Vista backup onto new Windows 8.1

S

Sayth

Gawd
Joined
Oct 7, 2001
Messages
618
Hello all,

I have a friend's new laptop here as she would like me to transfer her files from her old Windows Vista laptoip onto the new Windows 8.1 laptop.

I'm having a hard time finding any way for 8.1 to access the backup and extract the files needed. Any advice? Is there a "Windows backup extractor" tool that would just let me in to grab the Music and Pictures folder?

Maybe I missed something and I'm not looking hard enough, but this seems ridiculous.

Thanks!
-Sayth
 
Have the two machines on the same network and copy files over.
 
I should have been clearer... I don't have the other laptop and can't get access to it. She also mentioned it doesn't boot anymore so could be a hdd problem. She can maybe get it in a month or so if all else fails.

What I do have is a folder from her old back-up drive named "Jess-PC"
inside is a folder "Backup Set 2014-06-11 185819".
Inside there are 4 folders. 3 named "Backup Files 2014-06-11 185819" with different dates and one named "Catalogs".
Inside Catalogs is "GlobalCatalog.wbcat"
the others each have a Catalogs folder with a bunch of "Backup files 1.wbcat" and Backup files 1.verify"

And so on and so on...
 
If it won't boot, I'm thinking you're going to need physical access to the machine. At least then you could pull the hard drive and try imaging it. That's what I've had to do for customers and friends in the past who's machines wouldn't boot.

It not booting is going to keep you from doing anything over the network.
 
I understand that. What I'm trying to do is recover files from her Windows Backup that was made before the laptop died onto an external hard drive.

Windows Vista saves the backup in this folder structure full of WBCAT and zip files. I've tried accessing these files on my Windows 7 machine and they don't open.TRhe zip files op[en, but are a mess of scattered files. Worst case scenario I sift through these... Could take hours.

I was just hoping someone had seen this where:

- User using Windows Vista
- User uses Windows backup onto an external hard drive to "protect" her data
- Vista laptop is dead or not available
- User buys new Windows 8.1 laptop
- User restores all user files from Windows backup (located on external drive)

The last step is the one I'm not figuring out. Seems silly that Windows can't get files from a Windows backup, but that's M$ for ya... I would have recommended anything other than Windows backup, but that was in the past and can't be fixed now.
 
Okay so it looks like I was over-thinking it.

Solution: Simply selected ALL the zip files form the latest backup. Right-Click > 7-zip > Extract files... Choose a folder.

So it should extract all the files into their old folder structure under the desired folder. then I'll go in and pull the files she needs out of that.

Thanks for trying to help. This all seems so convoluted. I don't understand M$ sometimes. Ah well.

Cheers!
 
Glad to hear you found a solution! Also tucking that one away in the back of my head in case I ever find myself in a similar situation. Thanks for coming back and sharing your findings.
 
You must log in or register to reply here.
Back
Top