Direct to Desk

A laptop computer sitting upon a desk with palm trees overlooking a summery view.

What is the Direct to Desk Refresh initiative?

Western is dedicated to ensuring that staff can fully participate in technology-enabled work and learning. The Procurement & Corporate Services Team (PCS) in partnership with the Information Technology and Digital Services (ITDS) team are working to deliver an enhanced service delivery of Western’s enterprise end-of-lease program, called Direct to Desk Refresh.

What does this mean?

From March 2022, teams across PCS and ITDS will begin upgrading eligible Dell laptops and desktop computers for staff at Western. This will be for staff who have a current Dell device that has a lease expiration date prior to 1st Oct 2021. You will be contacted if your laptop requires replacing.

Getting a new Computer...Now what?

Back up the Old to Bring in the New!

To ensure that you have a positive and seamless experience swapping over to your new computer, we need you to do a few things. To help, we have prepared some steps to help you through the process, before and during. Afterwards, we would also love to hear from you as well to see how we could improve the process moving forward.


Let's Get Started

It is important to follow these steps to ensure you are up and running in no time!

Before: Back Up Your OLD Computer

Before your new Dell Computer arrives, it is important for you to backup and synchronise your old computer to the network. Please follow these instructions to get ready and use our checklist below (red centre button) to help guide you through the process

There are two ways that you can back up your computer.

1) Connecting to WSU’s Network and synchronising your computer.

  1. Once you are connected to the University network via cable (not wireless), log on to the computer with your WSU credentials.
  1. Right-click on the sync centre icon on the bottom right of the taskbar and select sync all. Wait until the icon stops spinning for sync to complete. Please see this guide (opens in a new window): KB0016376 Please note: This is for laptops only.

2) Sign in to OneDrive to backup data to the cloud

Staff can use OneDrive to store and backup their data and information at any time. Please see OneDrive (Laptops and Desktops) (opens in a new window) KB Number: KB0018542.

Please note: If you are not using a standard WSU setup/imaged computer, you will need to use the OneDrive backup method.

For additional information, please see our Back-Up Your NEW Computer (red button below) to help you through the steps.

Through each step, please feel free to contact the Service Desk via WesternNow. Please be sure to reference the term "Direct to Desk" in your ticket or phone call.

TIPS & TRICKS: Information/data to consider for backup include: - My Documents (Pictures, Videos), Items that you have on your Desktop, and make sure you look in your Downloads.

During: Set up your NEW Computer

Yay! Your new computer has arrived. Now what? As above, we have created a checklist for staff that are setting up their new computer. Please click on the centre button below to download it.

Please note: for those staff who have chosen to synchronise to the University’s network, you can only do this whilst you are on campus

Before you Begin: 

  1. Make sure that your new computer is connected via cable (not wireless) to the WSU network.
  1. Log on to the computer with your WSU credentials. Please note that your initial login may take some time while it creates your profile on this machine.

Now you’re logged in, please see our Setting Up your NEW Computer (red button below) to help you through the steps.

Through each step, please feel free to contact the Service Desk via WesternNow. Please be sure to reference the term "Direct to Desk" in your ticket or phone call.

Now You’re All Set up, We’d love to hear from you!

We would love to hear from you! We have set up a feedback form so we can see how to improve the rollout in the future. For those of you who have received your new PC., shortly you will receive an email from the Service Desk (via Qualtics). It should only take 2-3 mins for you to fill out.