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Transfer data from old to new iMac

I am upgrading my old PPC iMac G5 (OS 10.4) to the newest iMac with Snow Leopard. What is the best way to transfer over all my old files including all saved emails in Mail, all photos in iPhoto, all addresses in Address Book, all documents in Pages, Word for Mac, etc? Is there a way to hook the two iMacs together? I also have all the files backed up on an external hard drive. Maybe that could be hooked up to the new iMac.? Thanks in advance to all who provide help.

iMac G5 PPC, Mac OS X (10.4.11)

Posted on Nov 5, 2009 11:17 AM

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4 replies

Nov 5, 2009 11:28 AM in response to David Talley

the easiest is to use Setup Assistant. when you first turn the new mac on it will offer to migrate you applications and users from another mac or a backup drive. ollow the instructions there.

the backup needs to be either a bootable clone or a time machine backup. you did not say what kind of backup you've got. it will not work of you simply copied some files to an external by hand. f
you can also do it later using
Migration Assistant. It's located in /Applications/Utilities.
however, keep in mind that while using those automated tools works very well for most people you may have some issues because you are migrating from PPC to intel. consult this link for details
http://discussions.apple.com/thread.jspa?threadID=435350&tstart=0

this link also suggests that you should migrate manually but that is not actually necessary in most cases.

Nov 5, 2009 12:06 PM in response to V.K.

I will second V.K.'s suggestion to be very careful about using Apple's tools to migrate APPLICATIONS from an old PPC Mac to a new Intel Mac. I tried that when I went from a 2002-model eMac to a 2007-model Intel iMac and it caused problems.

Migrating user data was not a problem for me. There is a migration assistant tool that asks you to run a firewire cable from the new machine to the old one (I think it will also work with USB but I'm not sure). It can then automatically move your user account and data from the old machine to the new one.

It's best to reinstall third-party applications from the disks if you still have them, IMHO.

Nov 5, 2009 12:31 PM in response to V.K.

V.K. wrote:
however, keep in mind that while using those automated tools works very well for most people you may have some issues because you are migrating from PPC to intel.


The chances of this are slim to begin with & much less so for Snow Leopard -- its Setup/Migration Assistant is the "smartest" one yet & includes the ability to detect most incompatible applications.

Transfer data from old to new iMac

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