I want to build a new system. Usually, I uprgade my old systems, and the hard drive with the OS gets carried along. Now I Have a new problem, I am building one for someone else, I don't have a hard drive. I can get one, but I don't know how to get a blank hard drive up and running with an OS. I don't have a Windows 98 CD, which is all this new machine can handle at 64 RAM, so I wouldn't mind even copying my on HD to the computer, I just don't know how! Help! Thanks

64MB? why not just upgrade the RAM? if you can't, update the BIOS, once the HD is in, use a boot disk, run FDISK, create the partitions in the size you want, load OS, done

Let me be simple, let's say I have a BLANK Hard Drive, how do I get Windows on it, or how do I copy a Hard Drive to Hard Drive.

how can you expect to "copy" an OS from one comp to another when all the hardware and drivers are different??

ok bill, first off you need to get a copy of windows98 regardless. for your situation, it is the best and easiest solution. but you can as you say "copy" windows from your old hard onto a new one by ghosting it and simply adding it to the new machine and reinstalling the drivers for that computer. but that would require a more technical person for the job, something probably you would not be able to handle. so i would suggest you just go out and buy a copy of windows 98 :-) have a good day

Every bit of hardware on your computer is more than likely totally different on that other computer. Different manufacturers, different speeds, different versions, different bios, and so on. Therefore, it would be pretty foolhardy to copy a hard drive with all of this hardware info. onto a computer with completely different hardware info - especially if you're not qualified for something like that. You could easily cause yourself DAYS of frustration, and perhaps even render something inoperable with conflicts. Serious conflicts, mind you. A blank hard disk requires either a bootable Win98 floppy, or a bootable Win98 CD if your bios has the boot option set to enabled, for booting from a CD/Rom drive. Then, a smart thing to do, is to use the FDISK program in order to partition the disk BEFORE you actually begin to do anything else with it. (More info. later, on disk copying). Once the drive partitions have been created, your computer, or rather windows, will treat each partition as a completely individual drive. This is a very smart thing to do, in order to keep your OS aparet from everything else, in order to organize your computer better - especially for games, music, and image stuff - and it also makes your hard disk/OS perform better by reducing the seek times for specific info. on the drive. When you create partitions, by default, the first partition is always the "C" drive. For XP or potential XP plus future upgrades, 5 GB should be more than sufficient. Having said this, you cannot use any of the partitions until they've been formatted. Now you can install the OS. DISK COPYING: For FAIL SAFE, simply disk copying processes by someone who is not a qualified technician, I would strongly urge you to go to www.powerquest.com/ for their DriveCopy software. It's a one time expense - but it works like a charm. Simple to use for anyone with a bit of common sense, and it will copy everything perfectly. For example, if you go from a 20 GB to a 40 GB drive, all of your partitions will be copied perfectly - and expanded automatically - in accordance to the new, available space of that new drive. I agree 100 percent with Peter. The last thing in the world that you want to do, is to remove your own personal drive, in order to copy everything onto another totally different computer. Not only can it happen that you're not knowledgable enough to do this without serious repercussions with your attempt, but on top of that, you can even embed errors or registry problems on your drive - that would now have to be reversed, if you want that drive to work on the original machine again. Bottom line? You need that boot floppy, or bootable Win98 version - to do what you propose without problems, and also LEGALLY. I suppose the "legal" issue is not that important if both computers were your own, and in the same husehold since you're "allowed" to have a backup machine. But it is a serious consideration, if that second machine belongs to someone else, and if that person tries to ever use MS Tech Support in the future. Sorry, but it is illegal to "copy" Win98 onto other machines, and last year, MS even cracked down on some poor slob who just set up 3 or 4 extra client machines, to make a few suplemental bucks for his family. Beware! Hey Intel, AMD rulez!

Ok, new scenario. I have a new hard drive. I am building a new computer, which I want to use for a backup of this one. This has Windows XP. If I make a MS-DOS Boot Disk from this computer, will I be able to boot up the new hard disk on the Built computer, to install the backup of Windows XP that came with this computer?