Transferring Information Between Computers?

Greyhound · Post by **Greyhound** » Tue. Sep. 22, 2009 12:26 am

Just bought a new ( to me ) tower unit. Any one have a software product that they have used to transfer contents of hard drive from one computer to another? Thinking I probably need to use USB.

Thanks!

Dann757 · Post by **Dann757** » Tue. Sep. 22, 2009 8:01 pm

Norton Ghost was one I think. I added my old hard drive to my new pc, it showed up as F. Then when I had everything I wanted I formatted it and now it's extra space. Old 20gig hard drives though. I'm still stumped at networking my gaming pc to my old pc. Download.com might have somthing. Good luck.

rberq · Post by **rberq** » Tue. Sep. 22, 2009 8:38 pm

I bought an external hard drive that plugs into a USB port. Primary use is for backups. But first I used it to dump everything off the old computer, then to load it all onto the new computer. It was about $85 for 360GB, as I recall.

Post by **Richard S.** » Tue. Sep. 22, 2009 8:48 pm

I'd suggest the external hard drive as well, you can use something like sync toy to manage it.

http://www.microsoft.com/downloads/details.aspx?f ... laylang=en

eelhc · Post by **eelhc** » Tue. Sep. 22, 2009 9:02 pm

invasive method... Take the hard drive out of the old computer and install it on the new computer as a slave drive... boot and copy over
non-invasive method... assuming you have a router, connect both computers to the router, set up file/print sharing and copy the files over via the network

I like hard drives as backup but prefer a NAS or an e-sata connection.

009to090 · Post by **009to090** » Tue. Sep. 22, 2009 9:05 pm

eelhc wrote:I like hard drives as backup but prefer a NAS or an e-sata connection.

Yep, kinda what I was gettin at, in the other thread.

Remote Disk Storage

kozel · Post by **kozel** » Thu. Sep. 24, 2009 10:47 am

Use a USB drive, a USB stick and a built in Microsoft tool, "The files and settings transfer wizard". Start the process on the new computer where you put the software necessary on a removable drive (the USB stick). Take the USB stick and the USB drive to the old computer and execute the software on the 'stick' selecting the output to go to the USB drive. When finished, take the USB drive over to the new computer and use the wizard to complete the process. It works very well. Instead of the USB drive, you can use a network share such as a NAS.

You'll find the transfer wizard in the system tools folder.

You don't want to ghost or copy the entire contents of your old drive over your new drive because you don't want to write over the new OS. You will have to and want to reinstall all of the applications you want to use on the new computer anyway. After you have it set up they way you want and all updated, that is when you take an image or a backup in case you have to restore it.

Greyhound · Post by **Greyhound** » Fri. Sep. 25, 2009 8:43 pm

Very nice and clean option. Thanks!

rberq · Post by **rberq** » Sat. Sep. 26, 2009 8:17 am

Another way, to avoid having to re-install all your applications:
(1) Get the drivers that are unique to your new computer and place them in a folder on the old computer.
(2) Use Norton Ghost or a similar product to save the old hard drive image to a network location or an external hard drive.
(3) Use the same Norton or whatever software to over-write the new computer's hard drive with the old computer's image.
(4) Boot the new computer, and when it asks you to supply drivers, point it to the folder where you placed them.

kozel · Post by **kozel** » Sat. Sep. 26, 2009 8:47 am

rberq wrote:Another way, to avoid having to re-install all your applications:
(1) Get the drivers that are unique to your new computer and place them in a folder on the old computer.
(2) Use Norton Ghost or a similar product to save the old hard drive image to a network location or an external hard drive.
(3) Use the same Norton or whatever software to over-write the new computer's hard drive with the old computer's image.
(4) Boot the new computer, and when it asks you to supply drivers, point it to the folder where you placed them.

I'd consider this somewhat risky. If you try this, 'ghost' the new computer's drive before you start. This will give you a fall back option.

Post by **Rob R.** » Wed. Oct. 07, 2009 3:17 pm

eelhc wrote:invasive method... Take the hard drive out of the old computer and install it on the new computer as a slave drive... boot and copy over
non-invasive method... assuming you have a router, connect both computers to the router, set up file/print sharing and copy the files over via the network

I like hard drives as backup but prefer a NAS or an e-sata connection.

I would pull the harddrive as well, but if you aren't comfortable with that you can get a network crossover cable and connect the network cards in each computer. This allows you to setup a network without buying a router or switch.