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Question

Booting a laptop from an external drive

Nov 6, 2018 5:05PM PST

Hello I'm sorry because I don't know much about computers but here goes... My laptop died and I bought a new one though it is DOS laptop. I was wondering whether it's possible to get the hard drive from the old laptop and to connect it externally and boot the new laptop from there.

Discussion is locked

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Answer
won't work
Nov 6, 2018 5:11PM PST

If you are talking windows OS, it won't let you boot it from a removable drive. You'd need to put the drive into the SATA port where current DOS drive is instead. It may boot then, but almost immediately you should get an activation needed warning too.

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And ...
Nov 7, 2018 12:54AM PST

after it's activated, you'll need to reinstall Windows including all drivers for the new hardware.

If you want Windows on a laptop, it's cheaper to buy one with Windows than to buy one without and pay more for the license, unless you can get an academic license for a few dollar via your school. And certainly it's less work.
But installing Linux is free.

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Hmm...
Nov 7, 2018 6:40AM PST

Honestly I wish I knew before buying the laptop thanks though.

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Thanks
Nov 7, 2018 6:38AM PST

Thanks for the quick reply