Calling Windows geeks

[Boac]

Situation: I have an ageing laptop with OEM W7, upgraded to W10. I wish to buy a newer laptop. I realise I will have to buy W10 on the new machine, either OEM or full, but does anyone have experience of then transferring the existing W10 setup to the new machine? I wish to avoid having to re-install software existing on the old machine on the new.

I have looked at EASUS 'ToDo PC Trans' as an option - is it going to do the biz? Could I simply transfer prog data, the programme folders and the registry to the new machine or will the 'new' W10 reject that?

[Pontius Navigator]

Not sure but I know after a particular crash restoration some programs restored and worked, others had to be reinstalled. Took a week of step by step restoration.

[jimtherev]

I know it is a chore, but it seems sensible to me that you do a clean instal of all your software. Apart from anything else, you'll be delighted with the increase in speed. Much-used, much-adjusted programs tend to accumulate lots of unwanted and discarded overheads, and the registry gets untidy, too.
Pain in the bum to get everything installed and tweaked, but IMHO it pays.

[unifoxos]

What Jim just said. However when I am next in that position I will be going for Linux. I am completely fed up with an OS that, even after numerous releases, will still crash if you insert a CD or SD card it doesn't like.

[Boac]

Appreciate all the above, folks, but does anyone know if what I am proposing works?

[Pontius Navigator]

Look at Laplink. Worked for me many years back. I had an offer last year when I was doing an upgrade. There was sufficient information to say it would not do what I wanted. It was something like only doing one partition.

[Pontius Navigator]

BTW, have you looked at laptops yet? What was a good spec years ago is quite different today. No optical drive, small, SSD 125 or 250, but HDD can be 500 or 1T. My first laptop was upgradable as you could open it up. My new one, 7 yrs old, has no visible screws so I never upgraded the memory.

[jimtherev]

Appreciate all the above, folks, but does anyone know if what I am proposing works?

A bit chancy, I'd say. Time was, M$haft made it fairly simple to understand what was going on. Provided you had the same 'mark' of Windows, the transfer of Registry and win.ini and system.ini, with a bit of a tweak here and there, you could make 95% of it work first time.
But seems to me that W10 as of today is radically different to that which I installed three (was it?) years ago. For example, I'm being nagged by one of my lappies to sign on to Cortana. Never use the perishing thing.
I'm sure you'll let us know how you get on?

[OFSO]

Laplink worked for me years ago, but that was on XP. The last time I set up a new machine I just used a USB drive to pick up individual things on the old and drop on the new. For software on W10, you'll need a fresh install, or so I have been told.

OFSO, perfectly happy with XP SP3 on main machine, 7 on its little brother, and 7 on laptop. All do what I want, and don't answer back.

[izod tester]

In the past I have used a Linux bootable USB stick to make an image of my then XP laptop and then restored that image to a new HD in the same laptop. The Linux distribution I used was System Rescue CD (it was originally developed as a bootable CD). You will need an external drive to save the disk image to.

That worked since the laptop hardware was unchanged other than the new hard drive so there were no driver issues. Since you want to transfer an image to a new hard drive there may be hardware driver issues.

[Pontius Navigator]

Another thought, if you have programs and data on DVD rather than get a laptop with optical drive, you can get a USB optical drive. I have one which is very neat.

[PHXPhlyer]

HELP

Windows 7 reinstalled on older desktop with new SSD.

Everything was working fine then all of a sudden Chrome and Windows Edge stopped communicating with the interweb.
Checked firewall, router and modem, resetting all. No joy.
Both WiFi and Ethernet show connectivity but neither browser will load anything.
Any ideas while waiting for computer repair place to open?

PP

[ian16th]

Not totally relevant, but I was reading recently that Win 10 now has a 'health check' of SSD's.

My SSD failed after a very short life and caused me more problems than all my previous home computers put together.

[PHXPhlyer]

SSD working fine.
Only other issue is trying to find my iTunes music on backup drive. Just not happening.
Very frustrating as are all computer issues!

PP

[ian16th]

SSD working fine.

So was mine, till it packed up!

[PHXPhlyer]

Issue is not with router as iPad and Android phone both connect.
Can’t find anything in desktop settings so far.

PP

[Boac]

Do you have any internet connection ie can you access any emails or ping any sites? When you click on the internet connection icon in the taskbar what does it say about your connection?

Did you have connection before the new SSD?

[PHXPhlyer]

No emails, or ability to connect to any sites through troubleshooter.
The connection window shows data being sent and received but no tabs will open, just pinwheeling.
The computer repair place is open now so going there next. In person seems to work better with them than phone.
Wish me luck.

PP