Computer help?

[bob svoboda]

Am replacing an old desktop(XP) with a new one loaded with Windows 7. Staples wants $100 to transfer files from the old one to the new one. Can I do this myself? I back up to Carbonite, so if I download from there to the new one will I get everything I need? I also have an external drive I could use if I knew how to transfer back and forth and not miss anything. Any help would be appreciated. (I am a techno-idiot).
Thanks
Bob

[ray hampton]

I bought a disc [forgot the name] that led me thru. the details of the tranfer

[Chuck Wintle]

If you use the external drive you can copy and paste the contents of your documents folder to the external drive. If you have other files, photos, excel files etc. to keep simply copy and paste to the external drive.

[Duane Meadows]

I'd do it for half that! No, seriously, if you back up you data to Carbonite, you should be able to restore to the new system. That's kinda what those kind of backup services are for. That will not backup programs... you will have to re-install those yourself(some may need updates). Staples won't transfer programs either.

However, I would do as Chuck suggested, and copy the data to an external drive or thumb drive. Then copy again to the new computer.

[Myk Rian]

$100? Guess where I would tell Staples to go.
Copy your files to the external, and either keep them there, or copy to the new machine.
Much of the time I take the hard drive out of the old machine, and stick it in the new one to do all the copying. Much faster.
But Carbonite is really all you need.

[Jim Becker]

I agree with the others...since you actually have data backups, do the work yourself. That said, don't forget you need to reinstall your applications to the new system...you cannot restore them from backups. Depending on what you use, you may or may not need a more current version of some things than you might have been using on the older OS, presumably XP.

[Bert Kemp]

I also use Carbonite I got a new computer and just went to carbonite and downloaded all my files. Like others have said you still have to reinstall all your software, such as Corel , any photo editing programs and the like .

[Fred Perreault]

Bob, you aren't a techno idiot.. you are smart enough to ask for help. All that folks have said is accurate. To summarize, what you want is your data... documents, photos, whatever you have created and saved. if you were a good doobie, you would have saved your data all in one place, but like many of us you have it scattered about. It is time consuming, but you should take the external drive and drag what you see is good for saving from your source to your destination drive. tediously and monotinously. Since you are using a newer operating system you will need to install all your favorite programs onto the Win 7 unit. And you will have to create your personal preferences and configurations again since the 2 operating systems treat the programs differently and can't be copied directly. You may need to recreate your email settings and program preferences and accounts, and have to deal with some other aggravating details. You could also partition your new Win 7 HDD into a smal partition for the operating system and programs (C drive) and then the larger partition (D) would be your filing cabinet for your data. That way you can have as many folders as you want to create, and it makes backing up (like we all do that...right?) or the next move easier as all the data is in one place. It may all sound daunting, but a very big plus is that you have an opportunity to clean up your act by reinstalling only the programs and stuff that you actually use, and getting rid of the riff raff. If this helps, or you have questions, PM me if you want. By the way, save your old HDD and use it later as an external drive where you will be able to see all your old data for whatever reason.

good luck, and take your time
Fred

[Tom Stenzel]

I'm not familiar with Carbonite so I don't know how thorough the backup is. But there's room for gotchas if all you've backed up is the contents of the \user names\Document folder. One would be email. If your email is entirely web based there's no problem. If you have email stored locally you'll have to dig it out. For instance using Seamonkey for my one POP email account, the email is stored in the easily found and intuitive location:

C:\Documents and Settings\(User name)\Application Data\Mozilla\SeaMonkey\Profiles\7nid2upu.default\M ail



Would Staples have found and transferred that? I wouldn't bet a used doughnut hole on it.

Typically email programs have an export function to make it easier for the user. I just wrote a batch file to pick up all the digital junk in all the places that I want, copy everything to the USB drive.

-Tom

[Jim Matthews]

Windows 7 includes "Easy Transfer".
http://windows.microsoft.com/en-us/w...-easy-transfer

You'll need an "Easy Transfer cable", Ethernet or External hard drive as a storage medium.
I recommend the external hard drive, as it can be used later, for regular backups.

http://windows.microsoft.com/en-us/w...pc#tab=desktop

[David Lawhorn]

Windows 7 includes "Easy Transfer".
http://windows.microsoft.com/en-us/w...-easy-transfer

You'll need an "Easy Transfer cable", Ethernet or External hard drive as a storage medium.
I recommend the external hard drive, as it can be used later, for regular backups.

http://windows.microsoft.com/en-us/w...pc#tab=desktop

I was wondering if anyone would mention Easy Transfer. As mentioned earlier, be sure to install all of the software packages that you remember and are sure that you will use, especially any MS Office suites if you use them (including outlook if you use that for email) before you run Easy Transfer. It can/will also create your old userid on the new computer while it transfers it from the old computer.
I found that it works surprisingly well albeit a little slow as it can take quite some time to transfer all of the data and settings from the old computer to the new one, of course that depends on how much data you have to transfer.

Good luck

[Chuck Wintle]

I'm not familiar with Carbonite so I don't know how thorough the backup is. But there's room for gotchas if all you've backed up is the contents of the \user names\Document folder. One would be email. If your email is entirely web based there's no problem. If you have email stored locally you'll have to dig it out. For instance using Seamonkey for my one POP email account, the email is stored in the easily found and intuitive location:

C:\Documents and Settings\(User name)\Application Data\Mozilla\SeaMonkey\Profiles\7nid2upu.default\M ail



Would Staples have found and transferred that? I wouldn't bet a used doughnut hole on it.

Typically email programs have an export function to make it easier for the user. I just wrote a batch file to pick up all the digital junk in all the places that I want, copy everything to the USB drive.

-Tom

if you use Thunderbird and/or Firefox then there is a free program called mozbackup that will backup the address book, mail settings and all emails for TB and all Bookmarks for FF. Run the program, save the file that it outputs and import into the thunderbird and/or firefox program on your new computer.

[bob svoboda]

I appreciate all the input, guys! Thanks and I think I'll keep my $100. and do it myself.

[Rich Riddle]

On a Mac you simply need to plug a cable from one computer to the other. Just did it from a 15 year-old Mac to a new one.