The Migration Problem

Every 3 years, your clients need to upgrade their PCs. Furthermore, the next upgrade won't just be a hardware upgrade - your clients will have to upgrade to Windows 7. They simply won't have a choice: Windows 7 is finally an OS that excites the market, and will most probably be installed on the next PC you buy.

Performing these upgrades has traditionally been a long, painful task. Users had to install their new OS from scratch, reinstall all their applications, configure them, copy their data, and then make everything work together again and feel like it used to before.

There are two main cases of a migration problem - replacing existing hardware, and upgrading to new OS.

Migration to new hardware

In this case, the user wants to get new PC hardware, and keep his user environment intact. This is usually done once every three years - this way, the hardware is under warranty, and does not exceed the reasonable wear and tear, which could lead to unplanned downtime.

What the user needs sounds simple - move the OS, applications, settings and data - to the new PC. In practice, this is not that straight-forward. You can't just take the hard drive and stick it into the new hardware - the system will crash before it even boots.

Zinstall solves this case by providing a single-click, robust product that moves the system from one PC to another, fixes the hardware and software incompatibilities and keeps the user environment intact. Just run it, and give the client his brand new PC - fully operational.

Migration to Windows 7

Windows 7 is not another Vista - it is really getting the market excited. People want to buy a new OS, and they want it installed on their next PC - desktop or laptop.

Once again, users have to install all their apps from scratch, configure them, copy their data - it's a huge headache, and leads to data loss and conflicts.

Just several of the migration problems are:

Software conflicts

When the old system runs GreatApp 3.0, and the new one has GreatApp 4.0, migration is problematic.

Do you leave the old one and uninstall the new one? That would prevent you from having all the new features.

Do you leave the new one? That may lead to old files and settings being incompatible with the new app - or just placed in incorrect locations.

Furthermore, sudden changes in not just the OS, but also the apps will confuse the user and hit the productivity hard. When the "Send" button moved to a new location in Office 2007, thousands of people have to call support just to send an email.

Software incompatibility

Legacy applications may not even run on the new system. Precious tools that served the user for years on Windows XP stop running. Other applications may have unexpected or partially broken experience.

This is an inherent problem when migration to a new OS - but there is a solution.

Changes in user environment and system look and feel

Right-click menus, Outlook rules, toolbar placements, application settings - these are all subtle but powerful things. While not really noticeable in your daily routine, you will feel it when they are gone. Without these settings, the new system just won't feel like home. Even look-and-feel aspects, like changes in the order of icons on the desktop, are devastating for many users, leaving them frustrated and non-productive.

Data loss

Manual and utility-assisted migration will, in many cases, copy only selected files to the new location. It may be just the user profile, or the My Documents folder. This is usually not enough, and leads to data loss.

To ensure a successful migration, we need to provide the confidence that all the user files are available on the new system - wherever and whatever they may be.

Just like the hardware migration case, Zinstall solves these problems by providing a single-click, robust product that moves the system from one PC to another - but in this case, the old system does not replace the new one. The user has both his old and new environments on his new PC, just like two TV channels - and can switch between them instantly, with a single click.

Read more to learn the details