Transferring Profiles to New Accounts with Windows Easy Transfer

Or, "Windows 10 Easy Transfer: Missing in Action."

Today I found myself needing to move a Windows profile to a new account on the same machine. That is, I wanted a new domain user account to have the same stuff (documents, settings, etc.) as an existing non-domain user. Some Internet searching turned up Windows Easy Transfer, a utility that comes with Windows 7 and is usually used for moving files to new computers.

First, you'll need to log into the machine with the new account so it has a profile. Then, switch to any account that is a local administrator, and open Windows Easy Transfer.

On startup, Windows Easy Transfer lets you choose your transfer medium - Easy Transfer cable, network, or external drive. The external drive option actually lets you store the MIG (migration) file anywhere, including the current drive. To start out, tell Windows Easy Transfer that the machine is the "old" computer. Select just the profile that needs to be transferred. There's not much purpose in securing the MIG with a password, so you can skip that. The program will write that profile's documents and settings to the MIG file.

Close Windows Easy Transfer, then open it again. This time, tell it you're on the "new" computer. Open the MIG. The trick in cross-account profile transferring is to press the "Advanced settings" link, which lets you change the account mapping. Map the old account to the new account, and start the process. Depending on the size of all the things, it could go quickly or take a while. You can erase the MIG once it's done.

Now the wrinkle: In Windows 8.1, Easy Transfer was gutted. There's no longer any option to create a MIG file or otherwise be the "old" computer, so the above procedure is impossible. In Windows 10, Easy Transfer is completely absent. I believe the recommended alternative for system administrators is the User State Migration Tool, which comes with the Windows AIK, and is supremely difficult to use compared to Easy Transfer. Clearly they should rename it to Hard Transfer.