What is a Easy Transfer Cable? or do you need to go from XP to Windows 7?

You have already heard that Windows XP support is history. If not, read the following:

http://hodentek.blogspot.com/2014/01/windows-xp-support-anit-malware-support.html

After Windows XP came a number of OS Upgrades the most important ones being Windows Vista, Windows 7, Windows 8, Windows 8.1 and soon Windows 10. Of course there were two different architectures as well x32bit and x64bit.

If you had had a Windows XP and migrating to Windows 7 you would need a easy tool. Looks like Windows Easy Transfer was utility made just for this and should be available in Windows 7.

With this utility there were three ways you could transfer stuff between two computers as shown in the opening screen of Windows Easy Transfer (migwiz.exe).

If you were without a network connection you could use the Easy Transfer Cable or create a file on a external HD or a USB Flash drive.

Well what is this Easy Transfer Cable?

It is a USB Male-to-Male connector with an intervening electronic device that allows fast transfer between the connected computers while providing short-circuit protection.

You could buy this cable from a number of vendors such as Belkin (Model FSU258, FSU279),  Dynex (DX-C113231), and many others.

Here is a picture of one of the Belkin cables.

 Here is a listing of transfer support it provides.

Read more here:
http://plugable.com/products/usb-easy-tran/

How do you create a compressed file in Windows 8.1?

Normally (as in Windows 7 or Windows XP) it should be real easy requring just a right click on the file you want to save as a compressed file.

It is (sometimes) not that easy in Windows 8.1. The reason being the right click produces a dud if there is something wrong. Did I say a bug? or corrupted file? Nothing happens, as in my case. The CMD.exe cannot be run in adminstrative mode since the same thing happens as a with a right click.

What do you do now?

As any sane person would do, trash your laptop/desktop/tablet/phone/xxx or Microsoft. I am kidding.

The solution I found is the following:
You need to read the next two posts to prepare yourself:
http://hodentekhelp.blogspot.com/2014/10/how-do-you-open-file-explorer-in.html
http://hodentekhelp.blogspot.com/2014/10/how-do-you-access-folderfile-properties.html

Having read the above open you folder which contains the file or folder you want to compress as shown:
Now you can see you can create a zip file. Click on New Item to create a zip file.

 

How do you access folder / file properties in Windows 8.1?

In earlier versions of Windows you would right click a file or a folder to access the properties via the drop-down menu.

But in Windows 8.1 (in my case Windows 8.1 Professional 64bit), a right click would just refresh the Windows Desktop and nothing happens). I believe this is not how it should be and here is a way to look at the folder / file properties.

In Windows 8.1 open the File Explorer as shown.

Click open the folder for which you want to review the properties. In this case Desktop for example.
The Window for Desktop opens with its own ribbon as shown.

Choose the folder or file (mysorian in this case) and access its properties via the Properties toolbar item.

It was so easy in earlier versions. I wish the earlier way of access is restored.