🚀 go-pugleaf

I have been using a cobbed together computer that has been added onto for a
long time.  I have outgrown my case and the speed of my CPU.  I am upgrading
from a K-6 200 mid tower case to a P-II 350 and a full server case with 300W
power supply.  I purchased a Super Micro Motherboard with built in Adaptec
UW SCSI.

In the past when I did something like this, and was happy with my OS and
programs, I would simply move my boot drive over intact to the new case and
reconfigure for the new setup.  The problem is that I am now running WinNT
and I have been told that it probably won't even boot with hardware that
conflicts with its previous install.

Here is the hardware that I will end up with in the new system:

P-II 350
256MB PC100 DIMM RAM
Diamond Viper V550 AGP 16 MB RAM
9.1 GIG UW SCSI
4.5 Ultra SCSI
2 GIG EIDE (boot drive)
2 - 32x SCSI CD ROMS
DVD Drive
56K US Robotics Modem
Diamond PCI Sound card
3-com network card

If I can transfer the NT system intact and get it to work, that would be the
best.  If I can't and have to totally reinstall, then I am considering going
to Win98.  I am happy with the performance of Win98 on my other two
computers.

Does anyone have any experience with this type of upgrade?

I really don't feel like spending 2-3 whole days reloading all my programs
like I just got through doing about two weeks ago because of a horrendous
system crash.

I see the advantages of switching to 98 as USB support, faster printing
speed with my ALPS printer because the NT driver sucks and the Win95/98
driver is great.  Better support for different types of hardware.  IRQ
sharing so less conflicts between devices.  Better Plug and Play.  Less
system overhead.

I see the advantages of NT being more stable.  Better memory handling.  More
security. (I think)

Besides if I can manage to move the NT drive over, then I won't have to
spend 3 days reinstalling software.   However, if I get to this point, and
decide that I want Win98 instead, then I will be hosed because there will be
no way to access my data on my NTFS partitioned drives.

Any ideas?

Kirk