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dliw
Premium Member
join:2003-03-09
Elsewhere

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dliw

Premium Member

Switching harddrives

Have two Dell desktops. Dimension 2350 and 3000 both running XP Home. Can I just switch the HDs on them?

Thank you in advance.
aguen
Premium Member
join:2003-07-16
Grants Pass, OR

1 recommendation

aguen

Premium Member

Those appear to be pretty "old" desktops. At one point, Dell was tying the OS license to the BIOS of that particular machine, don't know if that is the case with what you have or not. Only way to be sure would be to try it.

koitsu
MVM
join:2002-07-16
Mountain View, CA
Humax BGW320-500

koitsu to dliw

MVM

to dliw
Are you asking if the hard disks from the 3050 can be put in the 3000, and vice-versa?

The answer is yes, they can physically be swapped.

However, the OS/system may begin behaving oddly, blue screen on boot up, or have performance problems. This stems from the motherboard or devices on the motherboard differing between the two systems.

Dell Dimension 3000: »en.wikipedia.org/wiki/De ··· x_series

Dell Dimension 3050: I cannot find on the web any hardware specifications/details about this system. Can you please point me to a technical product specification PDF?

If you want to swap the two hard disks, go right ahead -- but I strongly recommend you do a full bare-bones OS reinstall (format + reinstall) afterward.

Furthermore, the drivers that are provided on the on-disk Windows reimaging partition on those systems may be specific for each model of system (e.g. 3000-specific drivers won't be available on the 3050, and vice versa). This will be your problem to solve.

dliw
Premium Member
join:2003-03-09
Elsewhere

dliw

Premium Member

Sorry! I meant 2350. Here is the PDF.
47717768 (banned)
join:2003-12-08
Birmingham, AL

47717768 (banned)

Member

You got PM.

dliw
Premium Member
join:2003-03-09
Elsewhere

dliw

Premium Member

I am using the 2350 for parts. The 3000 has a better CPU but smaller HD thus the switch.

koitsu
MVM
join:2002-07-16
Mountain View, CA
Humax BGW320-500

1 recommendation

koitsu to dliw

MVM

to dliw
Sadly the PDF doesn't give me enough information to discern anything reliably, meaning it doesn't contain enough actual (lower level) technical information for me to be able to accurately say "yes just swap the two disks and the OS won't need to be installed".

Thus my advice stands. Do a full format/OS reinstall, and pray you don't have to go find drivers.

Alternately you could just swap the two CPUs, you know...

dliw
Premium Member
join:2003-03-09
Elsewhere

dliw

Premium Member

Thank you very much for the advice koitsu See Profile. I'll consider the options.
Thordrune
Premium Member
join:2005-08-03
Lakeport, CA

1 recommendation

Thordrune to dliw

Premium Member

to dliw
From my experience with similar chipsets, no. Windows will have a fit about the different southbridges (ICH4 in the 2350, ICH5 in the 3000), most likely with a STOP 0x7B BSOD at bootup.

Depending on what CPU is in the 3000, a CPU swap may not work either. Certain versions of the 845-series northbridges don't work at all with Prescott CPUs (Celeron D, or Pentium 4 with 1 MB L2 cache).

As for Northwood support (plain Celeron, or Pentium 4 with 512K L2 cache), it'll likely run at a much lower speed than in the 3000. The 845GL only supports a 400 MHz front side bus, whereas the 865GV in the 3000 supports 400, 533, and 800 MHz FSB speeds. Any CPU that normally uses a higher-speed FSB will run at reduced speeds in the 2350. The 3000 likely has a CPU that normally uses a 533 or 800 MHz FSB.

Probably the easiest thing to do, if there's room for it in the case, is to add the other hard drive as a secondary. Personally, I'd do what koitsu See Profile suggested and do a fresh install. Fresh OS installs make me happy .

aurgathor
join:2002-12-01
Lynnwood, WA

2 recommendations

aurgathor to dliw

Member

to dliw
You can, but it's not guaranteed that the switch will work.

If I were to do it, these would be the steps:
a) make a backup of important data
b) while still in the old PC, download all the drivers for the new PC
c) switch HDs
d) start out in normal mode -- sometimes XP installs the needed drivers automatically, and you're done.
e) if it blue screens -- go to safe mode and try to install the needed drivers there.