Files Transfer Wizard and USMT

[Guest]

I work in a busy work place of Win2K & WinXP platforms with either Office XP
or Office2K3 being used by staff. I've been in IT for about 5 years. I alone
am tasked with migrating various office staff from their Win2K/WinXP
computers to Dell D600 laptops. The laptops are running WinXP SP2/Office2K3
on 20GB/512MB. We're on a Win2K3 server environment running the latest
Exchange server. We have a RIS box in place that I've uploaded a base
WinXP/Office2K3 laptop image on. I have 12 - 16 users that I'm converting to
laptops one or two at a time. No more than three max. The staff continue
their day-to-day work on their old PCs while I build their new laptops in our
IT Dept. My question is once I've downloaded the image from RIS, what steps
or processes do I need to take to transfer the user's current desktops and
Outlook settings onto their new laptop? The upmost important thing is that
user's Outlook contacts (personal 'Outlook Address Books', rules, notes,
journals, and archived folders) are tranferred INTACT. Would I copy these
items (PSTs?) manually or trust the Files & Settings Transfer Wiz (FSTW) or
the User State Migration Tool (USMT)? If so, which transfer tool do I use and
how-base on the environment I've described above?

 

[Ron Martell]

I work in a busy work place of Win2K & WinXP platforms with either Office XP
or Office2K3 being used by staff. I've been in IT for about 5 years. I alone
am tasked with migrating various office staff from their Win2K/WinXP
computers to Dell D600 laptops. The laptops are running WinXP SP2/Office2K3
on 20GB/512MB. We're on a Win2K3 server environment running the latest
Exchange server. We have a RIS box in place that I've uploaded a base
WinXP/Office2K3 laptop image on. I have 12 - 16 users that I'm converting to
laptops one or two at a time. No more than three max. The staff continue
their day-to-day work on their old PCs while I build their new laptops in our
IT Dept. My question is once I've downloaded the image from RIS, what steps
or processes do I need to take to transfer the user's current desktops and
Outlook settings onto their new laptop? The upmost important thing is that
user's Outlook contacts (personal 'Outlook Address Books', rules, notes,
journals, and archived folders) are tranferred INTACT. Would I copy these
items (PSTs?) manually or trust the Files & Settings Transfer Wiz (FSTW) or
the User State Migration Tool (USMT)? If so, which transfer tool do I use and
how-base on the environment I've described above?

I would use the FSTW, but then that is what I am most familiar with
and it works well for me.

See the article on using FSTW by MVP Gary Woodruff at
http://aumha.org/win5/a/xpupgrad.htm

One hint. When I am using FSTW to accumulate the files I always
create a new folder in the root directory and name it Transfer. FSTW
then creates an additional subfolder within that folder to actually
store the information. And when I go to import the data into the new
machine I always point FSTW at the \Transfer folder and not at the
subfolder. It always finds the data and puts it in the correct
location.

Good luck

Ron Martell Duncan B.C. Canada
--
Microsoft MVP
On-Line Help Computer Service
http://onlinehelp.bc.ca

In memory of a dear friend Alex Nichol MVP
http://aumha.org/alex.htm

 

[Guest]

File transfer wizard is already installed in xp,USMT is a add-on downloadable
at microsoft.In the file transfer,set computer as old,select the
files,settings,
you want it to save,save to a new folder,once the data is completed,move the
folder to a cd.

 

[Johan Arwidmark]

For admins the USMT 2.6 is a more mature/better migrating solution
than the FSTW wizard in XP.

Even though its a bit more complex to manage USMT 2.6 produces by far
the better result and provides detailed configuration of what data is
migrated as well as supports automation.

FSTW also does not support Office 2003 like USMT 2.6 does (even though
some Office 2003 setting do migrate using FSTW due to similiarities
with Office XP)

regards

Johan Arwidmark
Microsoft MVP - Setup/Deployment