What is the correct way to migrate my old SSD to my new build?

Hey guys,

I'm back again for a bit of advice. First of all thanks for all your previous help, you give me all the guidance I needed to get my SSD setup and running smoothly in my current desktop.

However, the time has come to undertake some upgrades to bring the rest of the system up to speed with my SSD and as such I have ordered a new motherboard, CPU, RAM and graphics card. The SDD (a OCZ Vertex 2) with my OS already installed on it (Win 7 x64) will be joining these new parts but I would be grateful for some advice on what the best way is to migrate this drive over to the new machine? I've only ever dealt with new blank drives and fresh installs.

Is it at all possible to transfer the SSD over without needing to reinstall the OS - being mindful of trying to limit the amount of writes I make to the SSD. Obviously the first thing that comes to mind is that there might be issues with drivers, configurations, etc. for other components in my existing machine, any way to remove all these and reset the OS to scratch? Or am I best formatting the drive (SSD wipe tool thing?) and reinstalling the OS from scratch? If so should I format the SSD inside my current machine or can I do it afterwards, once installed inside my new machine?

Thank you in advance for any assistance

well i think since you have a new motherboard alone, the win7 you currently (installed with the current motherboard) wont be working at all... but i'm not really sure..

i tried a drive with win 7 on it for my new setup and it said that i recently changed hardware and hence it could not load up...

maybe someone else knows more about this

It depends on what hardware you have now and what you are getting.

I upgraded from a Gigabyte GA-EP45-UD3P to a GA-X79-UD5, both Intel boards and the system booted fine to the SSD (vertex 2) from the P45 and proceeded to install most of the required drivers without my intervention.
I needed to install some drivers but only after the system was up and running.

I did need to reactivate Windows however.

i have just the tool you need to run ... SYSPREP!!

SYSPREP does exactly just that, prepares your windows installation for another computer and transitions it smoothly.

all info is here:

Windows 7 Installation - Transfer to a New Computer

It's less than likely it will start on the new hardware, but you can try it.

However to be sure you'll need to SysPrep on the old hardware as suggested, or boot and run hard-to-find Paragon Adaptive Restore CD on the new hardware.

Hi all,

I have to admit with my limited knowledge I was mostly thinking I would have to do a complete reinstall (being certain in my mind that it would either not boot or have many driver errors) but thankfully I asked here first, and sure enough you guys have the answers yet again :)

I think with my whole hardware setup changing from motherboard to GPU, rather than just plug it in an give it a go it looks like running SysPrep will be the safest option to clear out all the old drivers.

Having read the guide I do have a couple of questions I hope you guys can answer or I can ask in the guide thread if you think that would be better? Basically, as far as I understand it SysPrep keeps programs and user profile but it removes all the drivers, settings, etc that associate the OS with the current hardware (OOBE) - does it though remove all the settings that it has auto-created for my SSD at install and those I subsequently added after install or will I have to add all of the SSD specific settings again? Should I run something after it's installed with the new hardware to get it configured for new CPU, RAM, etc like WEI?

Again, thanks for all your help, without you I would have wasted a load of time wiping and reinstalling my OS :)

Watch the activity from System Tray when it starts up as it will be loading a lot of drivers and need several restarts to sort them all out.

Then run Windows Update repeatedly to see if any newer drivers are delivered since it will first load the drivers from the Windows Driver Store which may need updating.

Also before running sysprep, uninstall any drivers that are uninstallable in the programs and features control panel that are specific to the particular PC you are migrating from.

OK, will do, thanks for the tips guys :) I've got a busy week ahead so I will probably have to leave this until next weekend but fingers crossed everything goes smoothly.