[SOLVED] Windows 10 and Upgrading Motherboard

[2b2gbi]

Hello, I have built computers from scratch before and made minor upgraded but I have never upgraded a motherboard before and have some questions. I am upgrading my CPU, motherboard, and boot drive. My old CPU was an Intel i5 6600k and thew new CPU is an AMD Ryzen 5 3600.

My biggest concern is how to handle the current boot drive and windows installation. I plan to make a clean installation of windows on my new boot drive and use the old boot drive as an additional storage drive. My concern isn't installing Windows, I've done that before, but I am wondering what to do with the existing windows installation.

If I connect the old boot drive with the old windows installation still on it will that cause issues, and if it doesn't can I safely delete those old files?

Would it better to simply get the files I want to keep off that drive and then wipe it before connecting it to the upgraded PC?

Will I have to reinstall all my programs? Does this include games and programs installed on my storage drives?

 

[JohnBonhamsGhost]

if both OS drives are connected at the same time it will very commonly cause issues. there will still be system partitions on the old Windows drive that can interfere with Windows boot process and other functions of Windows with the new installation.

when running the new Windows installation you should be able to delete all of the partitions on the old drive and format the disk. then choose the new drive for the new installation.
but doing a full wipe/format of the old drive before the new install should have the same results.
the new installation will create it's own system partitions on the new drive and those will be used.

most programs will have to be reinstalled. there are lots of registry entries, drivers, system .dll's, and codecs that will need to be reinstalled.

a lot of games can just be copy/pasted back into place and they will still function.
if they are accessed through Steam, EGS, etc;
you may have to point the 3rd party launcher to the new drive's game location and allow it to scan the directory & update/reinstall the necessary missing system files. but this would save you from downloading many GBs of game data again.
any offline data like certain saves, game settings, etc will have to be backed up and replaced after the new OS install. most of these files are located in your "C:\Users" and "C:\ProgramData" folders.