Copy messages in messagequeues from Windows Server 2003 to Windows Server 2012 - .net-4.5

Question

We are migrating from Windows Server 2003 to Windows Server 2012. There are messages in private messagequeues on Windows Server 2003 that we need to move to Windows Server 2012. It's a one-time task.
The following 3 steps corrupted messagequeues on server 2012, and I had to uninstall and reinstall Message Queuing on Server 2012.
mqbkup -b c:\msmq_backup -y (on 2003)
Copy c:\msmq_backup from 2003 to 2012.
mqbkup -r c:\msmq_backup -y (on 2012)
http://technet.microsoft.com/en-us/library/cc773213%28v=ws.10%29.aspx
http://technet.microsoft.com/en-us/library/hh875586.aspx
I access these messagequeues and messages from .NET console and ASP.NET applications using System.Messaging Namespace.
http://msdn.microsoft.com/en-us/library/system.messaging%28v=vs.110%29.aspx
Any ideas would be appreciated. Thank you.

Answer 1

MQBKUP is not for moving to upgraded systems as it restores the old MSMQ configuration which, as you've found, won't necessarily be compatible.
If the computername is the same, you could try straight copying the LQS and Storage folders. On startup, MSMQ checks the address in the messages. If the address matches the local computername, the message will be loaded, otherwise discarded.
Of course, this assumes the MQ file format is the same in 2012 and, unfortunately, I haven't had a chance to look.