View Single Post - Install New Mobo. Strategy Needed

edgutgesell · Rated PG

I am new to this forum and this is my first post, so be kind!! I am not a hardware guy, although I have successfully upgraded mobo's in the past. I am not a gamer.

I am preparing to upgrade my 833 MHZ motherboard to a 2.0 GHZ Athlon 64. The reason for the upgrade is that I am attempting to capture, edit old VHS tapes and to capture camcorder DV, edit, and create DVD's from the input. The input I am getting from my capture device, (ADS DVD Express USB 2.0) ) and camcorder (Firewire) isn't acceptabel due to jerky capture. I think the slow P3 FSB is the problem.

My question is: What strategy should I use to do this upgrade. I have a current Ghost backup on DVD. I have a considerable amount of SW on the C: drive (10 GB on 200GB drive) Alot of the SW has patches and updates, which will be a pain to re-install. Since the architecture of the Athlon 64 is so different than the P3, should I start from scratch with a reformat and install XP Pro and reinstall all of my software piecemeal after installing the new mobo??? (I also will need to reinstall SP2) Or should I attempt to use the Ghost backup which was created on the P3? Is using the backup a bad idea? Crazy

The computer after the upgrade will be as below:

Athlon 64 2GHZ
1 GB DDR PC 3200
200 GB 7200 ATA drive
60 GB 7200 ATA drive
DVD Burner
DVD ROM
3, 1394 interfaces
6 USB 2.0 interfaces
128 MB ATI AGP