Upgrading motherboard without reloading OS

-1

This question is an offshoot of soemthing I asked earlier:

Disable "Auto Restart after BSOD" from Command Line

Is there a way to wipe out current motherboard drivers on the HD so that you can replace the motherboard without having to re-install the OS? My thought is that the HD will load a default driver or know that it needs a new driver and be able to install the proper driver afteward OR perhaps you could install the proper driver before before hand?

Situation: want to replace motherboard and CPU without wiping my HD.

Jeff

Posted 2012-01-23T16:25:04.047

Reputation: 189

Not possible.. trust me-- you can try and try.. even if it boots.. it still BSOD occasional.. you just need to reinstall it I am afraid.During install it detects base drivers that vary from MB to MB.. and there is no way you can change them.. - The disable auto restart is for debugging only.. so you can read the message and extended info.. – Piotr Kula – 2012-01-23T16:28:44.570

And the dubugging that issue is useless, I found. The info provided is the generic BSOD of "there was an error... in case you didn't know..." – Jeff – 2012-01-23T16:38:17.583

Well it depends.. I used that option to find the root cause of many problems.. and prevented me from reinstalling windows.. sometimes you need to look at the memorydump file too.. but thats another issue not related to your question. Just get in there and reinstall windows.. – Piotr Kula – 2012-01-23T16:39:44.553

Oh, I apologize... I already did re-instal windows. I just wanted to know if there was a way around that for next time. – Jeff – 2012-01-23T16:43:11.707

Oh.. still NO :) – Piotr Kula – 2012-01-23T16:47:39.750

On XP this can be an exercise in futility. On Windows 7 it might be more doable if the way it handled a complete video driver failure was any indication. – Fiasco Labs – 2012-01-23T17:52:12.140

1There are tools specifically for doing this. Acronis Universal Restore, for example. – David Schwartz – 2012-01-23T20:19:12.767

@DavidSchwartz - Thanks for that recommendation. I needed it a couple months ago and it would have saved enough time to pay for it. – Fiasco Labs – 2012-01-24T02:59:31.953

That is one thing I love about Linux... Just works when switching hardware. Too bad I love win7 too much :) – Peterdk – 2012-06-01T08:31:42.437

Answers

What OS? If using Windows Vista and above it will act a lot better then Windows XP or below when changing hardware. With earlier versions of windows the only supported way to update the HAL was by performing a complete re-install.

With newer versions of Windows things will mostly just work so long as the storage driver is properly configured before you attach the drive to the new motherboard.

Zoredache

Posted 2012-01-23T16:25:04.047

Reputation: 18 453

You can change motherboards as much as you want, OS is gonna handle all the stuff for you. Did that from various different systems. From Intel to AMD, Notebook to Desktop, just do it.

inf

Posted 2012-01-23T16:25:04.047

Reputation: 2 735

I take back my initial comment... perhaps there is something I'm missing. I just tried to do this and encountered a BSOD. What do you think the issue was (my not providing the error message is of little consequense as it had no information in it (0x00000007)). – Jeff – 2012-01-23T16:40:25.177

Well, of course there is always this "but". The reasons could be the standard ones, driver prob... etc. If I got a BSOD in such a case, which like I said never happend to me on total different configs, I would try safe mode and see if it works, deinstall all old drivers and try again. – inf – 2012-01-23T16:48:06.253

dont really believe you.. unless you are really lucky – Piotr Kula – 2012-01-23T16:48:22.667

@ppumkin You think changing from 939 to 1155 is luck? I think, it's more likely the awesomeness of win7. – inf – 2012-01-23T16:49:42.633

@bamboon I Admit i have not tried it with win7.... Looks like they finally released the whole package, hey? :) Still wouldn't trust it compelling for performance.. but thats just me.. – Piotr Kula – 2012-01-23T16:50:59.917