reinstall Vista on a new Motherboard ???

[pedmag2]

I have Vista Ultima but my Motherboard was burn from electric problem I
going to install a new Motherboard, my hard drive and the other cards are OK
they was check and tested , Is any way that I can do this and don't have to
reformat the Hard Drive ?????? The new Motherboard is diferent then the old
one, because I can no found the same MotherBoard, The CPU is OK and I can use
for the new Motherboard

Please any Help Thanks

 

[Rick Rogers]

Hi,

Provided you have sufficient free space remaining on the drive, you don't
have to format. Setup will just move the old installation to a windows.old
folder where you can later retrieve your data. Programs will still need to
be reinstalled.

You may find that if the hardware is closely related, that you will not need
any reinstall. I would just try it first, before bothering to reinstall.

--
Best of Luck,

Rick Rogers, aka "Nutcase" - Microsoft MVP

Windows help - www.rickrogers.org
My thoughts http://rick-mvp.blogspot.com

 

[Noel]

You need to see if the chipsets are the same. If they are not then you are
better off with a clean install. Then load the new chipset drivers.

 

[Grey]

It would be nice if that were true. I just went through a dying motherboard
replacement on my own machine and tried to put the same Vista Ultimate 64
installation with the new motherboard/CPU which were the only things
changed. It wont do it. You cannot repair install, so far as I can find,
since SP1 came out.

Please prove me wrong. I really would prefer to be wrong in this case!

----- Original Message -----
From: "Rick Rogers" <[email protected]>
Newsgroups: microsoft.public.windows.vista.installation_setup
Sent: Thursday, March 27, 2008 11:12 AM
Subject: Re: reinstall Vista on a new Motherboard ???

 

[Rick Rogers]

Hi Grey,

There is no "repair installation" option in Vista like with XP and previous
versions. It has naught to do with SP1. If the replacement motherboard and
processor are of similar build to the original, then there is a chance that
the original installation will boot on it. Otherwise, you are left with
creating a new installation. There is no requirement to format as part of
this process unless you are low on disk space (you'll need 15-20GB
available), so if you are stuck with that option then simply don't and
retrieve data from the original installation afterwards.

--
Best of Luck,

Rick Rogers, aka "Nutcase" - Microsoft MVP

Windows help - www.rickrogers.org
My thoughts http://rick-mvp.blogspot.com

 

[JW]

Here is one link that has several possible solutions:

http://www.windowvistarepair.com/

Also AFAIK if you run a Repair Installation from your Vista installation
disk it will rewrite the boot sector if required and make some other checks
but as Rick pointed out it is not the same type of repair installation that
you could do with XP.
I have read some links that stated that running the Vista System File
checker (SFC.EXE) will perform some of the same types of checks that the XP
installation repair does.

http://support.microsoft.com/kb/929833

 

[Grey]

Yeah I thought that WOULD be the case but how stupid is that?

Imagine you are the I.T. worker in a company where 20 new machines have been
delivered and you have to put the image done on Friday night for each
machine on that machine and have them ready to use by Monday so are working
over the weekend. You cant. You have to install Vista fresh then every
single program and all the other stuff each machine needs. Instead of taking
maybe an hour per machine, it is at least 2 with no real guarantee that you
haven't missed something as opposed to restoring an image to the new machine
which DOES guarantee you don't miss anything.

To put it another way, Vista makes any company's imaging software -
including the backup program from MS - useless excepting in the case that
the machinery is exactly the same.

MS must be trying to drive people away from Windows. No sane I.T. Manager
would put up with that rubbish!

 

[Grey]

Thanks for the links but nothing there changes the fact.

You can NOT move a Vista installation that was working with no problems from
one machine where, say, the motherboard died, to another machine with
different motherboard, CPU and ram. The only way you CAN possibly move that
installation is from the now dead machine to a machine with EXACTLY the same
hardware.

There is NO way you can survive with your current vista installation if the
hardware fails. The data may be intact but Vista wont operate with that
install on different hardware and there is no way around it.

 

[JW]

It worked for me without any problem.
The MOBO on my Vista SP1 system failed and I replaced the MOBO and the CPU
with completely different models from a different manufacturer and it booted
up the first time without having done anything else to the original HDD
installation. It even automatically activated over the internet without
having to do phone activation.

 

[Grey]

Thanks for the info but every MVP and everyone I have asked say different.

Also my own experience is the same. You cant do it. I know that is at odds
with what you say but nothing in that article you pointed out changed
anything. My bet is that, as has happened with me on many occasions with XP,
the hardware you changed to was similar enough. I have changed XP
installations from what appears to be different hardware to a newer computer
and for reasons that defy logic, no drivers needed changing, no repair
install no activate all over again. Made no sense but as it cut down the
time for the job, I didn't complain!

 

[Grey]

Great!!! NOW all the OP needs is a way to BOOT his machine to be able
to use the System File Checker.

IF he is not able to boot the machine with his new Motherboard/CPU, he
will need to do a CLEAN INSTALLATION.

XP allowed one to just do an inplace upgrade (i.e., "repair
installation"). This is not possible with Vista, sadly.

Hopefully, he will have already backed up his data on an external
drive.


Donald L McDaniel
Please reply to the correct thread and article.
================================================

Yep. Exactly the problem. It just cant be done with Vista SP1 if you had
Vista installed pre SP1 on that version's disks. It MAY be possible with
Vista SP1 disks but MS even stopped the ability for a streamline to work so
I wont know until I can get my hands on an original.

 

[Grey]

I.T. Managers don't have to use the older system prep software with
Vista. Vista uses a NEW imaging format, and Microsoft produces
software just for such folks to easily install a single image on
thousands of machines. This software is provided by Microsoft
free-of-charge. Just download it.

Again - it DOESN'T WORK where the hardware has changed and as it probably
DOES work where the hardware is the same, then the MS tool is useless
anyway.