1A First Alternative

Refreshing a user's Windows-profile - Windows 8.1

Microsoft has ceased security support for Windows 8.1 on 9 January 2018. This means that PCs running Windows 8.1 will no longer be safe to use.

Please contact your 1A partner to obtain a more recent operating system or a new PC.
This manual is for older systems and/or software and is no longer maintained.

This manual explains how to refresh your server profile. This remedies the situation where a profile has become too large.

Requirements

To complete this manual, you will need:

  • A computer connected to your 1A-server
  • The login credentials for the user in question
  • The login credentials for the local administrator
  • The name or IP address of your 1A-server

Steps

1
Preparation
  • Restart the computer
  • Log in as local administrator
2
Rename the local profile
  • Open 'Windows Explorer'
  • Go to 'C:\Users\'
  • Create a folder with the name 'Old'
  • Move the folder with the profile of the user in question to 'Old'
  • If it exists, also move the folder 'Temp' to 'Old'
  • If multiple folders for this user exist, for example User-PC2, also move these to 'Old'
Rename the local profile
3
Remove the profile from the Windows profile-list
  • Open the Registry Editor "regedt32", right-click the start-button and choose 'Run'
  • In 'Registry-editor', go to HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\SOFTWARE\Microsoft\Windows NT\CurrentVersion\ProfileList\
  • Find the folder with the profile of the user. It can be recognised by the value of the field ProfileImagePath (see the image for an example)
  • Remove this folder, including its contents. Do not remove any other folders!
  • Close the Registry Editor
Remove the profile from the Windows profile-list
4
Rename the network profile
  • Open 'Windows Explorer'
  • Enter the name or IP address of your server prefixed by two backslashes.
    For example \\servername or \\companyname
  • Behind that, enter another backslash and the username.
    For example \\servername\username
  • Press 'Enter' on your keyboard
  • Log in on the server as the user in question
  • Click 'Organize' → 'Folder Options'
  • In tab 'View', Check "Show hidden files and folders"
  • Click 'OK'
  • Rename the folder '.profileNT.V2' to 'OLDprofileNT.V2'
Rename the network profile
5
Configure the new profile
  • Log off the local administrator
  • Log in as the user in question. The user will receive a completely clean profile.
  • Restart the computer
6
Restore data
  • Log in as local administrator
  • Go to 'C:\Users\'
  • Open the folder 'Old\username' and 'username' in separate windows
  • Copy data back from 'Old\username' to 'username'. Please note the overview of what to copy and what not.
Restore data
7
Recreate the Outlook profiel
  • Log off the local administrator
  • Log in as the user in question
  • Go to 'C:\Users\username\AppData\Roaming\Microsoft\Outlook'
  • Look for a file ending in '.NK2'
  • Note the name of this file without the '.NK2' extension. This is the name to give to the Outlook profile.
  • Start Outlook
  • Create the profile with the name you noted

Troubleshooting

1
This manual does not cover all software packages. Commonly used software that also requires data to be transferred includes the following:
  • Mozilla Software (like Firefox and Thunderbird)
  • Apple Software (like iTunes)
  • Microsoft Software (Excel, Word, Outlook Express)
  • Bank software
2
The user can only log in with a temporary profile
  • If the User can only log in with a temporary profile, it is possible that the old profile was not removed from the Profile-list in the registry (step 3)