Paragon Adaptive Restore

[Knightmare]

Long story short, my motherboard/cpu (I'm not sure which) died and now I have a new computer. Read about that in the link below:

 

 

My friend built it for me because I didn't want the parts sitting outside in the weather while I was at work, so I just gave him my case and had the parts shipped to his house. I know that when it comes to new hardware, Windows 7 has a hard time with new drivers conflicting with old drivers. I did a basic Google search for how to install a new motherboard without reinstalling Windows, and one of the links suggested a program called Paragon Adaptive Restore. Apparently, it will go into the OS and remove all of the drivers for the old hardware, which will make room for the drivers for the new hardware. I wasn't sure if anyone had used this program and had any luck with it. Or maybe you've never heard of it and I just gave you a new software to test for the weekend. 

[straycat19]

I have used it a couple times, but with mixed results.  It still carried a lot of junk over to the new systems.  It didn't bring all the old drivers but it brought all the old junk in the registry that referred to those drivers.  It is still better to do a clean install and reinstall everything.  Particularly the drivers for the new motherboard.  Best to do a clean install now then two months from now when you start running into all kinds of problems.  There are no magic programs for windows, just code to make others money.

[debebee]

Actually several backup solutions had that a long time ago  (cough ) 

Acronis True Image's Unversal Restore, easus todo backup, Symantec Backup Exec System Recovery, AOMEI Backupper Professional, Server, and Technician versions. 

all these had functions to Restore to dissimilar hardware

Just google Universal Restore programs...

 

As straycat19 poinst out, it should only be used as a lazyman's solution..

Best way IMHO is still a install from bare metal..

[Knightmare]

1 minute ago, straycat19 said:

I have used it a couple times, but with mixed results.  It still carried a lot of junk over to the new systems.  It didn't bring all the old drivers but it brought all the old junk in the registry that referred to those drivers.  It is still better to do a clean install and reinstall everything.  Particularly the drivers for the new motherboard.  Best to do a clean install now then two months from now when you start running into all kinds of problems.  There are no magic programs for windows, just code to make others money.

My thing with a new install are the license for programs that I purchased legally. Sometimes the licenses are so sensitive that they still read as active, even though the OS has been wiped. Then I have to work with the company to get my key deactivated, which can take a long time, depending on how busy they are. I know that with my PerfectDisk key, it can only be activated on 3 computers. I used one on my old system and one on my parent's computer, so this will be 3 but what if I have to wipe my drive in the future?

[debebee]

In the past  I used sysprep to force a transplanted windows to OOBE (out of the box experience)

 

Quote

 

Sysprep is a tool that is designed for system administrators, Original Equipment Manufacturers (OEMs), and others who must automatically deploy an operating system on multiple computers. After you perform the initial setup steps on a single computer, you can run the Sysprep tool to prepare the sample computer for cloning.  However with the propagation of computers with Virtualization and Cloud, deploying computers has taken on a whole new meaning.  Sysprep is a free tool that comes with windows.  In modern operating systems it can be found on your windows computer in the %SystemRoot%\System32\Sysprep folder (usually c:\windows\system32\sysprep). It can also be found on the boot CD/DVD of the operating system like Windows XP under the \Support\Tools folder. What it actually does is cleans out the security information (aka SID) on the computer and prepares the computer for a first time boot.  Like a computer that you just got from a store.  This allows the image to be copied and run many times without having issues of having multiple of the same computers on the network.  Be Careful, the process will wipe out all security and identification information and boot information on any computer you run it on.

 

Run Sysprep on a computer (virtual or physical) but in my case I will be doing a virtual machine running on Hyper-V.

1. On a reference (VM) computer, install the operating system and any programs that you want installed on your destination computers.
2. Click Start, type cmd, and then click OK.
3. At the command prompt, change to the root folder of drive C, Type C: then type CD %SystemRoot%\System32\Sysprep
4. Now you can run the sysprep.exe file but let’s start by running the /h switch sysprep /h  which will pop up a help box.

   

5. Notice that you can run everything on the command-line which is how I normally use it.  However, there is a Graphical User Interface for the program that you will likely want to use until you get familiar with this tool.
6. Now, let’s run it again without any parameters… sysprep

   

7. Turn on the generalize checkbox. If you intend to transfer a Windows image to a different computer, you must run sysprep /generalize, even if the computer has the same hardware configuration. The sysprep /generalize command removes unique information from your Windows installation, which enables you to reuse that image on different computers. The next time you boot the Windows image, the specialize configuration pass runs. During this configuration pass, many components have actions that must be processed when you boot a Windows image on a new computer. Any method of moving a Windows image to a new computer, either through imaging, hard disk duplication, VM copying or other method, must be prepared with the sysprep /generalize command. Moving or copying a Windows image to a different computer without running sysprep /generalize is not supported.
8. You will want to Shutdown the machine when done (instead of restart).  If you restart, the out-of-box experience will run before you have a chance to copy the image.
9. If you are sure, you want to wipe out all of the security data on the machine, go ahead and click OK!
10. Sysprep does not capture the image it only prepares the machine to be captured.  If you are doing this in a virtual machine, the image becomes the .VHD or .VHDX file after you shutdown the machine, copy it or duplicate it at will.  If you are doing a physical computer, you will need an imaging tool, like ImageX, to capture an image of the installation.

 

 

[Knightmare]

5 minutes ago, teodz1984 said:

In the past  I used sysprep to force a transplanted windows to OOBE (out of the box experience)

 

 

I will do that on this new system, but you have to do that before the motherboard crashes. 

[debebee]

after 

 

 

[Knightmare]

My friend brought over my computer and I can boot into windows but the mouse and keyboard don't work. I used a windows install from a flash drive but the mouse and keyboard won't work in that either. Anyone know a tool to load and unload drivers from a flash drive? 

[Knightmare]

I ended up buying a PS/2 adapter for my usb mouse and keyboard. Now I just need to take my ssd out of my computer, put the driver installers on the ssd, and install them. Do I need the Intel Management Engine with my new motherboard? I have a Tomahawk B350.