File organization woes

[five.five-six]

It's my own fault. Every time I upgrade my system, for the last 15 years, I just add my old HDDs to my new system or just copied an old drive onto a new partition. I have reached the point where I have14 volumes spanning 4 physical drives.

It's time for a new computer now that XP is no longer supported and this box is getting sluggish.

Sorting through everything is an enormous task, I am looking for a software solution that will help me do it.

[five.five-six]

Also, new box windows 7 or 8?

[billofrights]

Why just copy the whole thing? You're saving so much junk from multiple OS installs to all of the installed software and so forth. Copy out what you actually need- docs, pics, whatever, then wipe the rest. Wasting space keeping multiple old PC's worth of Windows.

[AreWeFree]

Get yourself a new Win 7 system and get rid of the old junk.

Your old hard drives contain: Windows folder, program files, misc junk files (extracted driver installations, temp files, etc), and then your user profile folder and any specific data folders you made.

Get a new computer, make a new folder called "Migrate"

Copy your old user profile folders and any known data from old drives to this new folder so you can sort through it later.

Now turn your computer off and remove the old drives, then move on with life.

If you missed a file and really need it the old drives are still there, but you will likely have everything you need in the user profile folders, which you should cut/paste to document folders, etc, so you can get organized.

[five.five-six]

Why just copy the whole thing? You're saving so much junk from multiple OS installs to all of the installed software and so forth. Copy out what you actually need- docs, pics, whatever, then wipe the rest. Wasting space keeping multiple old PC's worth of Windows.

That's Exactly what I am doing, I have about 15 years of photos and movies and documents hidden away in there, I actually just spent about 7 hours sorting through it today. I just hope I didn't miss anything.

[five.five-six]

Get a new computer, make a new folder called "Migrate"

Copy your old user profile folders and any known data from old drives to this new folder so you can sort through it later.

Now turn your computer off and remove the old drives, then move on with life.

If you missed a file and really need it the old drives are still there, but you will likely have everything you need in the user profile folders, which you should cut/paste to document folders, etc, so you can get organized.

That's kind of the source of my problem. I have a full tower and over the years when I upgrade my machine I have been just adding the previous HDDs. Last iteration there were 6 physical drives, mostly SCSI. I Just copied those into respective partition volumes. It's a lot to manage. I have a lot of old photos, videos and documents that are irreplaceable.

This iteration they are going on a RAID 5 or 10.

[AreWeFree]

It sounds like you are adept at using computers/managing files, so I'm a bit perplexed why you keep a dump of so much data that doesn't apply to your current environment.

If you have lots of pictures/photos/videos/documents (user data) and you know where it is, it should be very painless to consolidate this to subfolders. Spending an hour a day should have you done in no time and everything will be easier moving foward.

Also if you're considering using RAID, which I highly advise you don't use built-in motherboard controller or software for this, then consider a simple RAID 1 with two nice WD 4TB drives.

If you are going to shell out cash for reliable data storage then look at a decent NAS. It is more versatile since you can access/manage from all of your devices, uses very little power, is easily expandable and can be more readily secured (if that is a concern to you.) Plus you can regularly image your main system to the NAS and have a good disaster recovery plan.

Drobo is on the expensive side but is awesome. Seagate is cheaper but only decent (I don't recommend them, a few bad experiences), Netgear can be hit/miss depending on model but are decent, and newer WD devices are pretty good.

[five.five-six]

If you have lots of pictures/photos/videos/documents (user data) and you know where it is, it should be very painless to consolidate this to subfolders. Spending an hour a day should have you done in no time and everything will be easier moving foward.

See, that's the problem, I don't know where they all are. laziness over the last decade and a half. Every camera, phone or import device has the propensity to store stuff in their own little directory, so I have stuff spread allover the place.

Also if you're considering using RAID, which I highly advise you don't use built-in motherboard controller or software for this, then consider a simple RAID 1 with two nice WD 4TB drives.

Think this would be good enough?

http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16816117214

If you are going to shell out cash for reliable data storage then look at a decent NAS. It is more versatile since you can access/manage from all of your devices, uses very little power, is easily expandable and can be more readily secured (if that is a concern to you.) Plus you can regularly image your main system to the NAS and have a good disaster recovery plan.

Drobo is on the expensive side but is awesome. Seagate is cheaper but only decent (I don't recommend them, a few bad experiences), Netgear can be hit/miss depending on model but are decent, and newer WD devices are pretty good.

I'm thinking cloud storage but drop box seems pricey.

[billofrights]

Don't know where they all are? Just do a search for "*.jpg" and copy them all to the new location. Same for .mpg, .doc, etc. Just scan the whole thing. Remember to sort by size and ditch anything under a few kb also, there's tons of little icon files. I've gone through terabytes of stuff fairly quickly this way.

Once it's moved, go through and delete duplicates and do some organization. By year, event, whatever works for you.

[AreWeFree]

See, that's the problem, I don't know where they all are. laziness over the last decade and a half. Every camera, phone or import device has the propensity to store stuff in their own little directory, so I have stuff spread allover the place.
Think this would be good enough?

http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16816117214

I'm thinking cloud storage but drop box seems pricey.

1. I would strongly discourage you from relying solely on an online backup. It is slow to restore, may not be there when you need it, privacy risks, etc.

2. The RAID card you linked to is very expensive and you are already in the territory of a very nice dedicated NAS device. I just had a customer spend about $900 on a decent internal RAID 5 setup with an Areca card and 3 4TB WD Re drives. This is strictly protecting against a single hard disk failure and of course future expansion. Edit: The $900 was over half the cost of the new computer.

If you want a very good NAS that is simple, reliable, and expandable, I would suggest a Drobo:

http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=9SIA24G15S7986

3. Finding your files should be easy. Search for file types as suggested above with *.extension, such as *.jpg, *.png, *.bmp, *.jpeg, etc. Hopefully you know the filetypes your data is in.

Also you should just go through with a fine tooth comb and get your data in order.

As I suggested previously, make a folder to consolidate your data in, have two explorer windows open, and start cutting/pasting.

If you really don't want to manage this, then pay someone to do it for you. It would be reasonable to pay about $160 for a few hours of work having a reliable person migrate your data for you and set up a backup solution.

[Darryl Licht]

See, that's the problem, I don't know where they all are. laziness over the last decade and a half. Every camera, phone or import device has the propensity to store stuff in their own little directory, so I have stuff spread allover the place.
Think this would be good enough?

http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16816117214

I'm thinking cloud storage but drop box seems pricey.

I have over 20 years experience and am located in Riverside, I'd be happy to help you with the migration. <-- I do it all the time for clients & friends!

And... wish I'd seen this earlier, but just get the new PC and then connect old hard drive(s) into that as additional HDs. The new PC will be much faster at searching, organizing, and moving files than an old/tired XP machine. You will be blown away by the speed of todays multicore machines!

Raid card is expensive and requires additional drives to work. Windows 7 & 8 is much more organized regarding users files. How much user data (docs, photos, music, and videos) do you have? Are we talking MB, GB, or TB???