Options for installing W7 on new system

My motherboard died on my last pc and I am currently waiting delivery of a new system. It is considerably higher spec than the last one and I am wondering about how to re-install Win7.

The hard drive from the old system is still fine, so at first I was thinking of putting that in to the new system, and booting up from that rather than the new hard drive. I realise this will still involve some level of re-install however.

However, as I said the new system is much more powerful included a faster, bigger and higher cache HDD. For that reason I was thinking of doing a fresh install on the new system. From there I would have 2 options, either just go with it and still put the old HDD in as a slave and access my files and copy over where required. Or I have an external HDD which has a full back-up of the old system which I could restore. However, again I am worried about restoring the old programs and settings as I dont want to hinder the performance of the new system. I dont know if this would be an issue however, it is just my instinct that to get the best out of the new system it should have as little to do with the old system as possible.

So, I would like some feedback on my options as above, or anything else I may not have considered. I plan on using the same copy of Win7 (which is a full retail copy) so I know I will have to probably ring up to get it re-activated or certified or whatever you call it.

Any and all help/suggestions are welcome and thanks in advance.

Take a look at this tutorial for one option:
Windows 7 Installation - Transfer to a New Computer

or
You can use the base of this Tutorial:
SSD - Install and Transfer the Operating System

Thanks for those links.

Am I right in thinking that either way, I will need to get the old hard drive in to the new system to set it up for transfer?

With regards to a system restore, will using an image from a much lower spec system harm the performance of the new one, or will it sort itself out in the end?

Having read various guides on here it seems that I might just be best doing a fresh install on the new system and using the old HDD as a slave to get my files.

I didn't have that many programs on it that I can't just reinstall or download again. It mainly just had lots of music, photos, videos etc which I can just copy across.

Think I would rather start from scratch with the new system so I know everything will be as it should be.

Always best to do what you feel best with.

Clean Install Windows 7

Excellent, thanks for that as I had always wondered how it works to get Windows reactivated. Thought it might have been a lot harder!

You're very welcome.

Even if something goes wrong (which it shouldn't) you'll just be transferred to a Microsoft rep and be asked to confirm you are only installing the software on one computer.

Explain you've fitted a new hard drive and you'll be given a new activation ID.