I re-assembled the PC today including putting back in the HD which was a
clone of the other machine's one. I'd already loaded in a fresh copy of XP
on the first HD. Just out of interest, I tried booting from the second
drive and it worked. Got a message saying I have three days to re-activate
it as so much hardware has changed.

So why would it work now - but not without the first HD?

--
*Never underestimate the power of very stupid people in large groups *

Dave Plowman London SW
To e-mail, change noise into sound.

In article ,
John Rumm wrote:
On 05/08/2010 19:27, Dave Plowman (News) wrote:
I re-assembled the PC today including putting back in the HD which was
a clone of the other machine's one. I'd already loaded in a fresh copy
of XP on the first HD. Just out of interest, I tried booting from the
second drive and it worked. Got a message saying I have three days to
re-activate it as so much hardware has changed.

So why would it work now - but not without the first HD?

Have you got them on different interfaces (i.e. one on ATA another on
SATA for example)?

The 'main' machine I cloned the drive from has SATA HDs, and I cloned to
an ATA HD on the previously unused IDE buss. The 'broken' machine is ATA
only.

--
*To steal ideas from *one* person is plagiarism; from many, research*

Dave Plowman London SW
To e-mail, change noise into sound.

In article ,
John Rumm wrote:
On 06/08/2010 00:17, Dave Plowman (News) wrote:
In articlewL6dnahhTv9vscbRnZ2dnUVZ8uwAAAAA@brightvie w.co.uk,
John wrote:
On 05/08/2010 19:27, Dave Plowman (News) wrote:
I re-assembled the PC today including putting back in the HD which was
a clone of the other machine's one. I'd already loaded in a fresh copy
of XP on the first HD. Just out of interest, I tried booting from the
second drive and it worked. Got a message saying I have three days to
re-activate it as so much hardware has changed.

So why would it work now - but not without the first HD?

Have you got them on different interfaces (i.e. one on ATA another on
SATA for example)?

The 'main' machine I cloned the drive from has SATA HDs, and I cloned
to an ATA HD on the previously unused IDE buss. The 'broken' machine
is ATA only.

Just wondering if Boot.ini could have ended up with a drive or partition
number that did not match the layout on the new machine.

(if this is the case you can edit the ini manually or get bootcfg with
the "/add" option to allow other partititons with an OS on to be added
to the boot menu).

Finally got it sorted. Apart from the re-activation thingie.

Main problem was the cloned disc was G but everything on it referred to C,
as that was the one being cloned.

So tried again with a fully formatted blank HD. After it was cloned,
unplugged C&F from the main machine and booted from the clone, which now
came up as C. Shut down, and transferred it to the other machine, again as
the only HD. It then recognised that as C and everything is now
tickety-boo, after loading in the correct drivers etc for the different
MB, and changing the network settings. Only a couple of apps have needed
loading in again - most work ok.

As regards re-activation, same as Geoff. It won't work via the 'net - so
I'll have to do it by phone.

--
*No radio - Already stolen.

Dave Plowman London SW
To e-mail, change noise into sound.