Windows 7 Installation - Transfer to a New Computer

How to Transfer your Complete Windows 7 Installation to New Computer​

To start, a warning from Microsoft:

   Note

Important

You must use the Sysprep /generalize command to generalize a complete Windows installation before you can use the installation for deployment to a new computer, whether you use imaging, hard disk duplication, or another method. Moving or copying a Windows image to a different computer without running the Sysprep /generalize command is not supported.

This tutorial will show you how to do the transfer.

   Information

Windows 7 System Preparation Tool is a powerful, native Windows tool. When for instance used in so called Audit Mode, it let's you to freely configure Windows 7 to be then deployed to other computers as hardware independent image.

In this tutorial we use System Preparation Tool (sysprep) to prepare your Windows 7 installation to be moved to a new computer, keeping all your installed applications, program settings and user profiles. You can use this method for instance when you have bought a new PC and want to transfer your existing setup completely, without need to reinstall everything, or when you want to make major hardware changes like change the motherboard or GPU, which would usually cause Windows to stop booting normally.

   Warning

Using this method causes Windows 7 to lose all activation information, and it needs to be reactivated afterwards. If your Windows 7 is an OEM version, you might not be able to reactivate it, at least not without phone activation option.

I do not recommend to use this method on RAID systems. All experiments on RAID I know have failed.

With the speed of today's hardware evolution, most of us geeks are upgrading the hardware more often than operating system. Upgrading hardware can be painfully slow process if we need to reinstall the operating system and all our installed applications, plus transfer program settings and user profiles.

Using sysprep makes this easy. Changing the motherboard, or for instance an old ATI GPU to a new nVidia GPU quite often causes Windows 7 not to be able to boot anymore. This fact is usually accepted by the user, who then reinstalls the OS and all applications and transfers user profiles from a backup location.

Same thing when buying a new computer with completely different hardware setup compared to the old one, or trying to restore a system image to different hardware setup. Normally this would include a complete reinstallation of Windows 7 and all applications.

Why not use sysprep to avoid reinstalling? Here are the different scenarios where you can use it.

   Warning

An upgraded Windows cannot be sysprepped. As this method is based in sysprepping, this tutorial is valid only for Windows setups which have not been upgraded.

This means that if you have for instance in-place upgraded Vista to Seven, or using Anytime Upgrade upgraded for instance a Home Premium to Ultimate, you cannot sysprep and this tutorial cannot be used in your case.

Notice that a repair install is also an upgrade install, so if you have ever done a repair install (= in-place upgrade to same edition), you cannot sysprep.

PLEASE DO NOT FORGET TO CREATE A SYSTEM IMAGE BEFORE PROCEEDING!​

As you can read on this thread, on rare occasions this method does not work. If this happens, you can always restore your system using your backup image.

Backup Complete Computer - Create an Image Backup
System Image Recovery

IE10 Users: Please read this article first: Sysprep Fatal Error With IE 10 (FIX) | System Administration

METHOD ONE

Changing hardware components but keeping old hard disk(s)

Use this method if you:
- Change other hardware components but keep your old HD containing Windows 7
- Move the HD containing Windows 7 to another computer

1. Before installing new hardware, boot Windows 7 normally
2. Disconnect all external hardware except mouse, keyboard and main display. If your system folders are located only on C: drive, disconnect all other hard disks except that containing the C:. In case of relocated system folders, for instance the profile folder Users located in another drive and other system folders on C:, first move the relocated system folders back to C: then disconnect all other drives. Reboot after this
3. Run Command Prompt as administrator
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4. Type to Command Prompt: %windir%\System32\Sysprep\Sysprep.exe, and hit Enter
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5. In sysprep dialog that opens, choose System Cleanup Action as Enter System Out-of-Box-Experience (OOBE), select Generalize, select Shutdown Options Shutdown. Click OK
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6. Sysprep generalizes now your Windows 7 setup and shuts down your computer. Do not run any other programs during this phase!
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7. Switch the main power of your PC off and install the new hardware OR dismount the hard disk(s) and mount it (them) to a new computer
8. Boot the PC from sysprep generalized hard disk. You will notice Windows booting as if it was the first boot after installation, installing default drivers and updating registry. One or two reboots are needed, depending on your system specifications
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9. When Windows finally boots up, you will need to enter all information as if this really was a new, fresh installation
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10. Because your old user profiles already exist, Windows does not accept your normal username, but instead you have to create a new temporary user. I use username Test for this purpose
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11. When login screen appears, choose your old user account to login
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12. Windows boots now to default OOBE first boot desktop, with default 800*600 resolution and default theme. All your installed applications are there, as well as your old user profiles and folders. Windows has installed the default drivers for your setup, you can update them if needed
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13. Go to Control Panel > User Accounts and delete the temporary user account (in this case Test) that you just created

METHOD TWO

Change the hard disk(s) or move Windows 7 setup to a new computer using third party imaging software

Use this method if you:
- Replace the HD containing Windows 7 on your old computer
- Move Windows 7 to a new HD on another computer

1. Follow steps 1 through 5 above (method 1)
2. Boot PC with an imaging CD/DVD (Paragon, Macrium etc.). See Macrium Reflect Free:at our sister site TenForums.com: Backup and Restore with Macrium Reflect Windows 10 Backup Restore Tutorials . Also see this post for a practical tip to create a Macrium system image.
3. Create an image of your system
4. Turn PC off, change the hard disk(s) and reboot with imaging application, restoring the image OR boot the new computer with imaging software and restore the image
5. Continue from step 7 above (method 1)

This procedure is failsafe, and works every time. There is nothing to worry, but of course it is recommended to make a backup before trying this. I have even used this method when some serious driver issues caused the PC to constantly crash (BSOD), to reset all drivers to Windows defaults and then reinstalling them one by one to find the culprit.

   Note

What does Sysprep generalizing do to my Windows 7 setup?

• All system specific information is removed or uninstalled
• Security ID (SID) of your hardware setup is reseted
• All system restore points are deleted
• All event logs are deleted
• All personalization is removed (taskbar, toolbars, folder options, start orb etc.)
• Built-in administrator account is disabled (if it was enabled) and needs to be re-enabled after the transfer if needed

What happens when booting first time after sysprep generalizing?

• First boot configuration is run
• New SID is created
• Re-arm counter is reseted if not already re-armed three times
• Windows 7 is booted using first boot default drivers and settings

I have tested all above mentioned methods with all versions of Windows 7, from Starter to Enterprise. It works every time, with one exception: for reasons unknown to me, sysprep seems sometimes dislike Windows Media Player networking service, which is by default started every time Windows 7 starts. In about every third time I've done this, I've got an error message when trying to generalize:



However, this is not a big problem. You just need to stop the WMP networking service, and run sysprep with generalize option again. You can stop the service in question by typing net stop WMPNetworkSvc to command prompt, and hitting Enter:



If you have any questions, do not hesitate to ask.

Happy computing!

Kari

EDIT: A Useful tip from xxxwea, as later confirmed by Victor:

Kari, just a suggestion.

You might note in the tutorial that if on first booting Windows can't finish configuring, a reboot into safe mode, then a normal reboot will allow it to finish successfully.

This has happened to me both times I used a sysprepped system drive in a new computer. I found the answer to this problem buried deep in this thread the first time I ran into it, and the same thing happened yesterday on a different computer.

It's a seemingly very silly solution, but it works. I do believe many people have abandoned their sysprep work when they encounter the problem.

I think the solution deserves more visibility.

 

[blackzero]

Very excellent tutorial.

To be honest I just knew this after I read your topic. =x Shame on me.

 

[wkt]

Thank you Kari for your long answer.

I just found Method Three in your tutorial.

I think - though I am no deep knowledge Microsoft expert - I am beginning
to understand your method and I should have known it before I started my own
trial and error method.

Thank you for another great tutorial of this forum !

 

[Kari]

No problem. I'm still experimenting myself, learning as I go. The idea behind this tutorial was to take some of these wonderful Windows features usually only known and used by pros in corporate network systems and adapt them to benefit normal users, without being too technical.

Of course, doing this really as it should be done we would take WAIK to create WinPE to be able to build hardware independent images for deployment. But first normal users would already stop reading after they found those words WAIK and WinPE. The methods described in tutorial do the thing, and in one or two PC's home network it's all that's needed.

I am already writing the second part to this tutorial, for more advanced users. Give me a few days

Kari

 

[Dave76]

Looking forward to the tutorial v2.

Thanks for putting in the work on this topic.

 

[WDAexodus]

Very nice tuturial. Helps with tards like me who decide to install 7 on a partition that you didn't mean to install on. Yeah, would've helped if I would have realized this BEFORE I installed all the software and updates.

 

[gregrocker]

A great way to introduce consumers to SysPrep here.

I hope everyone who uses this tutorial will rep Kari above for such a valuable contribution:

 

[WindowsStar]

A great way to introduce consumers to SysPrep here.

I hope everyone who uses this tutorial will rep Kari above for such a valuable contribution:

+1

 

[Kari]

Thanks, Greg. Coming from a valued senior member and an MVP, your words really made me smile!

I happened to stumble upon this way of using sysprep almost accidentally, when sysprepping a newly installed system to be imaged and transferred to two other computers on my small home network. I then realized that because the things sysprep does, it must be possible to use it also when changing hardware, to let Windows "forget" current hardware setup and start from beginning.

It's just a practical example of that we quite often can use development, deployment and other tools also for quite simple tasks.

Kari

 

[Dinesh]

This is mostly used by Manufacturers like Dell or HP. I remembered while working with Dell, when our customer's used to turn on their new PCs for the 1st time, they could have all softwares pre installed and it would just run like the images shown in the above tutorial.

Great info Kari. Now we can build our own custom PCs and can sell it to customers. Lets make a new PC company.

 

[gregrocker]

Is there a way to SysPrep an image itself, other than Acronis 10+ with Universal Restore?

The steps given here show how to create an image from a Sysprepped HD. Can it be run on a mounted image instead?

 

[Kari]

You mean if you can sysprep an image? No, at least I have not heard of it.

 

[dmoney517]

This is perfect! Thanks so much for putting together this tutorial.

 

[BecXWin]

Have Image & Hard drive, can restore on another machine?

Hi Kari,

Great information. Thanks for your work.

Here's an "Anyway I can do this?" question...

My workstation died, but not the hard drive - the hard drive is fine (runs Win7 Pro 32bit). The night before, I did a fresh backup using "Backup and Restore", so I was thinking, no problem! I'll restore my system on one of our older PCs. The dead system is a Dell GX620, "new" old system is a Dell XPS.

Attempts:
1.) Just swap the hard drive into the "new" old computer. Fails at Windows logo.
2.) After much research, I restored the workstation image on a new, blank 1TB drive in the "new" old system and after running Repair Startup many, many times (and replacing the BOOTMGR), I got it to the point of selecting "Safe Mode". But, it still fails to boot (fails at Windows logo). Obvious hardware driver problems, I think.

Is there anyway to apply the "sysprep" to the hard drive with the perfectly good system (and all my applications) to get the "new" old computer to accept it? You already answered the question on if the image can be "sysprep-ed" -- no.

Maybe, install it as a second drive and use sysprep on it?

Thanks for your help and information,
Bradley

 

[Kari]

Hi Bradley, welcome to the Seven Forums.

Only thing coming to my mind is to boot to safe mode (you mentioned that's OK?), then try steps 2 & 3 in tutorial to try if Windows can boot to Audit mode. If not, I really do not know how to do it.

Sorry.

Kari

 

[gregrocker]

I believe your only easy option at this point is to boot Paragon Adaptive Restore CD to run on the HD before attempting to start it - it will remove all the drivers and prepare it to start without any problem unless the boot sector has been messed up.

 

[Filip433]

awesome job Kari,just one question,

im planing to change my motherboard. so if i do the sysrep. and then after the sysrep is done and my computer is shutdown. i start it with paragon from a cd, creating an image. shuting it down when its done doing the image. replacing my old motherboard with the new one and run paragon at start and restoring the image i had done with paragon before i changed motherboard?

one more question, is the image paragon is making stored on the harddrive?

awesome info man, hope u continue with what u do. big love a dumb 15 year old DD

 

[Kari]

Hello Filip, welcome to the Seven Forums.

If you are keeping your old hard disk where Windows is installed, just changing the motherboard, there's no need to make an image. The image is only needed when you also change the hard disk.

So, when only changing the motherboard, do this:
- Sysprep as told in tutorial (Method One, steps 1 to 5)
- When computer is shut down, replace motherboard (Method One, step 6)
- Boot the computer (Method One, steps 7 to 12)

Kari

 

[Filip433]

thnx^^, that easy seriously i thought i had to do a fresh install but now i can keep all my work ^^ i've got an OEM key for my seven right now. will i be able to use it to reactivate cause as i know the sysrep removes the key and i have to re-enter it. or must i buy a new license?

big thnx Filip

you are really a big help for all

 

[Kari]

You are welcome.

Some bad news, though... In the beginning of the tutorial you can find this warning:

   Warning

Using this method causes Windows 7 to lose all activation information, and it needs to be reactivated afterwards. If your Windows 7 is an OEM version, you might not be able to reactivate afterwards, at least not without phone activation option.

You most probably need to call Microsoft afterwards, trying to explain your situation. As far as I know, also what I've sometimes read on the Seven Forums, some users have had luck (or rather understanding from Microsoft's side) to get an OEM version re-activated after change of motherboard.

Strictly speaking the End User License is clear and you'd need a new license. But, as I said above Microsoft is known to have shown some understanding. You might have luck.

Here's an important tutorial for you to read: http://www.sevenforums.com/tutorials/18715-activate-windows-7-phone.html

Good luck!

Kari

 

[Filip433]

I'll try that thanx again! ^^