I have not been able to find a straight answer for. Is it legal to buy a pre-built computer store bought and remove the hard drive with windows 7 already on it and put it into a custom built computer? Does it even work? I was wondering because I don't want to pay 200+ dollars for just a hard drive and operating system. kinda ruins the whole idea of a "budget" build.
View 16 RepliesI just got my mother's computer back from a repair shop (they've changed the graphic card, the motherboard and the processor, the hard drive stayed the same)
It is a SONY VAIO VPCEE25fx.
I used my Windows 7 Ultimate OEM CD I had when I bought her the computer. But then, at the Custom Install step, it says No drivers or hard drive found. I've tried to reload, scan...none. I'm sure the hard drive is ok.
So I'm building a new computer completely from scratch, save for the hard drive, which I'm recycling from my old system. The hard drive currently has Windows XP installed.
My question is, can I upgrade the system with this? [URL]
Also, I plan to eventually buy a new hard drive. This presents a dilemma, because at the moment I can only afford the OEM or Upgrade versions of Windows 7. I read an article on PC World that claims there is a way to do a clean installation of Windows 7 using an Upgrade license. Here's the article: [URL]
Anyways, is that method still valid? Have any of you guys heard of it before?
I'm considering buying the Upgrade version of Windows 7 Home Premium, but I do not want to make the purchase only to realize later that I can not use it.
Really, I'm just looking for a solution. The only thing keeping me from buying Windows 7 OEM is the installation limits (can only install on one computer per license). When I get my new hard drive, I'd like to be able to use whatever version of Windows 7 that I own on it.
I just built a computer for the first time and for the boot drive i have a ssd. With that i have a hard drive. Now windows finds it in device manager but not in "computer". the Bios finds it too. i re installed the driver and restarted still nothing.
View 4 Replies View RelatedI have just finished my first build and everything was going fine until I tried to install Windows 7. I got through the first couple menus, then when I get to the part where I have to save the OS in a storage device, it does not detect my hard drive.
Specs:
Gigabyte Intel GA Z77X-U3H
Intel core i5 2500k
WD Caviar Black 1TB SATA 3 7200 rpm
Btw the HDD appears in the Bios.
I have recently purchased a custom built PC from a company and I have included in it an SSD for the operating system and programs, and a 1TB HDD for storage both are brand new with no data installed. Once I receive the PC I will be installing my own copy of Windows 7 Ultimate 64 bit. I have read on a number of forums that I need to unplug the HDD before completing the clean install of Windows 7 onto the SSD otherwise the boot partition will install onto the HDD if I keep it plugged in. I cant find any user guides/videos tutorials for this situation so would appreciate it if someone could confirm if its best to disconnect the HDD as I dont want to start taking the side of the case and unplugging the HDD if its not required.
View 1 Replies View RelatedPackard bell PC imedia something, radeon sapphire 5670 HD GPU upgrade, recent (Jan 2012) windows 7 64 bit custom install upgrade from vista 32 bit, during which I backed up all files on a Samsung external hard drive, then did a complete hard drive wipe install of windows 7, then put it all back on using software run by the Samsung drive. Went perfectly as planned. Other than that the PC was stock. One day playing Cod 8, screen inputs failed, then keyboard failed, then funny smell from PC tower, so I switched it off. After analysis, showed to be PSU fail. I took the opportunity to build a better PC, as this one is quite a few years old now.
So I only used the hard drive (WD6400AAKS)
Blu ray reader disk drive, memory card reader drive and Radeon GPU from the old PC
ASUS P8Z68-V LX mobo Overclocked intel i5 processor with artic cooling freezer 13 CPU fan Corsair TX650 PSU Antec DF-30 case with 4 led fans
All cables and such are new, and all plugged in correctly. When turned on the first time, all fans on, leds, and everything started as it should have, but No beep, monitor came on, instead of showing initial boot screen, asus version came up, then tried to boots windows, then just as the circles begging to circle the logo, it crashes, screen turns off, then on again, then back to asus screen, the windows screen crashes like before, then asks me to do startup repair or start as normally - No other options.
Every time I do this, it says it couldn't solve the problem, and restarts, then crashes, then restarts, then goes to startup repair option again. If I select start as normally, it just crashes again like before then loops back to startup repair option again. I have tried all options possible after the startup repair fails, including command prompt stuff, system restores, image restores, hardware diagnostics, basically everything. It either fails, then goes back to the startup repair loop, or tells me there are no problems with the hardware, then goes back to the startup repair loop.
I think my hard drive is corrupt, but signs have led me to believe its not completely corrupt - like it will see all the places and times on my hard drive to use when I select system restore, however after a fair time of trying each time, and with multiple possible restore points, it fails every time. I think all the other hardware is fine, and working as it should. I think some of the windows system files were damaged when the old PC's PSU blew while playing COD (it usually handles COD fine).
.I didn't wait for the computer to tell me it was ok to remove the drive in the usb port. Now my computer no longer recognizes the external drive After removing my external hard drive (without the ok) my computer no longer recognizes the external hard drive. What do I do.
View 1 Replies View RelatedI'm getting a kernel data inpage error BSOD on windows 7 ultimate x64. It seems to happen randomly regardless of activity (idle, gaming, video playback) and I'm having trouble finding the cause. The computer will not save dump files. So I've attached a picture of the BSOD, and an event viewer log.
Event viewer log:
- <Event xmlns="http://schemas.microsoft.com/win/2004/08/events/event">
- <System>
<Provider Name="Microsoft-Windows-Kernel-Power" Guid="{331C3B3A-2005-44C2-AC5E-77220C37D6B4}" />
<EventID>41</EventID>
[code]....
I'm curious as to what "build" is working the best for those of you who have OEM computers, such as HP, Compaq, Dell, Sony, etc...
If you have purchased any version of Windows and have built your own computer, then what version of Windows 7 "build" works the best for you?
i have just assembled a new computer, and i am attempting to perform a custom install of windows 7. however, i am getting an error message saying that no drives were found. i have a brand new seagate 7200.12, which shows up in the bios and will pass tests in SeaTools.
View 9 Replies View RelatedWhen I remove the power cord of a cpu while working, it often makes windows 7 crashes hard. When that happens, Windows 7 by default makes a system restore. Since we don't want that, we removed this option. Since the system restore has been desactivated, Windows 7 reboot over and over again. I have to reinstall. Sometimes, even the safe mode is not working. This scenario does not happen every time because sometimes Windows 7 succeeds in "getting back" online.
View 9 Replies View RelatedBought Windows 7 ultimate full version from ebay uk to install on a new SSD drivelisting states Microsoft Windows 7 Ultimate, Full Version, Standard License for PC - Retail 32 Bit and 64 Bit Edition I bought it for a gaming machine that I was building but I couldn't afford to finish it so I am selling all the parts. It is brand new but it isn't sealed as I opened it thinking I was going to use it at some point. I guarantee that the serial key has never been used because it was sealed when I bought it.On install its blocked by microsoft.Okay remove OS format ssd drive a get refund,go back to old ide drives.My question is how do I format my ssd to clean/new condition.
View 5 Replies View Relatedi have old windows vista trying to recover items on it to new windws 7.
View 2 Replies View RelatedI installed a new hard drive, and then installed windows to that new hard drive with the old one still connected and I now the two drives are somehow, linked so that if I remove the old drive, windows doesn't boot. When I reconnect the drive, windows boots up fine. I checked the boot priorities in the bios and its all as it should be.
I tried the windows repair disk, used the top option three times (as I've seen recommended on other forums), to no avail. I've tried the other options but the problem is, the windows installation is not detected, same with restore points, nothing works.
I think there's something to do with the Disk Management utility. I have the two disks, disk0 and disk1, disk1 is the disk I want to remove.
this is what the page looks like:
disk0 (boot, page file, crash dump, primary partition) disk1 (system, active, primary partition) + (8mb unallocated)
It seems the System-(thing?) is on disk1 so when i remove the drive, the computer doesnt boot. Makes sense. What doesnt make sense is that windows ISNT installed on that disk so why the hell is "system" on there and causing trouble??
Would making the partition on disk0 active solve my problem? I dont want to click on anything and break it so I ask here.
having a laptop with windows 7 and Linux installed in the same drive .....nw windows 7 got detected as Not Genuin .....so want to format but linux is still in the same drive ......i want to remove windows 7 without removing linux or any else data frm the drive......
View 3 Replies View Relatedi want to remove all data from my c: drive which has win 7 ultimate without removing my os and my d: drive which has win8 pro + data should not be affected.
View 3 Replies View RelatedI have a hard drive I want to backup to a 64gb flash drive and then restore it to another different hard drive than where it came from. I have windows 7 and office on my laptop and I want it on my desktop pc. There isn't close to 64gb of info on my laptop so it should be fine even though the hard drive says I have 160gb. It is all free space except for those programs.
View 3 Replies View Relatedunder XP, I had my own .reg file and an icon library, so that the drives of the card reader would have nice icons in the explorer. However, adding the info and copying the file does not do the trick in Windows 7... has something changed? What can I do to get my own icons back?
View 5 Replies View RelatedI did a custom install from vista to 7(32 bit) today.
I deleted all old restore points through the space management, however, the partition reads a still mostly full. There is only 1.8gb out of 8.3 available. When I access the folder, there is nothing in there, even if I show hidden files.
I believe it is remnants of my old vista recovery drive, which I did not erase prior to my upgrade and was always equally full to what it is now.
How would I go about eliminating these files now so I can backup my new OS installation?
I just did a custom install from Vista to Windows 7 with an upgrade disc. After completing the setup, deleting windows.old, and reinstalling all of my programs, I noticed that there were old folders on the C: drive. It is as if it didn't move anything from the root drive to the windows.old file.
I'm annoyed at myself for not noticing it sooner. Now I don't want to do another install since I spent all that time reinstalling the programs and configuring them for personal use.
I'm tempted to go in and just delete the old folders from the root drive, but I'm nervous. Honestly, I can't be certain of what should and shouldn't be there.
Is there anyway I can tell which folders on the root drive are leftovers? I thought about deleting according to the date modified stamp, but I'm not certain that is safe either.
Can anyone advise me? I really don't want to do another install of Windows 7, but I was pretty excited about starting with a true clean slate. I just can't help but wonder what else it left behind.
Drive C was an old IDE drive with XP on it. I installed and new SATA drive for WIN 7. Win 7 installed and activated just fine. Now I want to remove the Old IDE XP drive from the machine but the boot partition is on the IDE drive. I need to know how to remove the old drive and make the new SATA drive bootable into the Win 7 install on it.
View 4 Replies View RelatedMy current system was upgraded to windows 7 32bit from vista 32bit (I bought the windows 7 home premium upgrade disc when it was first released). I am going to build a complete new system. Can I install windows 7 64bit from the same windows 7 disc? Or do I have to buy a new windows 7 disc? Is there a way around buying a whole new disc?
View 1 Replies View RelatedI don't think this is exactly related to customization, but rather maybe the way Windows 7 handles file paths. I have an external HD with many folders with custom icons. On my PC the drive letter which is always assigned is G. Now, when I use it on a friend's PC, which assigns drive letter E, all my custom folder icons disappear. Note that all the relevant .ico files are where they're supposed to be (inside the folders whose icons they should customize). I'm assuming Windows always tries to locate the icons on a G: drive, which only exists on my PC but not on my friend's (where it's E). How can I change that?
View 1 Replies View RelatedSo, I have a i7 2600K system with a solid state disk as the boot drive, and an older (c2008) Samsung Spinpoint F3 500GB drive as the data drive for programs (that I deem as not worthy of the quick load times). The hard drive has given me some errors over time, and I bought a hard disk to replace it (a Hitachi 1TB). The issue I'm having is that the fact that Windows 7 puts a small (100MB) partition on the F3, and for some reason, even though I'm running Acronis 2012, it doesn't seem to be able to clone the F3 over to the Hitachi. I've also tried Drive XML, and for my 2 hour wait, I only managed to acquire a boot error. Thankfully, I've not done anything rash to destroy the data on the F3, but given the fact that I've seen corrupted files in Steam from that drive, I'm not will to trust it long term with my data. I really need to get the data onto that Hitachi, though... Anyone have any advice for upgrading the HDD in a SSD/HDD system? I don't really feel like it should be so hard, especially if I've bought Acronis True Image, but maybe they haven't designed their product to handle this scenario quite yet?
View 9 Replies View RelatedI used a windows image in transfer my computer to a new ssd drive. The image copied even the hd size. The ssd is a 256 and my old hd was a 160. I now have 150gb boot section, a 100mb reserve and a 90gb unallocated space. what can I do to remove the partition and combine the space so I have access to the full drive? I searched and couldnt find anything.
View 4 Replies View RelatedEquipment: Acer Aspire 5535 Laptop Originally running Vista Home Premium - no problem. I have updated to W7 and now on W7 Ultimate SP1 32 bit I can slot an DS card into the card reader and copy to/from with Explorer.
I then eject the device using Safely Remove Hardware and Eject Media icon in the rhs of the Task Bar.
I remove the card and then any other card slotted in is not recognised - including the original one. It does not appear in the Explorer window and is not accessible.
If I look on Device Manager, under Universal Bus Controllers, the eigth one down is USB Mass Storage Device and is showing an ! in yellow triangle. Right click on this brings up properties which tells me:
"Windows cannot use this hardware device because it has been prepared for "safe removal", but it has not been removed from the computer. (Code 47)
To fix this problem, unplug this device from your computer and then plug it in again." Well, if course I did remove the card but it don't see that
If I reboot the LT this is cleared. If I watch Device manager whilst ejecting the card, nothing happens till I actually, physically take out the card when it updates the window to show the fault triangle. I have checked for latest driver and am told it has the latest one. Other USB ports work OK.
Dual Core Windows 7 Pro 64 bit Toshiba laptop. My daughter was working on a Power Point project for school. She went to plug in her flash drive and it didn't seem to load the drive up. She unplugged it and then plugged it back in. We got a BSOD. We restarted it and it BSOD again. I tried some general troubleshooting, including restoring it to a previous version, and now cannot get into Windows at all. Not even in safe mode. Now I am getting multiple BSODs.
Currently I am seeing these BSODs:
I am getting one when just trying to start and run windows I am getting a BSOD about memory management. If I try to go into safe mode it loads the files and then I get a BSOD regarding the fbwf.sys.
Using the Windows 7 disc I have been able to get to the System Recovery Options. It finds my install and then blue screens with IRQL_NOT_LESS_OR_EQUAL or Driver_IRQL_NOT_LESS_OR_EQUAL even before it gets to finding my install.
Other BSODs I know I have seen are regarding the Ntfs.Sys and PAGE_FAULT_IN_NONPAGED_AREA.
I have a HP Touchsmart IQ500. Turning my computer PC on today, all I got was a blue HP invent screen with setup, boot menu, system recovery, and system diagnosis, and I could not get past it. I entered the BIOS and figured out that the hard drive was listed as "not installed." Pretty sure that is the main problem.I tried a system restore (with the Windows 7 install disc), but I guess the computer couldn't read the hard drive enough to enter safe mode (I tried restarting and F8ing several times). I put in an external hard drive, and the BIOS read it; however, windows does not allow you to partition an OS on a hard drive.
View 2 Replies View RelatedI have an internal hard disk not in use ,and I would like to make it as external disk !I looked on the net and I found I should have the " encelsure " butt I think I wont find it here in my city .So is there another way ? like usb -esata cable
View 3 Replies View RelatedMe and my brother built me a new computer from scratch (he did the building - i did the watching). I purchased an internal hard drive from Overclockers UK. It's a Samsung 1TB drive. I also have a 64 Solid-state drive in there as my primary hard drive that Windows was installed on and a couple of programs are installed on. My storage disk (the 1TB disk) is for all my music/films etc. Whenever I drag and drop a file into the Samsung hard-drive - it copies it rather than moves it instantly.When I had a laptop, I had 3 external hard drives and this is the way it copied files onto them.how I can get the internal drive to stop acting like an external drive?
View 6 Replies View Related