Can migration assistant be run a second time to finish transferring the same user to a new Mac ? On my first go it went to sleep and things like my address book did not get moved over.
iMac, Mac OS X (10.6.6), iMac 2.7 GHz core i5
Yes, but you first need to remove the user or the next migration will create a different username for the same account.
Yes, but you first need to remove the user or the next migration will create a different username for the same account.
Right. But what if the partially transferred account to be first deleted happens to be my admin account and therefore the new Mac's "accounts" pref doesn't want to allow me to delete it ?
Create a temporary second account with admin status. Log into that account. Delete the other account. Migrate your files again. Assuming success log into your migrated account and delete the temporary account.
I wish someone at Apple would take note of the conflict or trap THEY have created -- between the default "Sleep" setting in the Energy Saver pref panel on new Imacs shipped, and the proper and full operation of Migration Assistant as part of the normal user experience when first starting up a brand new machine.
While running the Migration Assistant, you are in trouble if you let either the "Source" (old Mac) or the new destination machine go to sleep while migration is under way.
My migration was destined to take 90 minutes at least, but unknown to me Apple had shipped my new Imac i5 with the default sleep setting set to around 15 minutes. Little did I know this when I started the assistant to try to move about 100 Gb worth of stuff from old to new computers.
The resulting 'crash" of Migration assistant caused me no end of trouble deleting partially transferred accounts and trying to figure out what had come over and what was missing before I fixed Apple's energy saver setting and ran the assistant all over again !
It would be a good idea to build into the migration assistant app a sequence that lets you set your sleep option on the target machine to "Never" - even if only for the duration of the time the assistant is running.
Apple specifically instructs that the source computer be set by the user to never sleep before running Migration Assistant:
http://support.apple.com/kb/HT3231
"Avoid letting your source computer go to sleep while you are attempting to migrate.
To prevent your source computer from going to sleep during the migration.
However the brand new machine (which is the DESTINATION computer, not the SOURCE computer) typically does not have any user account on it when brand new, so there is no way for the owner to tell it not to sleep. I do not expect this would be a problem normally because the DESTINATION computer is kept busy during the entire migration and hence would not go to sleep during the process. However there is a danger that the SOURCE computer could go to sleep, for instance while the DESTINATION computer is spending a lot of time moving files around or setting up directories, the SOURCE computer might have nothing to do for a long enough time that it might sleep which might interrupt the process. Hence Apple's guideline above.
I have used Migration Assistant and Setup Assistant several times and never had a sleeping problem, and these migrations took between 2 and 6 hours each.
Also, if you follow Apple's guideline and set the SOURCE computer not to sleep, that setting will get migrated over to the new one which means it won't sleep either.
I am guessing you had your source computer set to sleep and that's what it did, which caused the migration to stop, unfortunately.
If the Address Book is the only thing you are missing, you can manually migrate it easily. Their is an Address Book folder inside your user Library Folder, inside the Application Support Folder. That can simply get moved over to the new computer. Also, you may want to move several preference files from the Preferences Folder that have the name "address book" in their filenames. If you need to migrate a lot of other things also, then Kappy's suggestion is the best one.
Steve, I have to agree with Michael above. If you buy a new Mac during the set up it asks you if you want to import from another Mac. If you say Yes, then it takes you through the whole set up. Never, and nowhere, does it say 'adjust your energy settings to Sleep: Never.
This is an important oversight, and it should be included.
Can migration assistant be run a second time to transfer the same user to a new Mac ? On my first go it went to sleep and things like my address book did not get moved ovrr
