Do I have to reinstall Windows if I go from a KT266A board to nForce2?

[davidos]

I' d rather not if I can spare it right now..... Anyone done this or similar?

 

[ScrapSilicon]

If it was another Via chipped mobo..I'd not hesitate but being Nforce...you are taking a chance of a hosing but if your stuffz are backed up ...go ahead..might get lucky..but remember you will be dragging along previous drivers(Via..) and all that entails

 

[RalfHutter]

I agree with Scrap Silicon. I think you'll be lucky if it works. Windows is waaay more tolerant if the chipsets are close to the same. When you tyr this with different chipsets you usually run into trouble. Backup all your stuff first, if you get lucky great, if not, that's the breaks.

Which OS? If it's XP you can sometimes get away with running a repair install after you swap out the boards. This way all your apps are still there.

 

[Need4Speed]

one way to avoid having to reinstall is to use the sysprep tool found on the windowsxp cd. after running sysprep you can do one of the following:
1. shut down, replace hardware. When you turn on the pc after the hardware upgrade, winxp will reinitialize and reinstall all the hardware.
2. restart the pc, with a bootable floppy that has norton ghost on it. ghost your drive as you normally would, then follow the above step.

the only diff with those two steps, is that you will have a ghost image of your system should something go wrong. If this fails, you can always do a full reinstall and then get your important files, save games, and other docs from the ghost image using ghost explorer.

Personally i have done this several times and never had an unstable system afterwards.

Good Luck