I've searched for an answer to my question, but I didn't find a clear answer. I'm also very new to PC gaming and PC's in general, so please excuse my ignorance.

My friend helped build a gaming PC for me so I could try out some of the mods for Skyrim. I've decided I like gaming on the PC but I am going to need a bigger hard drive. With my friend's help, we picked out a good one and I'd like to transfer all of my Skyrim data to the new hard drive.

However, from what I understand, there are registries (?) that will prevent Skyrim from being transferred to a new hard drive... or something like that? This is where you will start to see I have no idea what I'm talking about. My question is, what do I need to do to get Skyrim running on my new hard drive, with all of the mods and my savegame data?

I assume I will need to reinstall Steam, Skyrim, and Nexus Mod Manager and that they would not simply transfer over. Do I only need to copy over the Skyrim Data folder to have the mods transfer over, or do I need to redownload them all individually? And what do I do to transfer the save game data? I don't even know where that folder is located..

Any help is appreciated. What might be simple for you guys is a time consuming and stressful chore for me! I'm learning though...slowly. Like very slowly.

Thanks in advance

The best thing to do is to reinstall Steam and Skyrim and any other programs on that drive.

As for your mods and whatnot, just copy over your Data directory. Saves, same thing.

Also, turn off the Steam Cloud Sync for Skyrim.

(My )Documents/(My )Games/Skyrim

Only copy the saves there. Nothing else. Wipe any INI files in the Data directory and in the directory that the Saves directory is in. Launch the Skyrim Launcher and set the settings to your liking. Then you can customize the INI and then add INI files back into the Data directory. And then you can load up your mods, script extenders, etcetera.

That should do the trick for you.