File History and restore to another PC

Using Glenn Gailey's method on Windows 10:

If you have already selected a file history drive you'll have to stop using it in Settings\Update and security\Backup; choose More options and scroll down to Stop using drive.

Go to Control panel\System and security\File history.

From the menu on the left select Select drive. From the list select the

drive with the old backup on it; if it's a network drive click Add network location.

When the list of existing backups is populated choose your old backup.

Respond to the dialog about reusing a previous backup.

I've just done this (right now) on a Surface Pro with the files from my old laptop, both running Windows 10. I didn't want all the old  files so I'm just copying the ones I want. If you want all of them you can restore the top-level directories.

Note that the old backup becomes your current backup and is renamed to your current machine. This may or may not be a problem for you. Repeat the whole rigmarole to start again with a new drive.

Richard

I have the same problem.

I had to reinstall windows 10, since my computer had stopped working correctly. My external drive, where I keep my windows history, had been connected up until the day before the crash, so I should have most of my files there.

After windows 10 had been reinstalled, I reconnected my external drive, and started up windows history configuration. The list of available drives was shown, containing only my external drive. When I selected it, no old history was shown, and no option to select an old backup was presented. This might have been because I had already started the new history. Another reason may have been that my computer name has been changed in the process (from KROISOS to DESKTOP-6A09HVD) and my user name was changed from BOUDEWIJN to WAIJERS. By now, I changed the computer name back to KROISOS.

Anyway, the path to the configuration directory on my backup device was: E:/FileHistory/Boudewijn/KROISOS/Configuration. The previously backup'ed files are in E:/FileHistory/Boudewijn/KROISOS/Data/C/Users/Boudewijn. Since I had already started backing up the history again, there is now also a directory E:/FileHistory/Boudewijn/KROISOS/Data/C/Users/Waijers, which contains my current file history (empty, but for the directories, since I have no files on my reinstalled pc yet). As noted, the files in Waijers are visible in the windows history backup overview, but alas, the files in Boudewijn are not.

In the catalog directory, all four files (config1.xml, config2.xml, catalog1.edb and catalog2.edb) have been overwritten, since I already started my new history. I have no copy of the original four files.

Is there any way to edit the names of the directories and/or the content of the xml files, in order to be able to have file history see the old file history, and restore it?

The content of the config1.xml file is as follows:

<?xml version="1.0" encoding="UTF-8"?>

<DataProtectionUserConfig SchemaVersion="1">

  <UserName>Waijers</UserName>

  <FriendlyName>Waijers</FriendlyName>

  <PCName>DESKTOP-6A09HVD</PCName>

  <UserId>7b9e03b0-d31c-4087-8967-0f391d2c687f</UserId>

  <Library>

    <LibraryName>*2112ab0a-c86a-4ffe-a368-0de96e47012e</LibraryName>

    <Folder>C:\Users\Waijers\Music</Folder>

    <Folder>C:\Users\Waijers\OneDrive\Muziek</Folder>

  </Library>

  <Library>

    <LibraryName>Opgeslagen afbeeldingen</LibraryName>

    <Folder>C:\Users\Waijers\Pictures\Saved Pictures</Folder>

  </Library>

  <Library>

    <LibraryName>*491e922f-5643-4af4-a7eb-4e7a138d8174</LibraryName>

    <Folder>C:\Users\Waijers\Videos</Folder>

  </Library>

  <Library>

    <LibraryName>Camera-album</LibraryName>

    <Folder>C:\Users\Waijers\Pictures\Camera Roll</Folder>

  </Library>

  <Library>

    <LibraryName>*7b0db17d-9cd2-4a93-9733-46cc89022e7c</LibraryName>

    <Folder>C:\Users\Waijers\Documents</Folder>

    <Folder>C:\Users\Waijers\OneDrive\Documenten</Folder>

  </Library>

  <Library>

    <LibraryName>*a990ae9f-a03b-4e80-94bc-9912d7504104</LibraryName>

    <Folder>C:\Users\Waijers\Pictures</Folder>

    <Folder>C:\Users\Waijers\OneDrive\Afbeeldingen</Folder>

  </Library>

  <UserFolder>C:\Users\Waijers\Searches</UserFolder>

  <UserFolder>C:\Users\Waijers\Desktop</UserFolder>

  <UserFolder>C:\Users\Waijers\OneDrive</UserFolder>

  <UserFolder>C:\Users\Waijers\Contacts</UserFolder>

  <UserFolder>C:\Users\Waijers\Pictures</UserFolder>

  <UserFolder>C:\Users\Waijers\Favorites</UserFolder>

  <UserFolder>C:\Users\Waijers\Videos</UserFolder>

  <UserFolder>C:\Users\Waijers\Music</UserFolder>

  <UserFolder>C:\Users\Waijers\Downloads</UserFolder>

  <UserFolder>C:\Users\Waijers\Documents</UserFolder>

  <UserFolder>C:\Users\Waijers\Links</UserFolder>

  <UserFolder>C:\Users\Waijers\Saved Games</UserFolder>

  <LocalCatalogPath1>C:\Users\Waijers\AppData\Local\Microsoft\Windows\FileHistory\Configuration\Catalog1.edb</LocalCatalogPath1>

  <LocalCatalogPath2>C:\Users\Waijers\AppData\Local\Microsoft\Windows\FileHistory\Configuration\Catalog2.edb</LocalCatalogPath2>

  <StagingArea>

    <StagingAreaPath>C:\Users\Waijers\AppData\Local\Microsoft\Windows\FileHistory\Data</StagingAreaPath>

    <StagingAreaMaximumCapacity>2497566453</StagingAreaMaximumCapacity>

    <StagingAreaWarningThreshold>1873174839</StagingAreaWarningThreshold>

  </StagingArea>

  <AvailabilityPolicies>

    <TargetAbsenceTime>5</TargetAbsenceTime>

    <TimeInUnprotectedState>3</TimeInUnprotectedState>

  </AvailabilityPolicies>

  <RetentionPolicies>

    <RetentionPolicyType>DISABLED</RetentionPolicyType>

    <MinimumRetentionAge>365</MinimumRetentionAge>

  </RetentionPolicies>

  <DPFrequency>3600</DPFrequency>

  <DPStatus>ENABLED</DPStatus>

  <Target>

    <TargetName>Backup drive I</TargetName>

    <TargetUrl>E:&lt;/TargetUrl>

    <TargetVolumePath>\?\Volume{98f03193-0000-0000-0000-100000000000}&lt;/TargetVolumePath>

    <TargetDriveType>FIXED</TargetDriveType>

    <TargetConfigPath1>Boudewijn\KROISOS\Configuration\Config1.xml</TargetConfigPath1>

    <TargetConfigPath2>Boudewijn\KROISOS\Configuration\Config2.xml</TargetConfigPath2>

    <TargetCatalogPath1>Boudewijn\KROISOS\Configuration\Catalog1.edb</TargetCatalogPath1>

    <TargetCatalogPath2>Boudewijn\KROISOS\Configuration\Catalog2.edb</TargetCatalogPath2>

    <TargetBackupStorePath>Boudewijn\KROISOS\Data</TargetBackupStorePath>

    <TargetWarningThreshold>98</TargetWarningThreshold>

  </Target>

</DataProtectionUserConfig>

The number of files in my old history is over 155,551, and just copying the whole tree to my newly installed computer, followed by deleting the files that have multiple versions, and finally renaming them to their old names would be unfeasible.

Perhaps someone knows of some third party tool that does the trick of searching through these files to sift out the files that have multiple copies (save for the timestamp)?

Or would it help to create a new user account 'Boudewijn' and then starting windows history again, hoping that windows history will then see the correct backup?

Or am I too late anyway, and is the fact that my catalog.edb files have been overwritten reason enough to stop hoping. Whithout these two files, is restoration in any automated way still possible, at all?

Thanks in advance for your advice!

All that is unnecessary. After reading all previous posts and experimenting I found the follow (in windows 10):

Which brings up the following:

Click on select another back and it will bring up the following:

From there you browse the files you want to restore, restoring individual files, or folders and all in them and everything.

Muzza.au

Unfortunately this doesn't always work (though I haven't tried it on the latest Windows 10) - it seemed to require the username and computer name on the new cleanly installed machine to be exactly the same as on the old machine, and even then it always failed for me on Win 8.1.