Most complete way to move user from vista pc to win 10 pc?

[Pete.]

Time has come to put my trusty old PC to pasture so I've bought another one and installed windows 10 home premium.

The current one has been running windows vista since 2014, with little or no problems until a couple of months ago when the PSU quit. This prompted me into getting the newer machine, although the current one did fire right back up with a new PSU.

Now obviously I have a LOT of stuff on this PC. I've bought a new 1TB HDD, fitted it and copied all of my files onto it - as in my entire profile folder complete with user documents etc, just as a start.

What I want to do is copy literally as much as possible to make the transition of moving from one machine to another. If I can I'd like to restore my personal file folder structures - which I think I could do with just a drag and drop copy, but more than that I want to copy over stuff like email accounts, email folders, dropbox account, firefox settings, all that stuff.

I'm looking for some direction here on the best to go about it. If there's a transfer utility I can get even a paid-for one for a modest sum, I'd appreciate recommendations for that if someone has used them.

What do we suggest as a way forward, preferably without having to do every last thing manually?
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a.k.a 'Geri'

132.9mph off and walked away. Gear is good, gear is good, gear is very very good

[kawakid]

There is a user state migration tool, but I don't think it will help you.

The copying of your data is exactly what you said, I usually have a robocopy script to hand and it copies c:\users\name and then the folders, documents, pictures, desktop, downloads etc.

But like you said, you can do this manually.

Getting the settings out of email like Mail or Outlook Express, isn't straight forward. In the past I have had to take screenshots of all the relevant smtp & pop3 settings. Saying that email is a lot easier with 365 and the like these days.

I don't use Dropbox so no idea.

Copying settings from IE, isn't really possible. But the c:\users\name\favorites folder has your saved bookmarks, these can be imported in to Edge/EdgeChromium in 10.

Again if you were running Edge in Vista (Don't know if this is possible, you can export bookmarks as an XML and reimport on your new build).

I've not found a way to copy settings like passwords, from IE or Edge from one machine to another.

I don't use Chrome.



Firefox is perhaps the best browser for copying settings, in fact it's entire environment, saved passwords, bookmarks etc. Browse to your c:\users\name\appdata folder.

In here there will be a folder called roaming, then in there, there is a profile folder and a profile.ini. All you need to do is run firefox on your new pc. Then immediately quit, then copy the profile folder and ini from your old machine to the same folder I mentioned above.
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I've a twin and a 4.

[Easy-X]

Either I build a new PC or whack a new system SSD and/or HDD for a refresh and I usually start with a blank O/S. Convenient as it may be to have everything teleported over until you start migrating what you really need you don't realise how much cruft has built up over the years.

BTW running Vista problem free for >6 years?

https://media.giphy.com/media/Xxv7IcepMra3j6Fkvc/giphy.gif
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Husqvarna Vitpilen 401, Yamaha XSR700, Honda Rebel, Yamaha DT175, Suzuki SV650 (loan) Fazer 600, Keeway Superlight 125, 50cc turd scooter

[Pete.]

Thanks guys for the replies.

In the end here's what I did:

Fresh install and all updates of Windows 10 on the new drive then I stumped up just under £30 for PCmover Home and patched the two PC's together with a normal cat 5 lead. The software took about 50mins to transfer over about 70GB plus installed quite a chunk of whatever applications I had on the vista PC onto the Windows 10 PC. All that went just fine.

I use Firefox for browsing so I simply installed and logged onto it and voila - everything done. Bookmarks, passwords all good.

However.

PC mover did copy over my contacts folder but didn't do anything at all regards email accounts. Also, Windows Mail in windows 10 stubbornly refuses to actually FIND those contacts and there's no way to import them without making a MS account which I haven't got round to yet. In fact, much as I wanted to use the built-in Windows Mail after several hours I dumped it and installed Thunderbird. Had to set up 5 mail accounts manually (with IMAP folders this time instead of POP3) and then spend the rest of today sorting through and deleting something like 6 thousand emails going back 6 years.

Sent items I could not get to sync any which way so I physically dragged them out of vista Mail onto a USB stick then dragged them into the relevant sent folders on the new machine. seems to have worked.

So, all in all I'm back up and running on a PC that is set out largely the same as the old one. I guess I'll be working on it all day tomorrow too, streamlining my user files, sorting into directories. Also got to get another 24" monitor and a double-header graphics card as this machine just has the onboard graphics and my old 19" twin monitor setup is woefully short on resolution.

Would I use the PC mover software again? Nope would I heck as like. Maybe the express version for just under a score but they promise that you'll sit down to a PC that's just like your old one and the most fundamental thing - emails and browsing - are just not catered for.
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a.k.a 'Geri'

132.9mph off and walked away. Gear is good, gear is good, gear is very very good

[WD Forte]

Late now I know, but I'd have probably tried to upgrade the Win Fister drive to Win 10 first before de crapping and cloning the disk to the new drive then debloating it.
I did this recently on my lads win8 lappy and it worked fine

A clean install is my usual route and have the Win10 ISO on a USB drive
with essential/most used software install files added on
make it a bit slicker process
Then just boot go online and let it upgrade itself to winver 2009 if it isnt the latest ISO ( mines 1909)

There are plenty of free tools to decrap/debloat win10 online too
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bikers smell of wee

[blurredman]

I was going to say, that if you don't like using 'profiles' for such simple stuff as Browsers, a lot of user data is stored in hidden folders in the user directory. Including things like save, or settings data for games etc too..

So you can unhide directories and copy the 'Appdata' etc accross.


As someone who migrated full time in 2018 from XP to win7, it can save a lot of time messing around getting paperwork out.
Personally i'm not going to even entertain win10 until 7 actually starts breaking when trying to do the things I want (hence winxp).


But you're happy with the result
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CBT: 12/06/10, Theory: 22/09/10, Module 1: 09/11/10, Module 2: 19/01/11
Past: 1991 Honda CG125BR-J, 1992 (1980) Honda XL125S, 1996 Kawasaki GPZ500S.
Current: 1981 Honda CX500B - 91k, 1987 MZ ETZ250 (bored to 295cc) - 38k, 1990 MZ ETZ251 - 49k, 1979 Suzuki TS185ER - 9k, 1973 MZ ES250/2 - 17k.