Migrate Windows User Profiles to a new computer
One of the common problems that IT Staff run into is transferring Windows users’ desktop profiles from one computer to another while mainataining all of their customizations, files, settings, favorites, emails, and whatever else. One would think that Microsoft would give IT Pros the tools to transfer this kind of data since they made it so critical with the advent of Windows NT & 2000.
Fortunately there is a tool put out by ForensIT that makes this a relatively trivial task. You can download it here. After you download it, follow these directions to use it to transfer your profiles seamlessly.
- Load the computer fully with the appropriate software, including MS Office if needed.
- Login and create the account of the user that you wish to transfer.
- Either remove and hook up the hard drive from the old computer to the new computer or connect to the computer’s default share (i.e. \\computername\C$)
- After hooking up the drive or connecting to the default share open launch a Windows Explorer window and navigate to “C:\Documents and Settings” folder.
- Copy the Folder for the user that you wish transfer to the new computer.
- On the new computer paste the folder to that same respective folder.
- After copying the folder to the new computer, open up the Windows Control Panel, double-click the System icon, and go to the Advanced tab. Click on the “Settings” button under the User Profiles section.
- Check the “Show Unassigned Profiles” checkbox.
- Choose the folder relating to the folder that you wish to assign, and click assign.
- Type in the username of the user that you wish to transfer.
- Log out and log back in as the migrated user
After following those steps you should have a fully migrated user profile. Keep in mind this dows not migrate programs, Windows is still incapable of doing this.
Enjoy!