Question is it possible to use my old ssd on with windows installed on my new motherboard?

[Sir Zes]

Hi, so i have an SSD with windows 10 installed on it. my current computer is getting quite old and i want to upgrade my motherboard, CPU & ram. I'm wondering if i can use my ssd with with windows pre installed and pick up where i left off. or would i have to reinstall windows 10 on my ssd due to changes in hardware. also would i have to use an activation key again. Thanks for reading

 

[Obakasama]

Ideally you fresh install Windows due to such a large upgrade (usually this means the motherboard) to avoid potential driver issues.

You would need to activate Windows again, but it does depend on the licence you have.
https://support.microsoft.com/en-us/help/20530/windows-10-reactivating-after-hardware-change

 

[hutchl]

You can, Widows 10 will detect the hardware changes and adjust. But the ideal thing is to do a clean reinstall.

 

[Ralston18]

Start with the following link from within this Forum:

https://forums.tomshardware.com/threads/install-windows-10-on-new-ssd.3323458/

 

[Colif]

There could be 1 of 3 results

1. it works fine and adjusts to new hardware
2. it works but you get weird bugs
3. it doesn't work at all.

A lot of the times number 2 will happen.And if its a new CPU/motherboard a fresh install will also bring performance enhancements.

And that doesn't even take into account activation. Moving a win 10 install to a new PC (swapping cpu/motherboard can be seen as a new PC) is likely to result in a deactivated license as PC checks it is activated every few months and if it notices hardware doesn't match what is on activation servers, it will deactivate, Fresh install after following link in next paragraph usually fixes that.

Follow the steps here before upgrading CPU/Motherboard to make sure you can move licence - https://support.microsoft.com/en-us/help/20530/windows-10-reactivating-after-hardware-change