Want old Windows HDD with Window 7 Home &new Win10 Home on new compute

I can't figure out how to do this. I don't have experience with two drives, dual boot, and such things.

My HP laptop with a 1 TB hard drive with Windows 7 Home Premium 64 bit broke its cooling fan and the repair place says it would they might not be able to fix it even though I already have a new fan and heatsink they can put in it.

So I bought a new all-in-one HP desktop with touch screen, two drive bays and a 1 TB hard drive and 256 GB SSD in it. To begin with I don't even know what an SSD looks like and whether it's taking up one of the two bays, or if one bay is still free. I will call HP tomorrow and ask.

I am thinking about taking the hard drive from the laptop and putting it into the new desktop. HP says it will fit and that can be done. But I am also thinking that I'd like to have Windows10 on that desktop computer too. I am trying to figure out how to do this.

There is no operating system on the new desktop computer - I asked them to ship it without one. I also have my own Windows 7 Pro on 32 and 64 bit disks that I bought quite a while ago for a different laptop, and I can get a new Windows 7 Home 64 bit disk.

I can also get a new 1 or 2 TB hard drive (preferably 2.... now kicking myself for not ordering 2 since my existing 1 TB drive in the laptop is 3/4ths full).

So I think there are a lot of options and possible combinations there. I am just not capable of thinking it through and deciding what to do!!! And whatever I do I won't have help because everyone else here is a Mac person. And I borrowed one of theirs until I can get this sorted out.

In fact, I don't even know if the touchscreen would work if I am using the Windows 7 Home OS on the new computer. I guess I don't really care if it wouldn't work with Win7 because I don't expect to like having my arm stretched out for hours poking at a screen.

Can I get some suggestions for what to do?

I have not done anything with computer hard disks in years and years. About 4 years ago I installed Windows XP on an old computer whose hard drive had failed, and I got a new hard drive and installed XP just for the comfort of knowing it was there. It wasn't hard to do. Looong before that I used Partition Magic to partition a hard drive.

At this point in time I consider myself as pretty much not knowing anything about hard disks and definitely zero about solid state drives. In reading threads here I constantly have to look up acronyms I've never seen before. I did look at the tutorial here on dual boot and got pretty confused.

Here are specs of the new computer taken off the order sheet.

HP EliteOne 800 G2 23" Touch All-in-One PC with AMD® Radeon™ R9 360 2GB GDDR5 Graphics (L3N94AV)

Product number: L3N94AV

•FreeDOS •HP USB-C to USB 3.0 Adapter •1 TB 7200 RPM SATA 6G 2.5" HDD •HP USB Business Slim Keyboard •16GB DDR4-2133 SODIMM (2x8GB) RAM •HP EliteOne 800 G2 AiO Country Kit US •Slim DVD-Writer •Intel® 8260 802.11ac M.2 Network Interface Card with Bluetooth® •HP Adjustable Height Stand •Intel® Core™ i7-6700 (3.4 GHz, up to 4 GHz with Intel® Turbo Boost, 8 MB cache, 4 cores) + Intel® HD Graphics 530 •256 GB HP Z Turbo Drive G2 TLC PCIe SSD Thanking you all in advance!!

Install the Windows 7 Pro onto the SSD by booting the computer from the Windows 7 Pro DVD or USB flash drive. Activate it with your Windows 7 Pro product key.

Download the Windows 10 ISO file. Save it to the 1 TB HDD already installed in the new computer. Mount it using a program that will mount ISO files in Windows 7. Run setup.exe from the mounted ISO file to upgrade your Windows 7 Pro to Windows 10 Pro. Currently, upgrades are still activating for free from Microsoft.

Buy a SATA to USB 3.0 Enclosure to stick the old laptop's HDD into and use it as an external drive.

That's what I would do.

Amazon.com: Sabrent 2.5-Inch SATA to USB 3.0 Tool-free External Hard Drive Enclosure [Optimized For SSD, Support UASP SATA III] Black (EC-UASP): Computers & Accessories

Working on these options... HP says I do have 1 empty drive bay. The drive in the all in one desktop is laptop size: 2.5 inch. I can take out the one that came with it and put in a 2 TB if I want.

HP says I can install the 2.5 inch HDD from the laptop but computer won't boot from it. I think he said it looks first for a bootable drive on the SSD. I said, can't I just point it to the laptop's HDD after I install it? He said there is a list, you can change the order. I think I know which partition my OS is on, in the laptop drive. Can't I boot the computer initially, change the drive the computer looks for to boot, turn it off and remove the HDD it came with and put my own in there and then turn it on and have it boot from my drive?

After that, can't I put the original HDD into the empty bay? FreeDOS will be on it and it should be bootable, right? So if I end up putting Win10 on it, I could do that? And if I want to switch OS, then how would I do that?

Can I do something that would make it stop at a screen and ask me which hard drive I want it to load an operating system from?

You want to install the OS to the SSD - not to the HDD. You have an SSD permanently installed in an M.2 slot. USE IT! Once you get a clean install of Windows 10 done to the SSD, then you can connect your laptop's hard drive to the spare space as a second hard drive and set up dual booting to it if you want to.

Thank you for your reply. I was thinking I'd deal with Windows 10 later on, maybe this summer, when I am not swamped with deadline work. I don't know how to set up dual boot and I don't have time to learn while I am swamped with deadline work... which will continue until late spring. I'm looking for a way around having to put Windows 10 on right now.

In fact, I don't even know if the touchscreen would work if I am using the Windows 7 Home OS on the new computer. I guess I don't really care if it wouldn't work with Win7 because I don't expect to like having my arm stretched out for hours poking at a screen.

My Win7 did work with a touch screen monitor, had a Win7 computer [now running Win10] connected to an HP 21.5" touch screen monitor IF I remembered to plug in the USB cable from the PC to the back of the monitor before starting up. The is that the data cable to the monitor is one way so the USB is necessary to "talk back" to the computer.

Well that's good news and since this is an all-in-one with no "box" under the desk maybe I wouldn't need the cable.

Comp Cmndo said:

According to the specs, there is no SATA SSD.
You have this: 256 GB HP Z Turbo Drive G2 TLC PCIe SSD
This is an error, because it won't fit in your model

What do you believe is in error? @kelliann's computer currently has 1 m.2 SSD and 1 SATA HDD installed. The OP has 1 free SATA port and bay available for 1 additional 2.5" HDD or SSD.

So, @kelliann, you have a few options. You can install your old Windows 7 2.5" HDD into the new computer. You do not have to remove the existing HDD or SSD to install it. You should be able to set the UEFI firmware to boot from it. How well the old Windows 7 will adapt to the new computer and hardware is unknown. For sure you will have to use phone activation to reactive Windows 7.

If your Windows 7 OS partition on your old HDD is small enough, you can clone it to the SSD installed in your computer and run your existing Windows 7 from the much faster SSD.

You might be able to do a clean install of Windows 10 (and it would be the smart choice to do that to the installed SSD) and activate it with the Windows 7 product key from your old installation. That depends on the condition that your Windows 7 product key is in with Microsoft.

If you move your Windows 7 to the new computer and get it activated, for the time being you can upgrade it to Windows 10 for free still - but we do not know how long Microsoft will continue to allow that.