best way to transfer everything on new hard drive for mac book pro

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Level 1

11 points

best way to transfer everything on new hard drive for mac book pro

Hi have a mid-2009 macbook pro with 4 GB ram and 250 GB hard drive, which is full now. I just bought 8 GB RAM to speed it up and a new 1 TB hard drive. I am running latest Lion (that I downloaded from mac app store - I have the original install DVD for Snow leopard). What would be the best and cleanest way to transfer everything (OSX, applications, data, files, user preferences, passwords, etc from the old hard drive to the new one)^

1- I heard I can hook the new hard drive via USB and do a clean install of my Snow leopard DVD, then update to Lion via mac app store. Then how do I transfer everything else?

2- I also heard about carbon copy cloner, but somewhere it says there is a file in Lion that this will not copy.

Anybody have any helpfull answers?

thanks

Naniners

MacBook Pro, Mac OS X (10.7.4)

Posted on Jun 28, 2012 7:47 AM

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Answer 1

sprale

Level 1

4 points

Feb 6, 2017 3:42 PM in response to naniners

$ sudo rsync -arv SourceDirectory DestinationDirectory

-a means archive with everything you need, -r means recursive to dive into subdirectories, while -v means verbose so you can watch the status.

If it fails, or if you want to treat it as a Time Machine alternative, just run the command again to continue the transfer or to add files that have changed on the old drive. It can take some getting used to rsync if you're not a command line person, but Terminal is your fiend, and can make some things so much faster than most apps.

Better than Time Machine: backup your Mac with rsync

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Answer 2

Bonenfant

Level 1

125 points

Jun 28, 2012 8:54 AM in response to naniners

My suggestion would be to use Migration Assistant. This program you have in your Utilities folder and once you hook up your old Hard Drive to the new computer via USB or Target Disk mode, it will pretty much direct you on how to do the whole process. If you have any other questions, let me know.

Migration Assistant steps for 10.6xxx

http://support.apple.com/kb/HT4413

Migration Assistant steps for 10.7xxx

http://support.apple.com/kb/HT4889

I've done this many times and it works very well.

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Answer 3

Jun 28, 2012 8:56 AM in response to naniners

I would go with cloning your hard drive via carbon copy.

I've done that a couple of times when I installed new drives in my macbooks. So far it works for me.

I'm running lion on both my macbooks and haven't had any issues when I did the clone.

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Answer 4

naniners Author

Level 1

11 points

Jun 28, 2012 9:00 AM in response to Bonenfant

Thanks for the fast reply,

I am new to this replace hard drive stuff

So, should I use lion recovery HD, to install lion on the new drive before using migration assistant? Or will migration do it for me?

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Answer 5

naniners Author

Level 1

11 points

Jun 28, 2012 9:02 AM in response to Bimmer 7 Series

Thanks bimmer,

Will ccc transfer everything? Lion osx, applications, iTunes, everything?

Can I just hook the new drive in its enclosure via USB, and run carbon copy cloner?

Do I need to format the new drive first?

Thanks

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Answer 6

Bonenfant

Level 1

125 points

Jun 28, 2012 9:06 AM in response to naniners

Migration Assistant does it all for you.

I'm not to sure on Carbon copy so you will have to rely on Bimmer 7 for support there.

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Answer 7

Jun 28, 2012 9:11 AM in response to naniners

Yes, carbon copy will transfer everything.

Here's how you do it.

Connect your new drive via USB, open disk utility, format/erase new drive as MAC OS Extended Journaled.

Once that's done, open carbon copy and start cloning. You will get a pop up message saying that "you haven't create a lion recovery partition ". Click ok and proceed to create the partition with carbon copy.

Proceed with Carbon Copy once the partition is done.

Once carbon copy is done, install your new drive in your macbook and turn it on. You're now back in business.

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Answer 8

naniners Author

Level 1

11 points

Jun 28, 2012 9:14 AM in response to Bimmer 7 Series

Thanks

I will try that as soon as I receive my new drive, should be next week. I will keep you posted

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Answer 9

naniners Author

Level 1

11 points

Jun 28, 2012 9:15 AM in response to Bimmer 7 Series

Should I buy the carbon copy cloner or the trial version is enough?

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Answer 10

Jun 28, 2012 9:20 AM in response to naniners

use the free version.

that's what i'm using...

yes, keep me posted to see how it works for you...

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Answer 11

naniners Author

Level 1

11 points

Jul 4, 2012 8:45 AM in response to Bimmer 7 Series

Just received my stuff, upgraded my ram to 8gb. Will transfer clone my new hard drive tonight.

I have a USB cable and a fire wire. Which one is best? Is te FireWire capable of powering up my new hard drive enclosure or shoul I use the USB? I don't have a AC adaptor.

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