I've got several hard drives running Windows 7, and one in particular has all my games and programs from my previous builds. It was originally installed on an LGA 775 motherboard, but when I switched it to another LGA 775 board, the system recognized the drive. However, it crashes right at the 'starting Windows' screen and keeps looping back to the BIOS. This issue persists across different motherboards I've tried. I've attempted to run the repair startup using a USB with Windows 7 Ultimate and executed commands like bootrec /fixmbr and /fixboot, but nothing changes. I'm hoping someone can give me some advice on how to clone this drive since that's my ultimate goal if I can just get this working.
2 Answers
Alright, let's backtrack for a sec. How long was this HDD running in the old setup? Sometimes if it was set up with a newer system, it might be facing issues with EUFI settings, since most LGA775 boards are older. You should check the BIOS settings on both motherboards to see if there’s something quirky going on, like a legacy boot option. If your drive is GPT instead of MBR, that could also be a problem since older systems have trouble booting from GPT drives. Also, it might be missing drivers for the new hardware you’re using. Windows 7 is picky with hardware changes compared to newer versions.
You might want to consider switching to Windows 11 or even Linux. Since Windows 7 has reached its end of life, it could be time to move on.
I'm using them for a specific project, mostly offline for gaming, not as my daily driver. My main PC handles that part.
Sorry for the delayed response! I booted up the old LGA775 with that hard drive as the primary, and it worked flawlessly the first time. So clearly, something's off. I'll definitely check if the drive is set as GPT; setting it incorrectly would be pretty silly on my part.