How to properly transfer Win10 installation to new computer?

[anon5123]

I remember the last time I did this, back in 2015, taking the SSD out of the old computer and putting it into the new one....Windows just refused to boot, bluescreening over and over again, and I was forced to use a fresh installation.

Does Windows still do that? I've heard that it kind of binds itself to your current hardware config, and if you change too many things, it won't boot. What I'm going to do is just image my current SSD and apply that image to the new SSD in the new computer. Will that work? I'd just do a fresh install, but I'm not sure how to make the license/activation carry over to the new installation.

[apluscarp]

I remember the last time I did this, back in 2015, taking the SSD out of the old computer and putting it into the new one....Windows just refused to boot, bluescreening over and over again, and I was forced to use a fresh installation.

Does Windows still do that? I've heard that it kind of binds itself to your current hardware config, and if you change too many things, it won't boot. What I'm going to do is just image my current SSD and apply that image to the new SSD in the new computer. Will that work? I'd just do a fresh install, but I'm not sure how to make the license/activation carry over to the new installation.

I have replaced the MB and CPU on several computers and Windows 10 recognized the new hardware and booted no problem.

[Sinaa]

If you care about performance just do a fresh install.

[Kufell]

I was always told that, unless there's a massive change in the architecture of the CPU, that generally moving your windows install over to completely new hardware won't be too much of an issue, if at all. I can't personally attest to how true this is as I've only personally only done this myself once with Windows 10 and in that instance it worked fine until a Windows Update corrupted some of my system files about two years later resulting in me needing to then do a fresh re-install. :/

If you have the two drives anyway and want to be on the safe side, you could always just do a fresh reinstall on the new drive, then just copy over anything you need/want manually.

Regarding the Windows Lincense; either way I think you'll need to re-enter the key, when I mirrored my old Windows drive to the new SSD I had bought, Windows 10 detected the change in hardware(as I had upgraded many other components too) and wanted me to re-enter the activation key.

[Thunderball]

With Win10 there's not going to be any issues provided that both motherboards run UEFI mode. Days of endless reinstalls are thankfully gone.

- - - Updated - - -

Regarding the Windows Lincense; either way I think you'll need to re-enter the key, when I mirrored my old Windows drive to the new SSD I had bought, Windows 10 detected the change in hardware(as I had upgraded many other components too) and wanted me to re-enter the activation key.

No. If he logged in through Microsoft account he doesnt need to enter anything. If he didnt then he needs to call the support.

[anon5123]

I just did an upgrade and all I had to do was enter my MS account info to activate Win10.

Ah, alright. I went over to the Activation page and signed in with my Hotmail account there, and now it looks like this:



So I'm assuming that, in the event that I have to use a fresh install of Win10, I won't have to deal with activation shenanigans.

I kinda would like to use a fresh installation but the thought of having to re-install all my programs, re-associate filetypes, re-fix all the Windows 10 bullshit, re-do all my browser logins and such, seems like a huge headache.

[anon5123]

Hah, yeah, there's already a fair bit of "weirdness" with my current hardware/installation, like every time I use remote desktop and then come back to my computer later, when I enter my password to unlock it, it sits at a teal screen for like 10 seconds before getting to the desktop. Or a very weird bug with Firefox that nobody else can seem to reproduce, where running any version past 67 causes weird freezing and lagging when opening links from other programs. I'm still running on Firefox version 67 solely because it's the last version that runs stable and doesn't have issues for me.

I did create a "rescue drive" USB from my current Windows 10 Pro, I'm assuming that will let me install w10 Pro when I boot to it? Since the m.2 I've got is blank, I'm going to just boot to the rescue USB and use that to install windows on the m.2

[Kufell]

No. If he logged in through Microsoft account he doesnt need to enter anything. If he didnt then he needs to call the support.

When I went through the process early into Windows 10, I had to re-enter the activation key. Granted, I think this was before the Microsoft accounts were as tied into Windows 10 as they are now.

Probably a change for the better.

[Thunderball]

When I went through the process early into Windows 10, I had to re-enter the activation key. Granted, I think this was before the Microsoft accounts were as tied into Windows 10 as they are now.

Probably a change for the better.

Yeah, it wasnt like that from the beginning. Moving to a different platform was also a pain in the beginning, gladly they fixed it.

[Naiattavain]

my case i had to get a new mother board. version 3 which is nice. just installed the new motherboard. and win 10 pro booted up no problems.

[Biglog]

The proper way is to always do a fresh install on new hardware. There are motherboard bios, driver, etc. differences in one hw to the next that will be carried over if you simply move the hd, and that's just asking for windows problems down the road. Just moving the hard drive over often will still boot and may even work ok, but it's definitely not the best or "proper" way to do it. That's the duct tape and super glue option.

Backup your data, do a fresh install (on a new system it literally takes about 5-10 minutes), and when done copy your data back. That's the correct way. Ideally your PC has 2 hard drives, so the backup data can be copied to the 2nd (non-system) drive that is just data and you just wipe the system drive for the windows re-install. And most PCs today have a fast NVMe drive for Windows and a 2nd ssd or hdd for data/games.

[anon5123]

Yeah, I decided that I'm just going to do a fresh install to solve all of the weird little issues and quirks I've had over the past couple years. Almost all of my games/media/personal stuff is saved on my external hard drive (just in case of windows drive failure) so all I did was just go through the two Program Files folders on my Windows drive and make a note of any programs that I want/need to reinstall on the new Windows setup. I also made an image of the drive, just to be sure that I've got a complete backup.

[ifrah]

I've always dreaded of the chore of setting up things from the scratch, but once you finally do that while taking your time and having all the old data backed up, I realized it's much less of a mess at the end of it than migrating an image of the old installation. Better to "de-bloat" your install and start off fresh.

[anon5123]

I've always dreaded of the chore of setting up things from the scratch, but once you finally do that while taking your time and having all the old data backed up, I realized it's much less of a mess at the end of it than migrating an image of the old installation. Better to "de-bloat" your install and start off fresh.

Yep, it was surprisingly easy to make a list of all the programs I need to install on the new Win10. And now I can actually use the newest FireFox, whereas on my old installation I was stuck on Firefox 67 due to a weird bug that nobody else could reproduce.

The new M.2 is a hell of a lot faster as well. I've got my mobo's "Fast Boot" option enabled and it's like 10 seconds from power button to login screen, and after logging in, absolutely no lag whatsoever, I can immediately start doing things. It's nice.