sta.pas said:
Hi there,
I have a system which its base configuration is as below:
Motherboard: Intel D946GZIS
CPU: Intel® Core™2 Duo Desktop Processor E6600
RAM: 2x512Mb
HDD: 1 IDE WD 80Gb + 1 SATA2 WD320GB
I think it’s time to upgrade and get the max of it
So I am thinking to install on the same motherboard
CPU: Intel® Core™2 Duo Desktop Processor E8600
RAM: 2xGb (KVR667D2N5/2G)
HDD: 1 SATA WD 72Gb (10000) and leave the SATA2 as it is...
My questions are:
1) Is the new CPU supported by the motherboard?
2) Is the RAM supported by the motherboard?
3) I want my OS configuration remain intact…So I am thinking of
imaging the whole system (IDE disk) to the new SATA…
Will it work? Or I will need to re-install everything?
Intel has tables for processor upgrades. The chipset
is FSB1066, which is the main limitation on processor
models. Intel is not known for pushing the chipset
as hard as other manufacturers.
http://processormatch.intel.com/CompDB/SearchResult.aspx?Boardname=d946gzts
http://www.intel.com/support/motherboards/desktop/d946gzts/sb/CS-026618.htm
If you had a motherboard that supported overclocking, you
could speed up the operation of the existing processor a bit.
For memory, Crucial says 2x2GB at up to DDR2-533. Notice that
Crucial also says faster memory is compatible, but it will run at
the slower speed when plugged into the motherboard. (I
do that on my current motherboard, some DDR2-800 running
at DDR2-533, with the CAS tightened up a bit. I figured
I'd reuse the DDR2-800 later.)
http://www.crucial.com/store/listparts.aspx?model=D946GZTS
The Kingston list is here.
http://www.ec.kingston.com/ecom/configurator_new/modelsinfo.asp?SysID=46776
Changing the processor or memory, generally won't affect the
OS in a negative way. If I replaced your E6600 with an
E6700 (a pointless upgrade), then I wouldn't have to do anything
to the OS.
But if you got a new motherboard, to run an E8600,
that could make a difference and require more work (doing
a repair install perhaps).
On Win2K, the transition for me from one motherboard to another
was relatively painless, because I "bounced" the drive to a
PCI controller card, then plugged disk and controller card
into the new motherboard. And that means the driver to boot
the OS is already installed, so it booted right up. Then,
after installing the chipset drivers, I could move the drive
to a motherboard port. I'm not sure whether WinXP would make
it as painless, as I haven't tried that yet. A repair install
is the usual method, if you don't do any prep work in advance.
I always image the drive, just in case such tricks don't work
out. I have had to restore the boot disk from the backup, so
if any "tricks" aren't working, I can fall back to the old
hardware configuration and prepare again to boot the new
hardware. Just for kicks, this time I imaged by doing a
sector by sector copy of the disk, using Linux "dd", and
that seemed to work fine. My disk currently has four
partitions on it, two FAT32, two EXT2, one of which is
a swap partition for Linux. And "dd" copied them all, without
knowing what they were. My disks were the exact same model,
so I was fairly confident that would work.
Paul
