Maximum PC

i recently replaced the motherboard in my computer. the motherboard i took out has SATA ports for the hard drive but the replacement board doesn't have SATA ports, only IDE.

so i made a clone of the SATA hard drive that was in the computer to an IDE drive (twice the capacity- 80GB to 160GB) using Acronis true image.

i plugged the IDE drive in and started the computer- before the Windows XP splash screen appears the computer restarts- i then see the screen stating that windows failed to start up and gives the options to start normally, safe mode, etc.

i tried doing a repair install but the windows install disc doesn't recognize windows as being installed- it only sees a partition, so i don't get the repair option- although ERD Commander 2007 does recognize the windows installation.

i've run a checkdisk from hirens boot disc which did make corrects, but windows still doesn't load.

any ideas?

Going from one motherboard to a completely different one will cause problems. The drivers most likely are not the same for both boards.

You might be able to recover some of the data using a bootable recovery disk, but otherwise, the simplest fix is going to be wiping and reinstalling. When using a cloned operating system, you want to make sure you are using the same motherboard.

The automatic restarts however is because of a BSOD (Windows defaults to restarting the computer right away), so the next time you see that menu, select "Do not automatically restart on error". We could probably get a better idea of what's going on. My guess is the BSOD will say "BOOT_DEVICE_NOT_FOUND" or something.

It's probably more than likely a driver problem.

Your best bet is is back up your files in another computer by plugging the drive in it as a data drive and boot to the drive that was in the machine to begin with. Then wipe the drive and reload windows in the machine the drive is intended to run in.

Taking a motherboard out and placing a different one in almost never works as when you install windows it surveys the electronic architecture and then supplies the proper generic driver to get things going. Removing the old drivers doesn't always work either. If it does, it will run slow.

Nasty

thanks to everyone for all of the responses, much appreciated!

someone suggested that i try using acronis true image home premium 2012 as an option- it allows for restoring disk images to different hardware setups. i've made a backup of the SATA disk (original) using an acronis home premium 2012 plus pack boot disc.

i began the restore process to the target IDE drive and choose a sector-by-sector restore and the universal option for restoring to different hardware. the following message appears:

Device driver 'PCI
\VEN_1039&DEV_7001&SUBSYS_0C56105B&REV_0F' for
'Microsoft Windows XP Professional' cannot be found.
Place the driver on a removable media or in folder 'A:\' and
click Retry.

so i'm guessing that i need drivers loaded in order for the IDE drive to "recognize" the windows xp installation, correct?

i'm not sure exactly what type of drivers it's looking for, though. i'm hoping that others have experience with using this version of acronis true image.

any ideas?

thanks again!

Sorry but a clean install is the only way to go.

Nasty

i just clicked Ignore on the prompt and the restore process finished.

windows booted properly right away and i just used the motherboard's driver CD to load the drivers for that device.

thanks again!