Xfer Files From XP OS to Vista. Without burning CD's or 'backing up', etc.

[Coldkilla]

Drives: 1. 300gb.

Situation: Just formatted my computer by copying 250gb's of files into friends 500gb hdd. Formatted my hdd with WindowsXP. Now I got Vista in the mail, I really want to install it.. But Don't want to have to borrow my friends hdd again so I can back up me 250gb's of data. I don't want to purchase another hdd, and I was wondering if there is ANY possible way to group the data somewhere and be able to access it from Vista, then delete XP and make Vista the only OS on my pc.

Possible??

Update:
Alright. I installed windows and selected: Keep files in my PC, and just upgrade windows. After it installed, it restarted my PC. It started to load Vista (Black Screen, loading bar on bottom w/Mic. Corp text on bottom). Then.. The blue screen of death

Notes: Compatibility Tests Prior to Vista Install: The PC was compatible.
Programs that conflicted with install: 0
The programs that "may be a problem after install"
http://img101.imageshack.us/img101/3455/untitledql1.jpg

Also, when I decide to restart my PC using XP, this comes up:
http://img167.imageshack.us/img167/1192/directionsfy0.jpg

 

[Smilin]

Gotta love that rollback! If you were going to 2000 to XP you would be fvcked!

Based on that compatibility result I'm betting you hit a Stop 7B for that BSOD.


I would suggest a backup, clean install and restore. Don't use XPs NTbackup for this though.

Whatever path you choose, have Vista compatible drivers ready for your SCSI raid controllers and provide them during install. Note: they no longer have to be on a F6 floppy. Cdrom will do.

 

[Coldkilla]

Will I need anything if I have the one hard drive?

I never used a floppy to install the current one (I don't even have a floppy drive).

When I connected it to my current set-up, it just worked out of the box. Will I need to locate drivers for it now?

 

[Smilin]

I'm kinda guessing here that the BSOD you got was a stop 7B. If that's the case then providing mass storage drivers during setup should fix you.

If it was something else I dunno.

In any case I would recommend a backup + clean install. You would of course need that 2nd drive or some other method to do the backup.

 

[Coldkilla]

Yea. Im leaning towards borrowing my friends HDD again for his backup space.

Alright I will do that. I'll try to find the drivers for my HDD as well. Is there anything else I should know before going into Vista and formatting?

 

[Smilin]

not really. If you are going the format+clean install route things should go very smoothly. reminder: don't use XP ntbackup to do your backups. You won't be able to read them in Vista.

See you on Vista soon!

 

[n0cmonkey]

Always always always have backups.

 

[Coldkilla]

Alright cool.

 

[Coldkilla]

Well I did a fresh install.. looked up in my file directory's.. I could access "Old Windows" folder, and I took everything from XP out that I wanted.. And everything works fine. Problem is.. I wanna delete old windows.

 

[Smilin]

you backed up right?

Delete away!

 

[Coldkilla]

Well, I didn't back up. It was 250gb's and I didn't have that many dvd's! lol. When I installed Windows Vista. There was an option to "Delete all files and install fresh copy of windows" I did that.. However, it didn't delete the old copy of windows. In my C directory there was a file called "old windows" containing all of my old partition's information. I simply copied all my music & important data from there into my Vista's partition. Then deleted the auto generated "old.windows" folder.