Windows XP had the somewhat archaic but functional "Files and Settings Transfer Wizard"

Windows Vista/7 has the wonderfully useful "Windows Easy Transfer" (at least wonderful on 7)

What does Windows 8 have? (Outside of the blind usmt; the highly unsecure MSA OneDrive sync, which is not an option and borderline illegal when dealing with legal information, and highly confidential data; and the per user 'Backup' feature, which is utterly useless for administrators)

Touching on USMT being 'blind', a command line tool whose only customization options reside in complex XML files, that lacks the ability to see inside user profiles to be able to pick and choose which items to be migrated.

Here is the scenario.

All users profiles are located locally on the systems to which they use. There is no central profile store, mainly due to cheap infrastructure admins. All computers are re-imaged once per year with a new, updated image.

Quite often, users are hit with malware of some sort, or fall victims of their own folly with 'bogged down systems' due to 'dirty profiles'. Many of these situations result in a re-imaging of the system. However, often we don't want to move entire profiles over to the newly cleaned system, and Easy Transfer makes it extremely quick and easy (and graphical) to pick and choose which items within the profile are moved, as well as the ability to openly view all profiles on the system and pick and choose those as well.

Here is where Microsoft's "great and easy backup solutions" in Windows 8 don't cut it.

USMT doesn't allow you to openly view all the profiles, and pick and choose individual profiles and items within profiles to backup. Sure I can take ownership of all the profiles and browse them manually, write down each profile and what items I want backed up and write a corresponding XML file... by which time, the reimaging would be complete, and WET will have transferred the data.

Microsoft Account with OneDrive 'sync' is completely useless for administrators, as it is a per user option. And each user needs a Microsoft Account. Sure I can tell every user that Microsoft is forcing them to have a Microsoft account, and to do their own backups. They bitch about their problems enough as it is, what's two more things to bitch about going to hurt! Not to mention the legal ramifications of synchronizing confidential and legal data to the internet.

New "Backup" feature, also completely useless for administrators, as again, it is per user. Each user has to set up their own backup sets, which then require some form of additional (preferably external) storage to hold the backups.

Both the MSA and Backup features blindly backup all user's settings as well as documents, etc... which defeats the purpose of why (in many cases) the profiles are being backed up and restored in the first place - to delete and recreate new, clean profiles, while retaining the user's documents.

So, again, what is Microsoft's solution for this problem in Windows 8 (and coming up, 10)? When is Microsoft going to get off the high horse and admit that discontinuing the WET tool (or redesigning it, as is the case with the WET over the Files and Settings Transfer Tool) was a huge mistake, making the lives of those of us that deal with their products far more complicated than it has to be, all because "We're getting with the future, and the future is CLOUD!"