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Upgrading from win 7 to 8.1??

Moonsurface

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Not really a Surface thread exactly but it is the SP3 that is making me want to upgrade my desktop to a newer OS. (I want to be able to run apps on my desktop).

So I don't want to do this right now but just out of interest I downloaded the upgrade assistant tool and it told me that I couldn't copy personal files and app settings, I'd have to select the option for just keeping my folders and files.

This is a bit of a concern as I recently had a problem with my desktop PC which required me to reinstall win7... however in the process I lost all my app settings, which for things like Photoshop are a right PITA as I lost all my presets and actions etc . I did managed to copy them over from the win.old folder but I was wondering if that is the case with all software and between OS version.. Is it possible to just copy things from the user/appdata/ folders and for it to work right???

Also would I be better waiting for win 10 or will the cost difference between going from win7 to win 10 direct, vs via win 8 be about the same do you think??
 
Windows 7 has an Easy Transfer Wizard that will save most of your data, (pretty much everything in the libraries) to a file that can be imported into Windows 8 and probably 10. It will not transfer programs but will bring back most of your settings.

There are some programs (commercial) that supposedly keep you from having to reinstall the programs but most don't work well if you don't have the ones they support, which is fairly limited. The best solution is to use the transfer wizard on a fresh install. Then reinstall the software. (actually, install the software first).
 
Windows 7 has an Easy Transfer Wizard that will save most of your data, (pretty much everything in the libraries) to a file that can be imported into Windows 8 and probably 10. It will not transfer programs but will bring back most of your settings.

There are some programs (commercial) that supposedly keep you from having to reinstall the programs but most don't work well if you don't have the ones they support, which is fairly limited. The best solution is to use the transfer wizard on a fresh install. Then reinstall the software. (actually, install the software first).
Does that include app data that would be in the "roaming" files in the user folder?
 
Yes it does. However, it has had a tendency to miss a few things in the roaming profile like Firefox and Thunderbird but that's easy to overcome. You may want to make a separate copy of the roaming profile just in case.
 
Go on line and search for a copy of Win 8.0.

I did this and was able to upgrade from 7.0 to 8.0. it preserved all my apps and data.

Then upgrade from 8.0to 8.1.

Stupid, but it works.

Len
 
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