Question Best use of HDD

Sep 27, 2022
4
0
10
My 9-year old HP 700-230qe died. The HDD (which is a seagate barracuda and I believe works fine) has some files I'd like to recover. I have ordered a new computer with a SSD and that computer has 2 slots to add a HDD. My question is whether I should (1) buy a hard drive enclosure and hook the old HDD to the new computer via USB port or (2) put the old HDD into the new computer. The old HDD has windows 10 on it so I believe I'd have to change the bios on the new computer to make sure that the new computer doesn't try to boot from the old HDD. Any reason why I should choose one method over another? Is there any chance that inserting the HDD into the new computer would somehow screw up the settings in the new computer?

As a third alternative, I also have a very old system (about 14 years old) that I had taken apart but still works. It's a different motherboard and CPU but I could put it back together and hook up this old HDD to that system. My understanding, however, is that this might not be preferable because windows will recognize that the hardware is different. Moreover, that mobo only has USB 2.0 so moving files might be slow.

Any thoughts would be welcome. Thanks.
 
No reason you can't simply attach the old HDD from the old PC to an ordinary SATA port on the motherboard of the new PC.

The new PC should still boot normally from its own original drive.

I'd confirm that the new PC works properly when you get it, before attaching the old drive. Get halfway familiar with it.

The old drive should appear as D or E or whatever. Not C.

You could then copy personal data from old to new.

But you shouldn't expect to copy installed programs from old to new.

Pictures of your cat? Yes.

Photoshop or Office? No.
 
My 9-year old HP 700-230qe died. The HDD (which is a seagate barracuda and I believe works fine) has some files I'd like to recover. I have ordered a new computer with a SSD and that computer has 2 slots to add a HDD. My question is whether I should (1) buy a hard drive enclosure and hook the old HDD to the new computer via USB port or (2) put the old HDD into the new computer. The old HDD has windows 10 on it so I believe I'd have to change the bios on the new computer to make sure that the new computer doesn't try to boot from the old HDD. Any reason why I should choose one method over another? Is there any chance that inserting the HDD into the new computer would somehow screw up the settings in the new computer?

As a third alternative, I also have a very old system (about 14 years old) that I had taken apart but still works. It's a different motherboard and CPU but I could put it back together and hook up this old HDD to that system. My understanding, however, is that this might not be preferable because windows will recognize that the hardware is different. Moreover, that mobo only has USB 2.0 so moving files might be slow.

Any thoughts would be welcome. Thanks.
Look close some machines come with a seal.

If you break the seal you void the warranty.
 
Sep 27, 2022
4
0
10
Thanks for all the responses. I'll just get the SATA to USB cable since the price is right and I don't have to worry about warranty issues or any other issues with having two drives with windows in one machine. I don't need the old drive in the new computer for storage so I'll take the easy route. Thanks again.
 

punkncat

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I also suggest getting a drive caddy. If you put the OS disk from another machine inside the new machine it is likely to cause some headaches. Use the caddy to extract and then format the disk, then put it inside the new machine and populate with backup data.

You well may run into some access violation issues as well since you are trying to pull info from a (previous) OS disk which will be attempting to open in an 'unknown' enviro.