Can we image an old drive with WIN XP + older s/w and then boot from it on a new rig?

[tradernick]

Need computer help and I'm assuming that there are lots of young stylin' IT types around here : )

A friend has an older laptop running Win XP. He's about to buy a current rig with an i7 proc and Win 8. He has some audio recording software along with plug-ins that he wants to continue to use. Let`s say we make an image of his current drive on an external drive (or conceivably just rip the old drive out of the old laptop). Is it likely that we can plug that external into the new rig and boot from it? Will the newer CPU talk to Win XP? And, will the older software be delivering data to the CPU in a useable way? Sorry I'm not a tech expert and these questions probably reflect that.

The program in question is Nuendo, which is currently on v 6.5.35. I am going to have the version he's running by tomorrow. There's also Adobe Creative Suite 4, which is apparently compatible with Win 8. Thanks for any input.

 

[Harold falcon]

You need to defrag the inverse bios first.

 

[tradernick]



You need to defrag the inverse bios first.

Oh, we've done that. Several times.

Anyone else?

 

[circumspice]

Windows apps are not portable. Meaning, if you have the original install files, install the apps on windows 8. There is generally no way to move an application from one Windows (7) install to another (8 or otherwise).

The old hard drive with Windows 7 may not be bootable on the new PC. You should be able to mount it, and copy data off of it while inside Windows 8, but don't expect to be able to move the applications and have them work. Only incredibly simplistic applications tend to be portable like that.