Resolved Transfer a user from a hard drive to another PC

The old computer has CPU, mother board, RAM and video card all burnt out. The hard drive, however, is good and everything readable when put on an USB dock.

How can I transfer the user and his files (documents, pictures, musics etc.) to another notebook as an additional user?

(Both the new notebook and the old computer's hard drive are running Windows 7 Home Premium.)

(I have tried Windows Easy Transfer but it requires an "old computer" instead of just the hard drive.)

 

The user's data migrated this way, but the user account does not. If I create a user account of the same name, Windows 7 will prepare a new set of settings for the new user account, instead of pointing to the imported personal folders. (If I change the Properties of each iimported folders, they will be added into the new user library, but the desktop and other things are not followed.)

So, "Copy and Paste" is not working. Any further idea?

 

Create a new user of any name and Windows will create the set of folders such as Documents, Music, Pictures, Videos etc.

Now copy the items in the old user's Documents folder over to the new user's Documents folder, then the items in the old user's Music folder into the new user's Music folder, then old user's Pictures to new user's Pictures, and old user's Videos to new user's Videos.

 

Thanks SpywareDr. I did it in a similar fashion, except that I renamed the original personal folder, so that I could create a new user of the intended user name. After that, I copied / moved the folders and files from the old HDD to the new notebook. However still, I lost the document history, reconfigured outlook, unable to de-authorise iTunes from old HDD and unable to reauthorise on new notebook, etc, and etc.

(What I wanted is one command line entry like this: "Move the user from the external hard drive to the new notebook!" After 2 hours, it's done! Can Windows 8 do it? If not, sorry, it's as crabxb+p as Windows 98.)

What about the desktop, favourites and etc.? And the user must use a new user name? All shortcuts will go.

This is the "manual" method I used for Windows 3.1, 98, Me, 2000, XP and Vista. There is no intelligence nor any evolution (improvement) in the last 20 years? If Windows 8 is still the same, why don't I keep working on XP?

Anyway, thanks SpywareDr.

 

Copy and Paste not good enough for another reason: The hiddon files and folders are not copied. e.g. the Users\user\AppData. I have no idea how many things will be omitted.

 

But of course. That's why I appended the "etc. ".

No.

I guess the answer would depend on someone's personal definition of itelligence, evolution and improvement. For me, we've come a l-o-n-g way from Windows 3.1, (a GUI for MS-DOS).

That's up to you. Windows 7 is more secure though.

You're welcome.

Copy and paste (drag and drop) will only work with the user's personal stuff. It will not work with anything involving Registry settings, (such as AppData, Programs, etc.).

 

The scenario is simple: A computer is broken but the HDD is okay. A new computer is purchased and I wanted to move everything to the new computer. How? and How much time is needed (of course, as short as possible). Why should I care about Registry, AppData and etc. It's like working on punchcards, machine code or assembler in the old days. A new OS should do much better than Windows NT from 1993! Windows XP is NT, Windows 7 is Windows NT and Windows 8 is no more than Windows NT! It's already 20 years and no change in the core!

Windows 8 has a 20 years old core! OMG.

 

Windows won't work without the "Registry, AppData and etc. "

So Microsoft's damned if they do and damned if they don't?

If the change isn't considered enough, we get all up in arms.

But God forbid if a change breaks our old stuff and/or habits.

 

Arie,

It's not about the backup. You never sure what have been or have not been backed up in order to have a complete recovery. The only way to do is to clone the HDD, RAID-2 or RAID-5 redundancy but they are not practical for consumer environments.

The backup settings did not backup user profile which was 40 GB seemingly unrealistic. It could be copied out and put into the new notebook but there were too many files duplicated / in conflict with the new HDD of the same names in the same folders. So, it's difficult to decide if they were replaced.

So, even though all files are there to transfer, but Windows has given us a hard time in moving a user from a hard drive alone to another notebook.

If it's a business case, what I'll do is to put the old HDD into any one desktop and use that desktop Windows' Startup Disc to boot up Windows 7. Then use Windows Easy Transfer program to transfer the User Settings, User Profiles and data to the new computer. From Windows Easy Transfer report, I'll see what programs need to be installed on the new notebook and do it, then activates all those programs. Unfortunately, iTunes could still not be able to un-authorized from the old HDD and might not be able to activate on the new notebook (due to the limitation of 5 devices per User ID.) This process might take 8 - 30 hours. If Windows evolves ideally, I believe one hour would be the max to transfer a user.

 

That's about 13 - 20 MB/s! I guess you're using SSD or 7200 rpm 5.25" drive on e-SATA or USB 3.0 on a 4 core i7 high end CPU.

The problem disk and the new notebook on my hand are low-end products.

 

Yes, a backup is very important. Though no automated solution there, a backup gives the way to recover data bit by bit. Settings can be re-built manually as well.

 

If I can't get Easy Transfer to move the "user ", I copy the My Documents, the Favorites and the Desktop.

The basics are then there, making it personalised is up to them. They usually enjoy a change.

Matt

 

This approach misses at least the AppData, a hidden folder.

 

Yes AppData is a hidden folder, but it holds most of the application information for the particular user.

It would bring across data or files not necessarily needed.

 

But many Microsoft files like the Outlook's .pst mail files are there. And without transferring this file, many data/documents are just not retrievable. and a user's habits cannot be restored (e.g. opening a browser with the browsing history and favourites restored as well.)

These are examples of the incompleteness of data backup of one user account to be restorable on another computer under Windows 7. All business continuity practises lost! Though eventually I was managed to "manually" moved the user from one computer to another but the process was not effective and not efficient.