Backup/Restore - File Source Not Found

Question

I'm having trouble restoring a .bak file while moving it from laptop A to laptop B. First, on A, I backed up the 'Staging' db, creating the Staging.bak file which I transferred to laptop B. I restored (or thought I did) the .bak on B but it doesn't show
up on my list  of B's Databases even after refreshing and restarting SQL Server.
Second, I then tried with T-SQL as below and got the error shown. I'm specifying a path with '\Program Files' and the error msg refers to 'Program Files (x86)' which, on my machine, doesn't have the subdir's listed in the err msg. Those dir's are part of the
\Program Files path (and this is also the 'Data Path' listed in SQL Server Config Mgr).  I'm running SQL Server 2014 Express on Windows 8.1.
RESTORE DATABASE Staging
FROM DISK = 'C:\Program Files\Microsoft SQL Server\MSSQL12.SQLEXPRESS\MSSQL\Backup\Staging.bak' ;
Msg 5133, Level 16, State 1, Line 1
Directory lookup for the file "C:\Program Files (x86)\Microsoft SQL Server\MSSQL12.SQLEXPRESS\MSSQL\DATA\Staging.mdf" failed with the operating system error 3(The system cannot find the path specified.).
Msg 3156, Level 16, State 3, Line 1
File 'Staging' cannot be restored to 'C:\Program Files (x86)\Microsoft SQL Server\MSSQL12.SQLEXPRESS\MSSQL\DATA\Staging.mdf'. Use WITH MOVE to identify a valid location for the file.
Msg 5133, Level 16, State 1, Line 1
Directory lookup for the file "C:\Program Files (x86)\Microsoft SQL Server\MSSQL12.SQLEXPRESS\MSSQL\DATA\Staging_log.ldf" failed with the operating system error 3(The system cannot find the path specified.).
Msg 3156, Level 16, State 3, Line 1
File 'Staging_log' cannot be restored to 'C:\Program Files (x86)\Microsoft SQL Server\MSSQL12.SQLEXPRESS\MSSQL\DATA\Staging_log.ldf'. Use WITH MOVE to identify a valid location for the file.
Msg 3119, Level 16, State 1, Line 1
Problems were identified while planning for the RESTORE statement. Previous messages provide details.
Msg 3013, Level 16, State 1, Line 1
RESTORE DATABASE is terminating abnormally.

Answer 1

When you take a backup all information including the file path(.mdf/ldf) is included as part of the backup. As you found out if you just run restore database it will try to restore to the exact same location(C:\Program Files (x86)\Microsoft SQL Server\MSSQL12.SQLEXPRESS\MSSQL\DATA\).
Looks like you dont have this path(C:\Program Files (x86)\Microsoft SQL Server\MSSQL12.SQLEXPRESS\MSSQL\DATA\) on target server where you are performing this restore.
To know the files and locations from backup file, you can use RESTORE FILELISTONLY option allows you to see a list of the files that were backed up and their original path.  So for example if you have a full backup you will see all of the data files
(mdf) and the log file (ldf) and their path.
RESTORE FILELISTONLY FROM DISK = 'C:\AdventureWorks.BAK' WITH FILE = 1
The result set would like the following.  The things that are helpful here include the LogicalName and PhysicalName.
ColumnName
Value
Value
LogicalName
AdventureWorks_Data
AdventureWorks_Log
PhysicalName
C:\Program Files\Microsoft SQL Server\MSSQL.1\MSSQL\Data\AdventureWorks_Data.mdf
C:\Program Files\Microsoft SQL Server\MSSQL.1\MSSQL\Data\AdventureWorks_Log.ldf
So as suggested please use WITH MOVE option while restore to provide the valid path.