If I add a new Hard Drive to my computer, and install a new Windows OS on it, can I delete the Windows directory off of the old Hard Drive? I want to have both of them installed. I was having a problem booting to the old HD so I installed the new one to boot to, but want to keep the old one for storage.
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New Hard Drive and OS install
- Thread starter tjbennett
- Start date
You could just go into the BIOS and set the New HDD as the primary boot agent. If you have the Old HDD as the primary HDD to boot off of, it could just stall with a "OS not found" error. Also, If using SATA drives, put the New drive in Sata port 0 with the Old in 1. If Parallel, Make sure the New HDD is the Master or in the Primary IDE slot, if more than one IDE slot is on your motherboard.
"You don't know what you got, till it's gone..
80's hair band Cinderella or ode to data backups???
"You don't know what you got, till it's gone..
80's hair band Cinderella or ode to data backups???
rclarke250
Technical User
Boot disk doesn't have to be on sata port 0, it can be on any sata port. You would go into the hard drive selection, and choose the model of the hard drive you want to boot first, or in new machines, you would have an HDD boot order section, and you would go into there, and set the order for the drives to boot, obviously if the drive is not bootable it should be placed at the bottom of the list, or deleted/skipped in the list.
And yes, you can delete the old windows directory, it will not be needed unless you want to keep it there, in case something were to happen with the new boot drive, you can revert back to the previous drive, and be back up in just a few minutes. If it is the same windows license, and you are worried about that, don't be, the license allows it to be loaded on one machine, it's still the same machine.
And yes, you can delete the old windows directory, it will not be needed unless you want to keep it there, in case something were to happen with the new boot drive, you can revert back to the previous drive, and be back up in just a few minutes. If it is the same windows license, and you are worried about that, don't be, the license allows it to be loaded on one machine, it's still the same machine.
and if you want to make sure that the new OS installs on the correct drive, then unplug the OLD drive first then hook up the NEW drive, power on go to the BIOS setup make sure that the CD/DVD drive is the first BOOT device, with the NEW drive being second then Exit and Save.
Proceed to install the OS...
after you are done with the installing and updating (installing drivers and all), then you can replug the OLD drive, enter the BIOS setup and double check the BOOT order, and make sure that the NEW drive is listed as the first HDD to be booted from...
and all should be set...
Ben
"If it works don't fix it! If it doesn't use a sledgehammer..."
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Proceed to install the OS...
after you are done with the installing and updating (installing drivers and all), then you can replug the OLD drive, enter the BIOS setup and double check the BOOT order, and make sure that the NEW drive is listed as the first HDD to be booted from...
and all should be set...
Ben
"If it works don't fix it! If it doesn't use a sledgehammer..."
How to ask a question, when posting them to a professional forum.
Only ask questions with yes/no answers if you want "yes" or "no"
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