Changing Hardware under Windows XP...Help

[coopaloop]

I just replaced my Motherboard, CPU, Memory.....Now my computer won't boot up (XP Pro)off my hard drive....does changing more than one component make windows XP screw up like this...I put in another hard drive and it booted up fine..... I connected the original hard drive (externally) and can see all the files and folders...But there was a couple of important e-mails on it i can't seem to get at...How can I access them on the new drive ...is there a way to get them onto my new drive or transfer them

[woof]

I don't think that Windows screwed up - you did by not doing your homework.

There are a lot of things you can easily swap out on a computer, but the motherboard isn't one of them. I assume that the new motherboard uses a completely different chipset than the old motherboard? If so, then the drivers which are currently installed support the old motherboard and don't recognize the new one. And since you can't boot up you can't change the drivers. I believe that you can fix the problem by booting up off your installation CD, using the Install/Repair function on it to redetect the motherboard and change the drivers over.

A re-install is cleaner and preferable when switching motherboards but since you haven't backed up your email and possibly other data before making this major hardware change go with the Repair thing instead to fix the drivers only. A recent similar thread along the same lines:

http://www.redflagdeals.com/forums/showthread.php?t=183274&highlight=windows+repair