transfer programs to new hdd

**rish p** · December 31st, 2004, 06:24 PM

i've got 2 hdds, new one master and old one slave. i had win 2000 installed on the slave but it wont work and i want all the files on it so can't reformat. what i want to do is run games that are already installed on the slave but they tell me i have to re-install them on my master drive. however, some games do work without re-installing and i dont have the cds for some of the games. any way of running the games from the slave drive or is there a program that will let me copy them to my master to make them work? btw i've tried copying and pasting the directory over o my new hdd

**TechZ** · January 1st, 2005, 04:16 AM

Hi rish p,

1] Reinstall those games, when applications/games are installed, they also add what are called registry entries to Windows, its always better to re-install them for a new OS, as copying/pasting teh directories/folder will not work

2] How is it that you dont have the CD's to your games? Youre outta luck if you cant find them.

**rish p** · January 3rd, 2005, 11:29 AM

is there any way of finding and changing the registeries or even copying and pastin them as well over to the new os?

**TechZ** · January 3rd, 2005, 01:48 PM

that would be rather tedious and complex, plus its always better to reinstall apps after a fresh OS install.

**SolApathy** · January 3rd, 2005, 05:41 PM

THe hard truth is, inless you want to go through a tedious process the previous poster is correct.

There is no easy solution for this problem. If the OS is corrupt & will not boot you are quite frankly SOL.

However, there is the possibility that the OS is bootable & that you just are not doing the process correctly to bring the drive up.

do you have a dual boot system, or is this a drive that you were using as a OS on this machine until recently?

Is this a OS install from another machine? that you moved over?

We need details as it may be possible to troubleshoot the actual OS and get it bootable once again.

Please give us the details regarding this OS, as well as your hardware configuration

**rish p** · January 4th, 2005, 11:44 AM

nope, i took it to a repair shop and basically no chance. i tried myself anyway and no. so where can i find details about the registry method?

**ShadowWynd** · January 4th, 2005, 02:41 PM

The "registry method" is very simple. Very time consuming, but simple.

Go to the registry on the old computer - if the old computer is not working you are SOL. Run regedit, find the folder key in question, then click File -> Export. It will prompt you for a name, then drop out a nice little .REG file.

Copy all these .REG files onto the new computer. Double-click each one, or go to Regedit, File-> Import.

However .... this can be very time consuming. You have to get ALL of the registry keys for most programs to work. Some programs are nice, and have everything under one key; others have entries under dozens and dozens (if not hundreds or thousands) of locations.

In addition, all of the DLL files and special fonts used by the program have to be copied over as well. The system/system32 directory is a good place to look for these.

It is doable. I have an old version of Quicken v5 that I prefer to the newer versions for what I use it to do. It was made before Windows 95, and so it didn't use the registry (but did use quite a few .DLLs in random places. It took about two hours of copying files (run Quicken, write down .DLL file it is missing, copy file to from SYSTEM to QUICKEN directory, repeat) before I had all the files it needed and it would run happily. Since I placed all the .DLLs in the Quicken directory, I can now move the whole directory and not have to go through that again.

I have also transferred Microsoft Office 97 using the registry method (as well as copying files). After two weeks of hunting down registry keys and copying them over, Office worked fairly well - not great; it would spaz out and give weird error messages, but it was running. It was not worth two weeks of work. Two weeks of work for a somewhat functional version of Office is two wasted weeks.

**kpataska** · January 4th, 2005, 03:01 PM

Originally Posted by rish p

i've got 2 hdds, new one master and old one slave. i had win 2000 installed on the slave but it wont work and i want all the files on it so can't reformat. what i want to do is run games that are already installed on the slave but they tell me i have to re-install them on my master drive. however, some games do work without re-installing and i dont have the cds for some of the games. any way of running the games from the slave drive or is there a program that will let me copy them to my master to make them work? btw i've tried copying and pasting the directory over o my new hdd

Um....

Swap the drive positions. Make the big new drive your slave, and keep the OS on the old one, now making it master.

I'll bet things work the way they should. And if you wish to migrate your data... Ghost it and then format the older, smaller drive after you've ensured your machine works properly.

And if you have a mix of ATA 33, 66, 100 & 133 on the same chain - expect poor performance from your new drive. It will only be as fast as the slowest ATA device on the chain.

Remember the K.I.S.S. principle...

Hope this helps!!!

Kenny P.
Visualize Whirled P.'s