Windows 10: Need assit in backing up user profile without win access

I've experienced a critical error in Windows that is going to require repairs and I would like to avoid losing or potentially losing as many settings, files and programs as possible. I assume the best way to do this is to back up my User Profile and any setup software I have for installed programs, preform a clean install and then replace the User Profile and install the programs again. I just need some help/advice on how to do this from the Automatic Repair>>Advanced Options>>Command Prompt environment, since the problem I'm having prevents me from accessing the Windows 10 OS.

Thanks!

:)

 

Problems backing up a User Profile to an external hard disk using drag and drop

Hi argel,

Thanks again for you quick reply - I was not expecting one over the week so again much appreciated.

I tried what you suggested and created a second new user but again got the same error message, namely :

The User Profile Service failed the sign-in.

User profile cannot be loaded

Yet again, this second new account did not create a folder in the 'Users' folder with the new name hence the error message.

While I was waiting for your reply I took the initiative (bad move !!) and created a folder with the first new account name in the 'Users' folder and moved/copied some files across from my original account to see what would happen. Well nothing happened
apart from filling up my disc which was what I was partly trying to relieve in the first place when I was backing up my user account to my external account. I decided therefore to delete the folder of the first new account that I had created manually. Actually,
I may have made things worse because when I now log on to my original account, although my original desktop icons appear, I get the following error message :

Location is not available

C:\Users\<first new account>\desktop is not available. If the location is on this PC, make sure the device or drive is connected ......................

..and all my desktop icons dissapear when I acnowledge with <OK>. Somehow, the system if looking for my desktop in the folder of the first new account name (which I have deleted) rather than in the folder of the original account name which still exists.

Looks like I am going to have to a complete reinstall from my original Windows 7 disk although I am not sure how I will be able to upgrade to Windows 10 since this is not now available.

Best Regards

alan

 

Problems backing up a User Profile to an external hard disk using drag and drop

After buying a Seagate Expansion, I thought that I would backup some files from my HP Elitebook and decided that the quickest and simplest way would be to drag and drop my user profile (under Local Disk C:\Users). The copy went through but not before it
prompted me with dozens of files that I did not have permissions and for each one I selected 'Skip' thinking that these would not be important to backup anyway. The next time I rebooted my PC (or straight away I can't remember) my default windows 10 background
had been replaced by a black background and my applications that were previously pinned to the task bar had been removed. Both the start button and the search box were not active and my program icons on the desktop did not start the associated programs. A
complete disaster !! The size of the backup on the Seagate was bigger than the size of my User Account leading me to assume that files and folder had been deleted from the source i.e. my PC hard driver. I do not have a windows 10 recovery disk or original
disks as I upgraded for free from windows 7.

Does anyone know what has happened and why drag and drop has seemingly corrupted or more likely deleted files from my PC when all I did was copy ? And, of course, does anyone know how to recover from this situation ? Should I try to delete my User profile
from my PC and copy it back from my Seagate or will this only compound the problem ?

 

You can't really do what you hope to do. After a clean install of Windows you have to re-install your programs/apps from scratch. There is no magic way to back up everything but the basic Windows OS and restore it all. About the closest thing you could try is PCMOVER but I don't know if that will work from an environment where you can't get into a running Windows that you are going to "move":
Feature Overview - Laplink(R) Software

What I do in a situation like yours is use Kyhi's Recovery Tools:
Windows 10 Recovery Tools - Bootable Rescue Disk

Boot from that and use the programs on there to either move the damaged Windows installation to a minimally sized partition at the end of the drive, do a clean install to the rest of the drive, and then pull what I can save from the old Windows saved in it's own partition.

or use Macrium Reflect (also on Kyhi's recovery tools) to save an image of the damaged Windows installation, do a clean install, then retrieve what I can from the backup image.

 

Thank you kindly for the advice!

I've already copied the folder: C:\Users\(username) to an external USB drive, so I can preform a clean install and then, as I think you've suggested, go through everything manually and pick out all the files and SOME of the more basic particulars involving the previous Windows setup, like visuals and icons and start menu items etc. Although it sounds quite tedious, I can do that!

I suppose that I thought there would be a simpler way to sort of move the old user profile to the new installation and import it so that windows recognizes it. I guess that's just not possible...

 

There might be a way and I just don't know about it.

 

NavyLCDR: I know you can mount image backups as virtual drives, or bring certain kinds of backups up as VMs. The latter might provide the source for something like PCMover to make its move from. The real issue is making sure you can get the VM that represents the prior snapshot up and running. I know you can't do this with a Windows backup image. I don't know, however, if a backup environment like Acronis or Macrium Reflect might not offer a VM creation tool. And of course, with sufficient preparation you can use Hyper-V to create a VM version of any running Windows installation (Convert a Windows PC into a Virtual Machine using Hyper-V).
--Ed--

 

Macrium viBoot - Create Virtual Machine using Macrium Image

 

Sweet! Thanks for bringing this to my attention. Can't wait to try it out.
--Ed--