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Using USMT V.5 to Migrate your Profile Data, Apps & Profile Settings

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Today we are going to show how can we migrate user profile settings, data & app settings from windows 7 to windows 8 using USMT V.5 (User State Migration Tool), using a Network Compressed Migration store, this type is used to be labeled as (PC Refresh, Using a Compressed Migration Store)

Download Assessment & deployment Kit, and run the installation:

  • Select No, then click Next

  • In the License Agreement window click Accept

  • Select (User State Migration Tool) and click Install

  • Based on your OS architecture you have to choose either the 64bit or the 32bit version of the USMT tool, and for simplicity you may copy the installation folder to the root of the drive to reach it more quickly

  • On that step, we are going to open and configure the outlook on the windows 7 PC and do some custom configuration inside as an example to test the application settings migration

  • Synchronization is now completed

  • In this example we shall create an outlook rules as shown

  • We shall also set an outlook signature for new e-mails as shown

  • After that we shall open the IE and add some web pages in the favorites bar as shown

  • Change the wallpaper to a specific one as shown

  • Create a word document in the Documents folder , in this example the document name is "1.docx"

  • On the windows 8 PC prepare a network share to place the migrated data on as shown

  • Create a shared folder on the a network share "in this case it is the target Windows 8 PC itself" to place the migrated data on it
  • Run the ScanState tool in an elevated CMD with the following syntax:
  • Scanstate.exe \\win8-1\Migration /i:migapp.xml /i:migdocs.xml /v:5 /vsc /encrypt /key:KamalKey
  • Note here that we are migrating User Application settings and Documents, we also used the following switches for:
  • /v:5 to turn the verbose output mode
  • /vsc to turn on the volume shadow copy during the migration phase
  • /encrypt: to encrypt the data on the target network share for protection and privacy
  • /key:keyname used to decrypt the data during the restoration on the new windows 8 PC

  • On the target machine (Win8-1):
  • Copy the installation folder from the source PC (Win7-1) "c:\User State Migration Tool\amd64\" to the target pc (Win8-1)
  • Open the CMD on "Win8-1" and type the following:
  • Loadstate.exe \\win8-1\Migration /i:migdocs.xml /i:migapp.xml /i:miguser.xml /v:5 /decrypt /key:KamalKey

  • After the migration is done, note the wallpaper you configured on the windows 7 workstation is now set to the new windows 8 machine

  • Open MS outlook and notice the same configuration is now migrated and your Hotmail account in that example if working fine

  • Open to check for your configured signature, you shall find it as it was in the Win7 PC

  • Open your "Documents" and note the sample document you created "1.docx" is found!

  • And finally open the Internet Explorer and note you Favorite bar, contains your Favorite Sites

 

I hope you find this Blog post Helpful.

Thank You for your time

Mohamed Kamal from NEPA team.

Comments

  • Anonymous
    January 01, 2003
    Kamal, this is very useful. Some things that I experienced. I had to decrypt the Documents folder, which I was unaware was encrypted. I also ran into issue with errors and return codes, which I Google'd. However, no real resolution was offered on the websites that I found. Is there a site or guide that instructs what to look for when, for example, error code 27 is received?

  • Anonymous
    July 22, 2013
    awesome thanks Kamal

  • Anonymous
    August 12, 2014
    Thanks
    is very usefull

  • Anonymous
    September 29, 2014
    does USMT 5.0 works on winsdow 7 pro to windows 7 ent?

  • Anonymous
    November 21, 2014
    The comment has been removed

  • Anonymous
    May 06, 2015
    Why not hardlink?

  • Anonymous
    June 30, 2015
    Do you know of a way to fix a corrupted catalog from this? I have an 18GB mig file but can only extract around 200 MBs from it.