Problem migrating walllet.dat with Windows Easy Transfer

[Waschtel]

I've spent the last couple of days migrating from a Windows 7 to a Windows 8.1 machine. There's a standard tool that comes packaged with windows called "Windows Easy Transfer". The promise of this application is that you push a button, all your old files are backed up and then you push another button and all your files reappear on your new machine.

This is overpromised, but not completely off the mark, and I guess a user with modest demands would find most of his data on his new machine.

However, when I installed the Bitcoin-QT client on the new machine, I saw that wallet.dat hadn't been transferred. The AppData folder is simply not backed up by Windows Easy Transfer and considered junk.

Wouldn't it be more user friendly if the Bitcoin-client chose a standard directory for the wallet.dat which is located on a backup path of Windows Easy Transfer? I'm sure a couple of hundred bitcoins will get lost because of this in the coming years.

[ToTheZeroth]

I think this goes deeper than Windows Easy Transfer. Placing the wallet file in a folder (AppData on Windows, hidden folder on Linux) which a "non-power user" is never supposed to poke around in, does not exactly encourage or facilitate making any kind of backup of the file. Or is the reference implementation only intended for power users, not for mass adoption? (I realize that most mass adopters might not want to download the entire blockchain, but the more who do so, the better, right?)

[deepceleron]

Windows easy transfer has previously transferred user app directories correctly, which is exactly where the wallet is located. If you manually unchecked the user profile when copying, you cause your own problems. http://technet.microsoft.com/en-us/library/cc722197%28v=ws.10%29.aspx

You will start to see Microsoft recommend that you transfer stuff with cloud skydrive with windows 8.1, so that they can hang on to the lock-in a bit more.

[Waschtel]

@deepceleron: I didn't uncheck anything. Easy Transfer ignored AppData all by itself.

[elasticband]

@deepceleron: I didn't uncheck anything. Easy Transfer ignored AppData all by itself.

that would be seriously big problem considering many applications store personal data in the appdata location.

[Waschtel]

The world is not a rational place:
http://ludwigkeck.wordpress.com/2011/05/27/treasures-left-behind-by-windows-easy-transfer/