for sale anymore, so he was wondering if
there are any cards that he could substitute for it, WITHOUT
having to reinstall windows in any way.

I read that there is a chance of just that, with motherboards
that have the same chipset. All you would have to do was reboot
into safe mode, then reboot, and it just might be fine.

Which cards have the same chipset? Any 865G cards?
Incidentally, is that the very chip that he fried?:
http://blades.dk/pub/865G.jpg

--
________________________________________________________
/ Thomas Hejl Pilgaard | If you understand what | /\ /\ \
/ Ostenfeldtsvej 8c 2 tv | you're doing, you're | ^ ^ \
\ 4700 Naestved, Denmark | not learning anything. | = @ = /
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[ElJerid]

Hello.

My brother has fried a chip on his motherboard:
http://blades.dk/pub/865Gone.jpg

The motherboard is an MSI 865G Neo2 PLS.

He can't find the card for sale anymore, so he was wondering if
there are any cards that he could substitute for it, WITHOUT
having to reinstall windows in any way.

I read that there is a chance of just that, with motherboards
that have the same chipset. All you would have to do was reboot
into safe mode, then reboot, and it just might be fine.

Which cards have the same chipset? Any 865G cards?
Incidentally, is that the very chip that he fried?:
http://blades.dk/pub/865G.jpg

Indeed, if the chipset is the same, you can exchange the motherboard without
reinstalling Windows (XP). Your best chance to find the required 865G-based
board remains Ebay!

 

[Merrill P. L. Worthington]

Indeed, if the chipset is the same, you can exchange the motherboard without
reinstalling Windows (XP). Your best chance to find the required 865G-based
board remains Ebay!

I'm curious about changing a Gigabyte with a nVidia 6100/430 chipset for
an Asus with a 6150/430 chipset. I don't want to reinstall XP.

 

[John S]

Hello.

My brother has fried a chip on his motherboard: snip


I read that there is a chance of just that, with motherboards
that have the same chipset. All you would have to do was reboot
into safe mode, then reboot, and it just might be fine.

Which cards have the same chipset?

You may find that it is easier than you think (ie to use existing Windows
installation with different motherboard).

During the last month I had to replace two computers belonging to a club.
Both of them had motherboards which suddenly "died".

We found it was reasonably cheap to purchase upgrade boxes with new
motherboard and processor included. All I did was to swap over the hard
drive from the "dead" computer in each case, start up (Windows XP booted up
OK) and insert the CD which came with the motherboard. This allowed the
correct drivers to be installed for all the hardware in the new box and
everything ran OK.

I suppose there is probably a bit of unwanted rubbish in the registry now,
but it doesn't seem to affect operations.

The final step had to be the re-activation of Windows XP, but I just
followed the instructions on-screen and it was fairly simple.

Not sure if this information is what you're looking for, as I guess you
don't want to buy a new processor chip, but just the motherboard to take
your existing chip?

However, if you can't find a compatible motherboard for your old chip, you
should be able to fit a new motherboard with its current compatible chip.

 

[Gary Brown]

You needn't reinstall the OS. Just update the drivers to the new MB.
I haven't updated a motherboard for an XP installation yet but have
many times with its predecessors. The OS will detect new hardware
and go into the appropriate dialogs.

Gary

 

[philo]

You needn't reinstall the OS. Just update the drivers to the new MB.
I haven't updated a motherboard for an XP installation yet but have
many times with its predecessors. The OS will detect new hardware
and go into the appropriate dialogs.

with new h/w ...XP may or may not bootup


however you do not have to reinstall the whole OS


if the machine does not boot...a reapir install usually does the trick

 

[saturnlee]

When Xp boots, it looks for South Bridege manufacture ID, devices ID,
BIOS power management's setting and etc. If it's can't find it, it
throws out the blue screen.
So you have to make sure the entries exists in the registry and the
power management's setting is the same .
Google "mergeide.reg" and read "mshdc.inf" in Xp
Study them carefully and add the entries to the registry if the new
Southbridge entries is not in the registry and copy some driver to XP
if required.
If you 're lazy, you can just find a board with the same South
Bridge(HD controller eg ICH5) without doing any registry tweak.

the mergeide trick works 99% of the time, except for the very old
board that the BIOS is bad-listed by XP.

I don't like the repair install since it adds more junk to the HD.

 

[saturnlee]

Just curious, is the fried chip a ICH5? if it is, then you're not
alone.
Many Asus intel ich5 motherboards has the same problem.

You can ask MSI if it is eligible for free repair

 

[Thomas Hejl Pilgaard]

When Xp boots, it looks for South Bridege manufacture ID, devices ID,
BIOS power management's setting and etc. If it's can't find it, it
throws out the blue screen.
So you have to make sure the entries exists in the registry and the
power management's setting is the same .
Google "mergeide.reg" and read "mshdc.inf" in Xp
Study them carefully and add the entries to the registry if the new
Southbridge entries is not in the registry and copy some driver to XP
if required.
If you 're lazy, you can just find a board with the same South
Bridge(HD controller eg ICH5) without doing any registry tweak.

the mergeide trick works 99% of the time, except for the very old
board that the BIOS is bad-listed by XP.

I don't like the repair install since it adds more junk to the HD.

But wouldn't the adding of data to the registry require the
existence of a fully funtional motherboard in the PC?...

Kind of a moot point in this particular case, then.
But I'll remember the advice if I ever PLAN to change the
motherboard in the future.

--
________________________________________________________
/ Thomas Hejl Pilgaard | If you understand what | /\ /\ \
/ Ostenfeldtsvej 8c 2 tv | you're doing, you're | ^ ^ \
\ 4700 Naestved, Denmark | not learning anything. | = @ = /
¯¯¯¯¯¯¯¯¯¯¯¯¯¯¯¯¯¯¯¯¯¯¯¯¯¯¯¯¯¯¯¯¯¯¯¯¯¯¯¯¯¯¯¯¯¯¯¯¯¯¯¯¯¯¯¯¯¯

 

[Thomas Hejl Pilgaard]

Just curious, is the fried chip a ICH5? if it is, then you're not
alone.
Many Asus intel ich5 motherboards has the same problem.

You can ask MSI if it is eligible for free repair

All I can make out, is that it's an intel chip.

The store of purchase had no trouble exchanging it, but that
would take too long (similar cards are not exactly on the
shelves these days), hence my interest in replacing it with
a different card. And it worked.

A new card, from a different manufacturer, with a different
chipset, and even a different ATX-format (micro-ATX) was installed,
and after fiddling a bit with the SATA cables, windows was
able to figure out how to operate on it - no problem.

--
________________________________________________________
/ Thomas Hejl Pilgaard | If you understand what | /\ /\ \
/ Ostenfeldtsvej 8c 2 tv | you're doing, you're | ^ ^ \
\ 4700 Naestved, Denmark | not learning anything. | = @ = /
¯¯¯¯¯¯¯¯¯¯¯¯¯¯¯¯¯¯¯¯¯¯¯¯¯¯¯¯¯¯¯¯¯¯¯¯¯¯¯¯¯¯¯¯¯¯¯¯¯¯¯¯¯¯¯¯¯¯

 

[Rod Speed]

I'm curious about changing a Gigabyte with a nVidia 6100/430 chipset
for an Asus with a 6150/430 chipset. I don't want to reinstall XP.

Its not big deal to do an install in place with XP, just proceed as if you
are going a clean install, tell it to install in the partition its already installed
in, dont format that partition. XP will say that its found an existing install
and offer to repair that.

Best to use a slipstreamed SP2 XP CD tho.