Data Transfer Differences in Storage Migration Service

[CathiMT]

I found an article from 12/2019 saying that once you hit the transfer button (and then don't cutover right away), when you come back it will change to say "transfer differences."  I want it to do this so that I can run the initial transfer for timing and testing purposes before we do the actual cutover, but on all 3 servers I've run the data transfer, none of them say "transfer differences."  Has this feature been removed?  I would hate to transfer ALL the files every time and it would save time if it would just transfer different files or same files with different/newer updated dates on them (meaning users made changes and I want to make sure those changes get copied over as well).

Any help?

[#2 · Accepted solution]

I figured out how to resolve this issue by doing the following:

1) installing storage migration service proxy on destination servers

2) installing windows updates

[#3]

I'm hoping this might help others attempting to use Storage Migration (assuming its not a dying product). Sorry if I'm posting this in the wrong place.

Sync

• The "transfer differences" box did not come up for me, when it had some errors on the sync. I assumed I could push past these "cosmetic" errors as they were shares I didn't want anyway. This doesn't appear to be the case, and you do need a successful initial sync on everything before it allows differentials
• As per other peoples posts, if "Destination Proxy Wasn't found" comes up, make sure you've installed the storage migration proxy on the destination server, and windows updated everything (source, destination and orchestrator) and restarted multiple times (even then, I dont really trust how robust the orchestrator's ability to pick up changes quickly on rescans, I've had servers powered off and it still thinks it can see them)
• The COM error is apparently a known issue and can be ignored

Cutover

• When performing the cutover, if renaming the the old server to something which exceeds NETBIOS, you dont get any warning but it does contract the name (not a biggy as long as you know...)
• The already known issue on a cutover, of attempting to set a new static IP for the source server causes issues. KB patches which are meant to resolve dont seem to help so seems best just to leave as DHCP
• In my case, no matter what I did, the network adaptor settings would not fully migrate. So I would end up with the primary DNS server set on the NIC, but the actual static IP not set. At least DNS resolution worked
• With the cutover, it doesnt seem to inherently perform a final sync. Which is fine as long as you know... 
• If the cutover stalls, there doesnt seem to be an obvious way to cancel it on the Orchestrator, however with a bit of messing around with IP or DNS settings on the source/destination, it can right itself (worth checking you know the local admin password of both boxes)

Environmental issues which were not Storage Migrations fault

• DNS not handling records properly and producing weird results
• admin$ shares missing on old 08 servers which needed to be recreated using LANMAN reg keys

It feels like it could be a good product, but needed more polish. I can't see a lot of activity since 2019 which is a shame.