Moving All My Stuff

Darren

Darren

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Staff member
I'm going to be building my new computer tomorrow and I'm wondering how I should go about transferring my files. All my current HDD's are IDE and my new motherboard won't have IDE support.

I have a few things I want to transfer and if someone could tell me how to do each that would be great. :)

1. iTunes. This includes music, apps, and movies. I have about 3 GB worth of music, 16GB of apps (yes I know it's crazy), and about 4 GB of movies. I just synced up my iPod and it's my understanding that I can just download iTunes on the new computer, plug in my iPod, and it will sync everything that's on my iPod onto my new computer. Correct?

2. Steam. I have about 30-40GB of steam games (maybe less, not sure). I have an external HDD that I can use to transfer these games over. Do I just copy my entire steam directory over to the external then put it back on the new computer? This transfer will be going from Windows XP to Windows 7 if that makes any difference.

3. Microsoft Office 2007. This is a legit copy that I got about 2 years ago. It came with a free upgrade to 2010 when it would be released. I did that update and am now running 2010 on this computer just fine. I noted somewhere from a review on Amazon.com that doing so voids your 3 licensed installs on separate machines. Not exactly sure if that's true, and if it is, why? I've only installed it on one. Anyone heard about this? Hopefully I can just install 2007 and update to 2010.

All my documents and pictures I can throw on my flash drive and transfer over.

Thanks for any feedback.
 
Last edited:
Denther said:
I'm going to be building my new computer tomorrow and I'm wondering how I should go about transferring my files. All my current HDD's are IDE and my new motherboard won't have IDE support.

I have a few things I want to transfer and if someone could tell me how to do each that would be great. :)

1. iTunes. This includes music, apps, and movies. I have about 3 GB worth of music, 16GB of apps (yes I know it's crazy), and about 4 GB of movies. I just synced up my iPod and it's my understanding that I can just download iTunes on the new computer, plug in my iPod, and it will sync everything that's on my iPod onto my new computer. Correct?

2. Steam. I have about 30-40GB of steam games (maybe less, not sure). I have an external HDD that I can use to transfer these games over. Do I just copy my entire steam directory over to the external then put it back on the new computer? This transfer will be going from Windows XP to Windows 7 if that makes any difference.

3. Microsoft Office 2007. This is a legit copy that I got about 2 years ago. It came with a free upgrade to 2010 when it would be released. I did that update and am now running 2010 on this computer just fine. I noted somewhere from a review on Amazon.com that doing so voids your 3 licensed installs on separate machines. Not exactly sure if that's true, and if it is, why? I've only installed it on one. Anyone heard about this? Hopefully I can just install 2007 and update to 2010.

All my documents and pictures I can throw on my flash drive and transfer over.

Thanks for any feedback.
Click to expand...

#1 won't work, I don't think. I tried that and it said an error "you can only sync with one library". I think your best bet is to use a external hard drive. You could just copy your whole library to there and then copy it from the external HD to the new computer. I think that would be the easiest way. It's also good to have one to backup your stuff anyway.

#2 won't work. You can't just copy the directories, unfortunately. You have to reinstall the games.
 
According to Steam support #2 works?

https://support.steampowered.com/kb_article.php?ref=7418-YUBN-8129

I've read that this has worked with people moving to an entirely new computer.

Also this leads me to believe I can do what I said with iTunes.

http://support.apple.com/kb/PH1463

Sorry to contradict what you guys just said and I probably should of researched some more before posting a thread...

Anyways thanks for the help. I'll attempt to do what these articles say. If it doesn't work I'll use your methods.
 
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