User State Migration Tool and USMT Customization

USMT is an extensive tool, deserving its own dedicated tutorial! In short, USMT searches a system for all user data and settings, packaging them into a single archive file. You can then import this archive onto another system, restoring the user data and settings. USMT's default configuration captures all known Microsoft-centric settings and data, such as wallpaper, color scheme, Microsoft Office documents, favorites, and all files in the user's profile folders. You can customize these defaults based upon the requirements of your environment. The current version of USMT, 4.0, is part of WAIK and is the preferred version to use with OSD because it adds many capabilities. The "USMT Versions" section discusses the differences between the two current version of USMT and choosing between them.

Microsoft provides documentation on USMT 3.0 (required for migrating to Windows XP or Windows Vista) at http://technet.microsoft.com/en-us/library/cc722032.aspx and USMT 4.0 at http://technet.microsoft.com/en-us/library/dd560801(v=WS.10).aspx.

USMT Customization

The information USMT captures from a source system is highly customizable by modifying or creating a series of eXtensible Markup Language (XML) configuration files. These XML configuration files describe the files, folders, and registry entries that USMT captures; you can either specify exact filenames and registry locations, or perform wildcard searches to locate data or settings in these XML configuration files. USMT then uses these configuration files to capture all specified data and settings and put them into an archive for later use in restoring to a destination system.

USMT actually consists of two tools:

• LoadState.exe
• ScanState.exe

As their names imply, ScanState.exe captures the data and settings, whereas LoadState. exe restores them. Although the use of these two tools is mostly hidden from OSD in ConfigMgr, it is worth noting.