Transferring Windows XP Files to Windows 7

If you want to transfer all files and programs from a standalone Windows XP computer to a standalone Windows 7 computer, you can use one of the remote file transfer scenarios described in this chapter. There are three transfer methods that you can use:

• Parallels USB cable . A boxed version of Parallels Desktop Upgrade to Windows 7 comes with a special USB cable that can be used for transferring the data from one computer to another. Using the Parallels USB cable is the easiest way to perform the transfer. The only limitation is that the two computers must be physically close to each other fro the cable to reach from one to another. For detailed information on USB file transfer, see Transferring Using the Parallels USB Cable .
• Network . You can transfer the data using the network connection between your Windows XP and Windows 7 computers. For detailed information, see Transferring over Network .
• External storage device . You can also transfer the data from your Windows XP computer to a virtual machine and save the virtual machine files on an external storage device, such as a USB external hard drive. After that you can connect this device to the Windows 7 computer and transfer the virtual machine to it. This process is useful if you do not have the Parallels USB cable or if your computers are not connected over a network. For detailed information, see Transferring Using an External Storage Device .

In the following sections, we will use the term target computer to refer to the Windows 7 computer and we will use the term source computer to refer to the Windows XP computer.