I just installed a Asus P5e Deluxe Motherboard as a replacement for an MSi g31m3 that burned out. I was hopping that I could get my old hard drive from that build or one of my clones to run on the new MOBO but I have been unsuccessful. I have my OS and all my data and licenses from the old system on these drives and I really do not want to clean install just because the mobo went bad. Any Idea's?

quote saylor06

I just installed a Asus P5e Deluxe Motherboard as a replacement for an MSi g31m3 that burned out. I was hopping that I could get my old hard drive from that build or one of my clones to run on the new MOBO but I have been unsuccessful. I have my OS and all my data and licenses from the old system on these drives and I really do not want to clean install just because the mobo went bad. Any Idea's?

You will have to reinstall your OS for sure if you have XP. Vista and Windows 7 might be able to deal with it.

If you have XP, you don't have the choice to backup your data on another media, unless you partitioned your hard drive. Reinstalling the OS will format only the main partition and will not affect your data partition, if you made one. If not, I highly suggest you do this time.

I've personally had luck where I've used XP hard drives on different computers and had them work ok (well, beside of course the usual re-installation of the mobo drivers etc), but I think my experience has been in the minority.

Windows Vista and Windows 7 might have better luck, however Windows NT/2000/XP had problems with the HAL being tooo different from 1 mobo to another for the orignal OS to be stable.