Selling old build, question on sending it without a drive

Hello all,

Selling an old build to a friend of mine. I'm keeping my drives, he's getting everything else. Is there anything I need to do outside of unplugging the drives and sending the computer on it's way? I intend to wipe the SSD which has my OS on it currently (starting fresh on a NVMe SSD) and won't have to bother with HDD as their are no paths to it...just data I manually placed on there.

Please let me know if there are proper steps to take here in doing this. Thank you.

RolandJS said:

Is it an Windows OEM or a Windows Retail that you are "moving" from the old computer onto your new computer?

I have a a Win 10 64-bit System Builder OEM DVD copy. I will be installing this fresh onto my new NVMe SSD on my new build via bootable UEFI USB. My friend has a copy of Window as well and will be installing that onto my old build with one of his drives.

Nope....there is no problem at all doing what you're asking. The only concern would be the hardware....as long as it's fully functional now, there should be no issues.

All your friend would have to do is buy a HDD and install his copy of windows. I do it all the time with my builds....but I pass my old builds down to my kids.

Plankton said:

Nope....there is no problem at all doing what you're asking. The only concern would be the hardware....as long as it's fully functional now, there should be no issues.
All your friend would have to do is buy a HDD and install his copy of windows. I do it all the time with my builds....but I pass my old builds down to my kids.

Yeah I know before you weren't able to move System Build/OEM version of Windows...something about it being permanently installed onto MoBo. I know with a more recent Windows 10 update you are now able to link your Windows key to your Microsoft account (which mine is) so once you activate all you have to do is enter your username and password to Microsoft account and you are good to go.

I guess my question, more so now is, how do I properly wipe my 850 Pro? Can I use Samsung Magician to do a secure wipe on it while I am booted into my OS? Is there a better method to use? I know you can use diskpart but am curious what happens when you execute the wipe if you are in OS? Same goes for Magician.

All you have to do is delete all the existing partitions on the drive during the Windows 10 install. That will result in one big unallocated space on the drive. Select the unallocated space and click next to let Windows set it up.

NavyLCDR said:

All you have to do is delete all the existing partitions on the drive during the Windows 10 install. That will result in one big unallocated space on the drive. Select the unallocated space and click next to let Windows set it up.

No, I believe you are misunderstanding me and maybe I'm not explaining correctly.

I have an 850 Pro that my current OS is on, I want to wipe that completely but it will not be plugged in when install Windows 10 because I will be doing that on my new NVMe SSD (best practice not to have any other drives plugged in). My question is how to properly wipe my 850 Pro before I install Win10 on diff drive, in new build. I'm reusing 850 Pro for programs and games in my new build.

cwburns32 said:

No, I believe you are misunderstanding me and maybe I'm not explaining correctly.

I have an 850 Pro that my current OS is on, I want to wipe that completely but it will not be plugged in when install Windows 10 because I will be doing that on my new NVMe SSD (best practice not to have any other drives plugged in). My question is how to properly wipe my 850 Pro before I install Win10 on diff drive, in new build. I'm reusing 850 Pro for programs and games in my new build.

Yes, I was misunderstanding, but the answer is pretty much the same. The easiest way to do it is from within Windows, and you can do it after you install it as the second drive in the new computer. From a Command Prompt (Admin):

diskpart
list disk
select disk # <replace # with the drive you want to erase found by list disk
clean
exit
exit

Then create and format whatever partition(s) you want on it. If you want to create the partition in diskpart, before the first exit command run:

create partition primary
format fs=NTFS quick

Code:

Microsoft Windows [Version 10.0.14393]
(c) 2016 Microsoft Corporation. All rights reserved.

C:\WINDOWS\system32>diskpart

Microsoft DiskPart version 10.0.14393.0

Copyright (C) 1999-2013 Microsoft Corporation.
On computer: JOHN-LAPTOP

DISKPART> list disk

  Disk ###  Status         Size     Free     Dyn  Gpt
  --------  -------------  -------  -------  ---  ---
  Disk 0    Online          447 GB     9 MB        *
  Disk 1    Online          931 GB  2048 KB        *
  Disk 2    No Media           0 B      0 B
  Disk 3    Online         7496 MB  7495 MB

DISKPART> select disk 3

Disk 3 is now the selected disk.

DISKPART> clean

DiskPart succeeded in cleaning the disk.

DISKPART> create partition primary

DiskPart succeeded in creating the specified partition.

DISKPART> format fs=NTFS quick

  100 percent completed

DiskPart successfully formatted the volume.

DISKPART> exit

Leaving DiskPart...

C:\WINDOWS\system32>exit

NavyLCDR said:

Yes, I was misunderstanding, but the answer is pretty much the same. The easiest way to do it is from within Windows, and you can do it after you install it as the second drive in the new computer. From a Command Prompt (Admin):

diskpart
list disk
select disk # <replace # with the drive you want to erase found by list disk
clean
exit
exit

Then create and format whatever partition(s) you want on it. If you want to create the partition in diskpart, before the first exit command run:

create partition primary
format fs=NTFS quick

Code:

Microsoft Windows [Version 10.0.14393]
(c) 2016 Microsoft Corporation. All rights reserved.

C:\WINDOWS\system32>diskpart

Microsoft DiskPart version 10.0.14393.0

Copyright (C) 1999-2013 Microsoft Corporation.
On computer: JOHN-LAPTOP

DISKPART> list disk

  Disk ###  Status         Size     Free     Dyn  Gpt
  --------  -------------  -------  -------  ---  ---
  Disk 0    Online          447 GB     9 MB        *
  Disk 1    Online          931 GB  2048 KB        *
  Disk 2    No Media           0 B      0 B
  Disk 3    Online         7496 MB  7495 MB

DISKPART> select disk 3

Disk 3 is now the selected disk.

DISKPART> clean

DiskPart succeeded in cleaning the disk.

DISKPART> create partition primary

DiskPart succeeded in creating the specified partition.

DISKPART> format fs=NTFS quick

  100 percent completed

DiskPart successfully formatted the volume.

DISKPART> exit

Leaving DiskPart...

C:\WINDOWS\system32>exit

Okay, thank you for the thorough response here. Any issues having both SSDs (each with an OS, one new, one old) plugged in upon boot or should I plug in my old SSD after I boot into Windows and then wipe it? Getting ready to rock on this right now!

The only issue will be to be sure to pick the correct SSD to boot from in UEFI after you connect the second SSD. When you do the clean command on the second SSD, it will erase the EFI system partition on it so you should not see it as a boot option in UEFI after that.