A PC noob question

Ok! I got a old laptop that is getting SLOW BY THE DAY!! Can I take out its Hardrive and use it in my Desktop? It has Windows 10. will it work with no problems?

Yes you can, but you will probably have to format it and partition it for your desktop to recognize it. But give it a try and see if anything shows up. all you need is a sata capable, you connect it to the motherboard and then connect the power supply to the hard drive.

@Dark_sageX: Thanks!

You should be able to connect it.

As for "no problems"....maybe? If it has the OS loaded on it, I don't know, there might be some issues there. I've also heard there can be DRM issues when swapping to different hardware (specifically motherboard) configurations.

But, at the very least, if you reformat ("wipe clean") the hard drive you are moving over, you should be able to use it no problem.

@mrbojangles25: I want it as the boot drive. I want all the data on it.

Its not guaranteed to work, but I swapped boot drives a number of times prior to windows 10... Id set the laptop to boot into safe mode, then swap it into the other system, and hope for the best. :P

Well in that case you will most definitely have to format the harddrive and re-install windows in it. The OS installed in the harddrive won't just run on the desktop since its connected to a completely different motherboard with a different registration. You should retrieve whatever valuable data you have in that harddrive before formatting, because formatting will delete absolutely everything with no chance of recovery.

+1 to everything Dark said, but if it's Windows 10, try just swapping the HDD over. Win10 is good with new hardware so you might get lucky.

You'll have to update MOBO drivers, Windows 10 will do most of the job for you but you'll still have to look in device management for missing drivers.