I am swapping out a Gigabyte GA-970-UD3 to a Gigabyte GA-990FXA-UD3, as well as a sapphire hd 5450 for a dual x sapphire hd 7970 oc. My question is will i need to reinstall Windows 7? And if so would I be able to reuse the key that came with the Windows 7 install disc that I originally bought when I built the machine to start with? I am sorry for asking this question but i was not really able to find a definitive answer one way or the other, and I would like to thank you in advance for any help that may be provided.
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1Be sure to make a backup of your data, Or do the install of windows again and let windows move your old files to a Windows.old file on you C Drive. But Yes you should be able to just use your same hard drive but you will need to reinstall windows because the hardware configuration is different and it will have trouble. But you will be able to reactivate with your build and your windows 7.– NetworkKingPinJun 14, 2016 at 6:58
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Short answer is NO. Unless something gets corrupted or you don't have the right drivers for the motherboard you are installing. I have done this in the past on my desktop gaming computer build, and all you should have to do is reactivate Windows again. I think they tie the activation to the motherboard. I had to call Microsoft and explain that I upgraded the motherboard, and they reset my key for me to use 10 times again.– trentenJun 17, 2016 at 16:21
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1 Answer
Read everything before doing
administrative command prompt
c:\windows\system32\sysprep> sysprep /generalize /oobe /shutdown
unplug power
switch motherboard and video card
plug in
turn on
wait 20 minutes for sysprep to complete.
In the unlike situation you get a stop code 7e have a copy of the windows 7 DVD or bootable USB around. Find the SATA controller drivers on the gigabyte DVD. Boot from Windows 7 and then SHIFT F10 gets you a command prompt. dism /image:c:\ /Add-Driver /Driver:d:\satadrivers\ /recurse /forceunsigned d:\satadrivers is the location on the gigabyte DVD for the SATA controller unless you copied them to a USB stick then use that location.
