Hi,

Just a general question:
If I have a computer that has a bad motherboard, could I simply replace the motherboard and / or cpu, and connect the existing hdd, and fix the problem? The computer's motherboard is dead, but the software / OS xpsp2 worked fine, will this again work fine once I have it configured to boot using it with the BIOS? Or would I have to reisntall the operating system on the hard drive?

Thanks,
Brett

Are you 100% sure it's the motherboard & not something else??

Unless you're replacing the old board with an identical board, you'll have to reinstall XP. A "repair installation" *usually* works, but you will lose ALL the Windows updates that were previously installed.

http://www.microsoft.com/windowsxp/...

So there is no way of getting around the reinstallation of XP? See I work for a computer tech company, and need to fix this computer. If I have to reinstall XP, i'm going to have to charge much more, simply because of company policy, and I don't want to do that :)

So my only bet is to get the same mobo?

If you work for a computer tech company, why are you asking for advice in a forum? You should already know what you need to do. And why are you asking an XP question in the CPU/Overclocking forum?

I would bet that this is a compaq tech, they told me you cant install an xp upgrade cd without an operating system on the hard drive. I was "discussing" this with there tech for a good half hour. Amazing...