How to Migrate Office 2013 or 2016 to new computer

I recently upgraded my workstation to a new computer running Windows 10 Pro.  I needed to move over my Outlook 2016 email accounts and calendars to the new location.

 

This is a very easy process.

  1. Install Office 2013 or 2016 on the new computer.
  2. Run windows updates
  3. Make sure both computers are not currently in Outlook
  4. Copy the entire outlook data folder to your new computer.  I am not providing directions for this.  You should know what your doing here (or use google).
  5. Now you will have a copy of outlook data (PST’s) in both locations.
  6. Copy over any internet shared calendars from your old machine to the new machine.  File location is here, and it would be sitting in the root if it exists:
    1. C:\Users\{username}\AppData\Local\Microsoft\Outlook
  7. On your old machine run REGEDIT.  EXPORT this entire key which contains all your email account settings.
    1. HKEY_CURRENT_USER\SOFTWARE\Microsoft\Office\16.0\Outlook\Profiles\Outlook
    2. Note: If you are on a different version of outlook the version 16.0 will be a different number.
  8. Copy that REG file to your new PC and double click and let it insert it into the registry
  9. Move over any signatures from your old computer to your new computer.  Those are located here:
    1. C:\Users\{username}\AppData\Roaming\Microsoft\Signatures
    2. Note: You probably should just copy the entire folder and paste it in the same place on your new PC.
  10. Launch Outlook on the new PC.  Pick your profile and set as default.  Then go update each accounts’ passwords.  Once you update the passwords you will be able to resume doing email exactly as you were doing it on the old PC.

 

One comment

  • Bill C

    I tried this approach. Trouble is, when I start up Outlook after inserting the reg key on the new computer, it fails on .ost files not being present. This appears to be a catch 22 to me and I’m not sure how to get around it.

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