Cannot Copy Current User Profile on Windows 7

I'm running Windows 7 as my operating system. Now the problem is that when i try to copy the built-in administrators profile to my new profile, it doesn't allow me to do so. I had been logged in as the administrator and when i try to copy a profile to the default user profile, the copy to button is grayed out. Machine has been rebooted numerous times. of the machine and the domain and still the this particular profile "copy" button is still grayed out. I'm still unable to copy the profile "grayed out". There are other profiles on this machine that will let me copy the profiles, just not the user profile I need to copy. Can any one tell me that why i cannot copy current user profiles on Windows 7? Does any body knows about it? Kindly help me out to resolve the above issue. Thanks.

Create a new admin user, log in with that user, and THEN copy the profile to a network location. It copied files onto my desktop that were on the old account, but it did not copy the same background, icons, and start menu setup from the old account to the new. Now, you can simply call a script that copies the ntuser.dat file from the network location (or a location on your install CD) to the "%systemdrive%\Documents and Settings\Default User" folder automatically during the build.

The Default User in Windows 7 is also quite unique than a users profile too. I use group policy to set Library Online as the custom user interface. I also use an autologon to the “all” account. This is set in the registry of Windows XP. It contains quite a few links to all the "hidden" stuff that is there to support Windows XP (application data, My Documents etc).

You don't want to copy it to the desktop, you want to copy it to the location of the new user profile. The file is basically the HKCU key of the user's profile, and there are quite a few memory-mapped registry keys in that hive. Log on as administrator and change the new account to administrator. Make the copy. Go back to User accounts and change your new account back to limited.