What's the best method to transfer data to a new 24" M1 iMac?

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What's the best method to transfer data to a new 24" M1 iMac?

As I await delivery of my new 24" M1 iMac, I wish to prepare for the transfer of data to it from my current iMac (21.5", late 2012) running Mac OS 10.15.7.

I see various suggestions here in this forum using Migration Assistant, but some questions remain.

Any specific advice regarding the following would be appreciated:

can I do the entire transfer via an ethernet cable?
or, what other cables/adapters will I need?
or can I just do it cordless via my existing private/secure WiFi?

Note: I do have a Time Machine back-up, if needed. The new 24" iMac is maxed-out; 4-port.

Thanks in advance for any advice.

Posted on Mar 29, 2022 6:59 AM

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Answer 1

Top-ranking reply

rkaufmann87

Level 10

143,688 points

Mar 29, 2022 7:48 AM in response to larrybobba

Please follow the directions in Setup Assistant and Migration Assistant and your migration will go perfectly. It is really extremely simple and is overall the fastest and most reliable method.

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Answer 2

den.thed

Level 10

82,102 points

Mar 29, 2022 7:26 AM in response to larrybobba

Wi-Fi Migration will fail 99.9% of the time and an Ethernet connection is really really slow.

The fastest and easiest way to Migrate to a new iMac, is to connect your old iMac's Time Machine backup to the new iMac and use Migration Assistant when prompted by the Initial Setup.

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Answer 3

Mar 29, 2022 7:34 AM in response to larrybobba

Have a last Time Machine backup completed on your 2012 iMac. Before you power up the new iMac, connect that Time Machine drive. During the initial setup process when you power the M1 iMac for the first time, there is a prompt about transferring data from another Mac, or Time Machine drive. Choose Time Machine and select that drive. Then sit back as it transfers your personal data, email, contacts, etc to the new Mac. This might still take an hour or so… but when you finish and the new iMac is operational, everything should be where it was on your old iMac.

You may want to disconnect that Catalina Time Machine backup drive before allowing the first backup on the new iMac, and I suggest that you start with a new, APFS formatted drive that is 2.5 - 3x the size of the drive in the new iMac. You would have to visit System Preferences > Time Machine, point it at the new drive, and then select Back Up Automatically.

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