Feedback appreciated.
Tech Ping
How much are you expecting to spend on this upgrade?
Yes, many motherboards come with one AGP slot but they also come with graphics capability already built into the MB, making the card unneeded. Your hard drive would be better off as a slave drive because doing a fresh install on a new hard drive will give you a lot less headaches.
====whether I can just migrate my current HD and Graphics Card over to a faster mobo/cpu====
If you’re starting over, I highly recommend you start with a new or freshly formatted HD. Take all of the critical data off the current HD and put it on another HD. Once you get up and running, you can grab the data again.
The vid card needs a driver/software and it should work on any new computer if you have the correct slot.
Bottom line....build it from the ground up.
here's a decent article, emphasis on changing IDE controller to Standard. (Saves a lot of headaches with XP finding\installing drivers for your new hardware)
Here's also decent “how to”
http://www.theeldergeek.com/move_harddrive.htm
Good luck...when in doubt...dont! ask someone
Many new Mother boards come with raid built in. This allows you to use multiple drives like they are just one drive and with make your response time faster. I have 3 80GB sata drives on this machine. The smaller sata are cheep now. This set up and plenty of ram helps with video editing.
I’ve done this dozens of times. Among the things you have to consider are whether you are replacing the motherboard and whether your copy of XP is retail or OEM.
If you aren’t replacing the motherboard there is nothing to be concerned about. If you are, you need to consider whether you are switching to another brand of CPU. I’ve done both scenarios, and switching from Intel to AMD, or vice versa, is a pain, but it can be done.
For switching motherboards it is best to keep the old hard drive, until you get the new systen XP activated. XP will usually activate without a call to Microsoft if you don’t swap the hard drive. You will need the motherboard driver CD after the swap.
If you change brands of CPU, you need to do a repair/reinstall, which is a pain, but I’ve done it several times.
Did I mention that even if you are keeping your old hard drive, you should first clone it. Once you start down this road you need complete backup of the entire system. Preferabley done before you damage anything.
Once you have replaced a motherboard and gotten XP activatd you can upgrade the hard drive. Trying to do both at the same time will be interpreted as an attempt to install XP on two computers.
You can still get Windows XP pro from Newegg.com for $140.00
You will just have to buy a motherboard, processor, HDD, video card or some system componet at the same time.
Finding a MB that has an AGP slot shouldn’t be too difficult, but your selection may be limited to older stock. Same goes for CPU and memory, but you might get lucky and find a board that has an AGP slot and an AM2 or LGA775 cpu socket.
The best bet for using the same hard drive without disturbing apps and data is to do a repair installation of windows with the new computer. This strips out the old system files and allows proper base driver selection for the new equipment. Alternately you could strip out the IDE drivers (delete when booted from the current system) then assemble the new setup and see if windows can recover on boot (can always do a repair install afterward if it fails).
Internet surfing
That I can believe.
I have to say your request is really quite odd. You’re considering a Mac, spending at least $1K, but you’re also trying to save as much money as possible by salvaging both your outdated graphics card and your outdated HDD.
Newegg has exactly three Intel motherboards with AGP slots and two AMD mptherboards with AGP slots. All are low-end by today’s standards, so I would recommend a new PCI-X motherboard (or, as others have suggested, getting a motherboard with integrated graphics). You won’t be able to do much, if any, “modern” gaming with an integrated graphics controller but it is useful for less demanding or older games.
As far as the HDD goes, every motherboard I can think of has IDE capability. Most drives these days are SATA, though. Still, no matter which route you take you will be able to use that drive.
Another thing to consider is your copy of XP - if it’s retail you’ll be fine, but if it’s OEM you might have to call Microsoft to activate. It shouldn’t be a major issue. Note that you can get a copy of Vista for 70 bucks on Newegg, and I assure you it’s at least as good as XP. It’s worth considering if you’re upgrading as today’s most popular processors (like the Intel Core 2 series) are 64-bit processors. 64-bit Vista versions are easy to find and give you options for more memory and generally faster applications (64-bit IE is much faster than 32-bit IE, for example).
What about moving to a Hauppage Video capture card....then you can get more recent motherboards with Mobo base Display drivers for your monitor.,
Yes.
Get a new motherboard with a SATA II chipset & connectors on it [Tyan or ASUS is the best bet].
Go to Storage Review to find the fastest and quietest SATA II hard drive you can afford:
http://www.storagereview.com
Once you get your new motherboard, attach your old ATA drive on the ATA connector, and it will be your "C:" drive.
Then attach your new SATA II drive on the SATA II connector, and it will be your "D:" drive [this requires that you create a partition and format it - and note that formatting one of these 500GB SATA II drives can take an hour or more, so don't be in a hurry that day].
After you have established the ATA drive as the "C:" drive, and the SATA II drive as the "D:" drive, then go here for instructions on how to seamlessly move all of your "Documents and Settings" and "Program Files" over to the new, fast SATA II drive [so that they still appear to be on the old "C:" drive, but are actually physically residing on the new, faster "D:" drive]:
http://www.tumfatig.net/docs/01_os/windows/How%20to%20move%20Program%20Files%20and%20Documents%20and%20Settings.htmlIn line with those instructions, I use "JUNCTION.EXE", which is now available for free from Microsoft [since they purchased SysInternals]:
http://technet.microsoft.com/en-us/sysinternals/bb896768.aspx
A few days reading at this site, and you’ll be one of the world’s foremost authorities on the latest in upgrading pc’s:
http://www.tomshardware.com/us/#redir
I’ve got an ATI AiW 9K in the box I’m on right now.
The last time I was in the market for a new card, ATI had killed off the AiW line.
Sucks. I like having a TV tuner and graphics card in one package. :(
Anyway. Enough crying.
The hdd is probably PATA and your AiW is (?) AGP.
I’m almost sure you’ll need to upgrade your motherboard, before anything else.
Unless you’re particularly fond of your case, might as well build a new box from scratch.
I’d plug my old hard drive into the new computer, set up the bios to boot first from the old one, leave the new hard drive in for additional storage. Should work without problems. I usually plug my old hard drive in as the secondary drive and boot from the factory drive, but that wouldn’t do what you want.
As for the video card, I’d check to see if it is really an improvement over what the factory sent.
First off, Windows may not be able to handle the sudden appearance of all the new hardware. I've seen Windows freak out in the past when a drive was moved to a new box that was too different from the old one. A fresh install will also get rid of a lot of "Windows rot" since you'll be getting (somewhat more) debugged updates from MSFT. (Instead of a collection of patches and bandaids that have accumulated over the years!)
Also, you may find that there's a lot of software on the old drive that you aren't using. I suggest that you install titles as you need them. This means less clutter and less potential for conflicts between programs.
Or you could just go out tomorrow and buy a Mac.
(Well... Someone had to say it!)
I like to start fresh whenever I upgrade. I keep a logbook of my latest computer settings (installed apps, hardware descriptions, network settings, etc.). I keep backups of data and documents on a network drive (I do a backup just before the upgrade). If I'm working with windows, I keep a copy of current drivers I'll need on a CD (I don't use anything later than Windows 2000 Pro, so I don't have to deal with activation). I assemble the hardware, wipe the drive (if I'm using the old one), and install the OS from scratch. I reinstall all the apps (getting the latest versions in the process), and transfer data over from the network drive. I don't get an exact copy of the previous machine, but I always get a better copy!
My latest upgrade (which I got carried away with, and it ended up being an entirely new machine) is a Shuttle SG31G2 Barebone, an Intel Core 2 Quad Q6600 CPU, a WD Caviar 500GB SATA drive, and 4GB Kingston RAM. It's running Ubuntu 8.04 64bit. The on-board video seems OK for me, but I can add a video card later if I want to. So far I've only used it for ripping DVD's, besides the usual net surfing. I like it.