I have only ever seen one old OEM pc that had one IDE connection, but normally any PC can handle at least two HD. The option of leaving the existing XP hard drive as is, and just add the extra 160GB as further storage is the easiest, and certain to work. It's far better to do a full format of a hard drive, install the O/S then drivers, then programs. I did use the 'upgrade vista to 7' disk, and it did leave all my programs, photo's and music intact, but it was very slow. I would backup anything you value off the pc altogether. If I have got this wrong, just post on here again.įairly sure if you upgrade from XP you will lose all your work, but in any case I wouldn't trust any automatic system to get it all right, no matter what it says on the paperwork/site. Worst case, is if you can't get it to work, you can put the 40GB XP back! The only real problem is that the older PC may be of the type where it can only have one hard drive, in which case you will have to fit the 160GB HD, and install XP onto it, ( with a SATA/ RAID driver ) as the only drive. You may know that the obvious option, to copy the XP drive contents over to the 160GB drive, is the one option you cannot do, as it will fail the Microsoft 'activation test'. You may find when connecting to the 'net, that XP needs to 'activate' your O/S again as it is considered a major change in hardware. So you will have 'C' with XP on, and 'D' as an empty 160GB storage drive. If the older pc can support 2 hard drives, it would be much easier to fit the 160GB as slave drive, and leave the existing 40GB HD with XP on as is. So any wanted files will have to be saved off the 40GB HD first. ( There may be a SATA/RAID driver to install in this case as XP didn't support SATA drives as standard.) There is an adapter that claims to adapt one to the other īut then you will have to install XP from scratch, 'day one' type of thing.Īs long as you have an original XP disc and product key, it should activate. If I'm understanding this correctly, you intend to take a 160GB sata hard drive and build it into an older pc that currently has a 40GB IDE HD with XP on?
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