Transferring Windows 10 system to new hardware: who can do it well?

May 5, 2024 10:17 AM

I have to replace my mother's decade+ old PC with new hardware, preserving all her files and apps and everything as faithfully as possible. The last time I did this myself, it was difficult and extremely time-consuming. This time around, I want to find someone who (1) can be trusted to (2) do it properly with (3) minimal supervision on my part. Who am I looking for?

Critical to this migration is that the new system looks and acts as much as the current one as possible. My mother is old and not tech savvy, and I need to minimize the disruption that a computer move might cause.

The current PC is an old low-spec HP with small HDD, Windows 10 (probably retail-bought but not 100% sure), DVD drive, and external VGA monitor. I installed a version of Microsoft Office and she regularly uses Word and Excel; I'm pretty sure it was retail-bought and I may have the license keys for those, but am not sure. I haven't bought a new computer yet, and have flexibility on what I buy, in case that factors into the equation of how to migrate her computer.

I know of migration software tools like Laplink, and used a package (not Laplink, some other) the last time I did it myself 10+ years ago. I'm not a Windows expert (being a Mac user myself), but am functional enough, and while doing a migration is within my skills, the combination of researching how to do it, doing it, then adjusting anything that needs to be adjusted is just too time consuming.

Are there people who are capable of doing in-person full computer migrations of old snowflaky systems? I don't particularly trust an outfit like Geek Squad not to screw it up, although maybe that's unfair. What kind of expert does this kind of work? What keywords should I search for when looking for someone? I've never paid someone else to do computer maintenance work (always did everything myself), so feel clueless about how to proceed.

The migration can't be done remotely due to how networking is set up where she lives. I can clone or copy the computer contents to an external SSD and bring it to someone, if that's easier. We live in Santa Barbara, CA, so presumably it would have to be someone in the area.

posted by StrawberryPie to Computers & Internet (6 answers total)

I hesitated on posting an answer because, on the one hand, my answer is no, I don't know of such a service per se, and I am hesitant to recommend Geek Squad since I've never used them. I hope someone else has a more direct answer for you.

I did just replace my failed Windows 10 tower in March 2024 with a new (from Costco) Windows 11 tower. Since Costco allows returns up to 90 days, I kept careful notes of everything I did in case I decided to return the machine I could then try again on a different one. That document is 320 lines long.

I assume your new one will be Windows 11 since I believe Win10 goes out of support 2025-10-14. So right off the bat you are dealing with Microsoft "improvements" in Win 11 (vis "looks and acts as much as the current one as possible" could be a challenge). I will give you just a thumbnail version of my migration document as an idea of scope:
- I set up Win11 with only a local user, not a Microsoft account so my network shares worked (but there are rumors Microsoft plans to tighten up such loopholes).
- Set a Windows Restore Point
- Firefox Browser and chosen Add-ons (I had a dozen) plus any "Pinned" or "Bookmarked" Tabs
- Thunderbird (Email application, as opposed to viewing email on a phone or Web browser)
- Email accounts per se (security, address, application passwords as opposed to account passwords)
- Hardware (Fujitsu Scan Snap Scanner and related software, also HP Office Jet Printer)
- Restrict Windows Updates to times when machine is not usually in use
- Set Privacy and Security options in Win 11
- Any assorted apps like Quicken, MS Office, Anti-virus/Anti-malware, Zoom including registration keys, transferring data files including putting them in locations your mother is accustomed to
- I assume your mother will NOT need to open a Command Prompt (black window)
- Backup support software like Winzip or 7-Zip, etc. and file extension associations
- Music, Photo, Video or eBook management apps (Calibre, Media Monkey, Irfanview, VLC, etc.) and file extension associations
- Is your mother accustomed to a specific screen capture application or software (and associated key sequence, check if that works the same for her in Win 11)?
- Password and/or Pass Key manager?
- External USB drives including getting them assigned to the drive letters your mother is accustomed to (if any, see this link)
- Any automated backup scripts that ran on the old machine, don't forget to set-up some equivalent on the new machine
- If you are unhappy (as I was) that Microsoft was wasting space in the Win 11 Task Bar with a Chat Windows for MS Teams this link will help.

I realize you do NOT want to do this yourself, but this list may at least give you some idea of what is involved and as discussion points for any person/company you may discover.
posted by forthright at 12:23 PM on May 5 [1 favorite]

This may sound weird, but one way to do it is package your existing machine as a VM, then run it in the modern machine as a VM. Then you may be able to support it as a regular Win11 system, while your mom would "use" it as an Win10 system. The question basically becomes, do you have any specific hardware or software you must preserve, and how well they run as a part of VM?
posted by kschang at 12:58 PM on May 5 [1 favorite]

There is a small, locally owned computer support type shop near me that would do a custom request like this. You need to find a shop like that near you.
posted by LoveHam at 4:25 AM on May 6 [3 favorites]

In Linux I would just install Linux, Firefox and Thunderbird, copy the old Thunderbird and Firefox folder to the new installation before I run both the first time. But windows. I guess I pass.

Windows and office license keys can be extracted:
https://www.alphr.com/find-microsoft-office-product-key/

I always extract them, wipe the SSD, install my linux flavor and reinstall windows in a virtual machine with the extracted keys. No issues so far

Your best bet is to take a backup of the data and try to find somebody on Craigslist. Make sure the data is no problem (banking log-ins etc). Good luck.
posted by maloqueiro at 6:00 AM on May 6

Response by poster: kschang: that's an interesting idea, actually. I use Windows VMs for software developments, albeit Windows-on-Mac (using Parallels) and not Windows-on-Windows. Is there software to clone an existing PC such that the result could be run in a VM?

She does not use any special software (no password manager, no screenshots, no games, no music/video) nor does the computer have any particularly special hardware components.
posted by StrawberryPie at 12:02 PM on May 6

@strawberrypie: VMWare specifies that their VM hypervisor can create VM from powered on and running machine via instructions here. Googling shows Microsoft's Hyper-V can do the same. So you should be set.
posted by kschang at 10:19 AM on May 8 [1 favorite]