Discussion on:

10 things to remember when replacing your PC

Have you or your users ever lost important information in the process of upgrading to a new machine? What other elements would you add to this checklist?

For some people, saving their "Desktop" is important to them (including people who hate going into the Start menu for anything).

Document templates (and personal dictionaries) are important for those who have spent a lot of time customizing them.

We also look for any Outlook data files (*.pst)where the users save offline email (if they use Outlook, of course).

Take a look at the user's Local Settings \Temporary Internet Files for something they may have opened and didn't do a Save As to keep it.

Has anyone encountered a problem with saving SUBFOLDERS under the Outlook Address Book? I lost a subfolder called Personal (it didn't get exported like the root of the Address Book). Had to rebuild from memory (yeah, right!).

Takes just a few minutes and you have all your bookmarks and mail in a backup. Nice to do about once a month and store on the backup server for GPs.

Here's the link:
http://mozbackup.jasnapaka.com/

I have a lot of recorded macros for MS Office to automate some of the things I do frequently (ie: setting up a large document with page numbering, guttering for binding, two-side printing,, multiple sections, alternate page footers and headers for each section, title page, table of contents page etc with the click of one button on the toolbar).

I also have custom styles that I use. Having to recreate all those Styles and macros can be a real nuisance.

If you use iTunes, don't forget to deauthorize the old PC. Also, NAS prices are so low now it's worth looking at during the move to the new PC as well as afterwards. Buffalo Linkstation prices now compete with USB disks. I store all my music and large movie files there, and response time is fine. MSFT Files and Settings Tranfer wizard works pretty well as does MSFT Office Save My Settings Wizard (with an excellent destination for these files on your NAS device).

In Windows XP, the "file and settings transfer wizard" (migwiz.exe) will handle most of this for you.

the PC to be replaced has XP on it. My old system orinally had windows 3.11, has been upgraded until it squeaked, and finished up with W 2000 pro running slowly. Time for a new one I thought.

It started out as a 386sx/16, 2MB RAM, 65MB HD, both 1.44 and 1.2 floppies, amber monitor, with MS-DOS 3.3 on it. It went thru a series of upgrades over the years (both hardware and software) because I could only afford to upgrade it piecemeal--couldn't afford a whole new computer. I still have the thing, but it only has ONE part that was in the original computer--the 5-1/4", 1.2MB floppy drive which got worked harder than the three 1.44MB drives I replaced put together. Everything else (case, motherboard, hard drives, etc., etc.) has been replaced.

One day I'm going to put that old beast back into service again.

The File & Settings transfer wizard will work from Win9x .. (sorry I don't know about 3.11

The TARGET (new machine) must be XP or Vista, but the older SOURCE machine can be 9x/ME ... and I agree, it is a VERY GOOD place to start.

Just install all the applications on the NEW PC first as it is, like it says, a FILE and SETTINGS transfer tool; and it can't xfer the settings for MS Office (for example) if Office is not installed on the new machine...

You may need the certificates from Internet Explorer. This is especially true if you do financials or payroll type items via the Internet. An explanation of how to export and import the certificates can be found at: https://www.microsoft.com/technet/prodtechnol/ie/reskit/6/part2/c06ie6rk.mspx?mfr=true

This is a great, yet broad list of PC replacement. It needs to be dug deeper, especially on the topic of email. You discuss the basics of setting up an email account with outlook or through a browser, however an encryption product should be included whenever a fresh email account is activated.

Even personal email accounts are under hacker surveillance these days with bank, credit card, and other personal information flowing back and forth via email. Encryption software is the fastest and best way to ensure yourself that your fresh email account will remain private.

If the old PC is on a network, you will have to recreate the network printers (ports/drivers) and any mapped drives to shared data. Don't forget to re-install applications that are hosted on serverss. In our case we also need to re-create terminal services/citrix connections and remote printer setups.

Thanks. Good info. Logical sequence. I'm going to be replacing my home desktop soon, so this helps me a lot. Enjoy your day.

Helpful article. Would the Files and Settings Transfer Wizard handle most of this?

Having recently been through a similar process, I agree that this is an excellent checklist, as others have said. I forgot my Thunderbird address book too, so I sympathize! Fortunately, I was able to find it on the backup DVDs I made of the whole system.

When I'd finished, I bought a USB external hard drive enclosure and put the old hard drive in it. If anything else shows up as forgotten, I won't have to reinstall the old PC to get at it. And when finished with, it will make a handy backup device for the new machine. The enclosure was a bargain at about US $12 equivalent from a local computer fair.

it's a pretty good list. as far as back ups though i would just set the old hard drive to slave and just drag and drop, instead of using CDs. if your new hard drive is a WD(western Digital), the CD has a file and settings transfer wizard too. but since you chose to buy a prebuilt; setting your old Harddrive as slave and putting it in your new PC would be a little more reasonable. oh and you forgot firewall with the antivirus.
other than that very nice list. Again useful when replacing with a brand new system.

How do you keep updates to antivirus and anti-spyware apps? They never give me the choice to save to disk or run.

Thanks.

Very worthwhile computer guidance. I have three old
computers that I use everyday. My newest one is from 2002. The oldest is from 1998. I will be keeping my old ones. The only thing I've got to do with the other computer made about 2000 is to get an IDE controller for the harddrive and update the bios on it. Your advice on what to remember was the most important. Backup of the computer is extremely important.

I prefer checklists like this-- using keywords (e.g., "Bookmarks") instead of recipes ("backup HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\...") because the first is universal and the second can change. Keywords are harder to follow, because you have to research each step-- but you learn more and are less likely to foget things.

That said, an easy way to grab most of the user-related stuff is to just copy the Documents and Settings to your friendly neighborhood USB drive. You'll get items 2-6 (and the others have to be manually installed anyway).

Also, I would NEVER back up my system and then just restore the backup to a new box, as some people suggested. Auto-update often doesn't work, and you can spend weeks killing all the flakeys.

And it's really annoying when you learn that the drivers or registry entries that were causing BSODs are related to the joystick that broke in 2002. You never have to take it out, if you don't load it in.