by ronallandottk on Mon Apr 27, 2009 10:58 pm
Moving a formatted HD with an OS already installed to another PC is almost always a hit or miss affair. Sometimes you can get away with it, especially if the donor and recipient PC are close in specifications, but if the configurations are really different, a clean format and reinstall may be the only way to go.
The thing is, when the OS (XP in your case) loads, it loads drivers for devices which in all likelihood it cannot find anymore causing it stop midway during the boot process.
If you're really intent on doing a straight HD transplant (or a motherboard transplant for that matter), the proper way is for you to uninstall all non-default drivers from the OS first, leaving only the basic ones that come with the OS before making the transfer. That way, when faced with a new motherboard (or an entirely new PC in your case), the OS can still boot.
It may be a little late for that now, considering you've installed the HD already. Of course, you can try returning your HD to your old PC, uninstall the unnecessary drivers, and reinstall it in the new PC, but it seems like a lot of work.
There are other possible ways to make the hard disk boot Windows, but to be honest, none of them are very elegant, and you'll almost always end up with a cluttered hard drive and an unstable system.
If it were me, I'd just do a clean reinstall.
If you insist however, you can try booting from an XP disc and repairing the XP installation on the hard drive. You can also opt to reinstall XP over the previous installation directory. But if you're going to do this, why not go all the way and make a clean install?
Hope this helps.
