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User profile for user: Chase Ring
Chase Ring Author
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Somewhat migrating to Mountain Lion

I currently have Lion installed, which is an upgrade over Snow Leopard. My iMac is a Summer 2010 Intel. The HDD in this system is 1TB. I'm currently using up about 450GB.


I want to upgrade to Mountain Lion, but I don't want to do it the regular way because I have too much old stuff on here that I don't want, but I still want to pick and choose the things I want to keep.


So what I was thinking is this:

Cutting the main partition in half. 500/500. Installing Mountain Lion fresh onto the blank partition, and then from within that partition running, mount the old Lion partition, and copy selectively the stuff that I want over. Music, some Applications, and whatever else I want.


When that would be all set and done, and I definitely don't need the Lion partition anymore, I was wondering this:


(The question)


Can I delete the Lion partition, and basicallyl absorb the free space into the Mountain Lion partition. I would like to have it so that it works just like I installed ML onto the main partition to begin with.

The only thing I ask on top of that, is that since I'm a little OCD... it would bug me if the partition numbering would be off by one. For example, I know that the main partition is 0, and it would unfortunately bug me if after all this was completed, that the main partition would for some reason be labeled as 1.


It wouldn't stop me though if the numbering was off, would simply bug me a litte. A small price to pay for being able to do the thing I ask.


Thanks for any help everyone!


(In case some people are wondering what kind of things I don't want following over, would be any old settings, old files, fluff from old applications, and worst of all ... some weird font problem where I somehow have thousands of fonts installed [that I honestly don't know where they came from] that I want gone, but can't manage to get it to reset the fonts ... even when I use the Font Books font reset thing)

Posted on Oct 3, 2012 7:31 PM

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User profile for user: Lanny
Lanny
User level: Level 6
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Posted on Oct 3, 2012 8:14 PM

(The question)


Can I delete the Lion partition, and basicallyl absorb the free space into the Mountain Lion partition. I would like to have it so that it works just like I installed ML onto the main partition to begin with.

No, not directly. You won't be able to absorb the free space because it is in a position before the new partition.

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User profile for user: Lanny
Lanny
User level: Level 6
13,183 points

Oct 3, 2012 8:14 PM in response to Chase Ring

(The question)


Can I delete the Lion partition, and basicallyl absorb the free space into the Mountain Lion partition. I would like to have it so that it works just like I installed ML onto the main partition to begin with.

No, not directly. You won't be able to absorb the free space because it is in a position before the new partition.

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User profile for user: Chase Ring
Chase Ring Author
User level: Level 1
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Oct 4, 2012 4:26 AM in response to Lanny

Is there some sort of work around since you say "Not directly?"


How about if I split it 500 (0 = old) and 500 (1= new) were to copy over whatever I wanted to keep from 0 to 1, format 0, clone 1 to 0, then erase 1 and absort the free space into 0?


This should theoretically work, and fix potential problems with the numbering I mentioned above ( 🙂 ). The only question then that I think remains, is can I clone 1 to 0, and have it still able to boot up like regular? I know I can select start up discs, so maybe this would?


Either way, if I needed to take the extremely long way around, I could split them, install on 1 (to get it working), from 1 copy all my stuff, erase 0 and install ML, from 0 copy stuff from 1 ( :/ ) and then erase 1 and absorb it into 0. (Right? Would this work? I can't imagine it wouldn't...)

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User profile for user: Lanny
Lanny
User level: Level 6
13,183 points

Oct 4, 2012 5:54 AM in response to Chase Ring

Yes those cloning steps would be a work around. You could either clone the SL to the new partition (my recommendation) or, later, clone the new ML back to original partition.


However, the safest course of action would be to invest in an external HD. You should have a back up plan and external drives are not that expensive.


You could very easily make a mistake during your installation and cloning manipulations and lose your data.


However, if you persist, I would add the new partition. Then clone your SL partition to it. Then test the partition to verify that it works properly. Then upgrade the original, partition to ML. Don't spend time trying to copy your data to it. You can always delete any non working apps later on.


With a Terabyte drive, you could just keep both partitions.

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User profile for user: Chase Ring
Chase Ring Author
User level: Level 1
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Oct 4, 2012 10:23 AM in response to Lanny

I think this is what I'll do based on your feed back:


  1. Split partition 500/500
  2. Clone Lion from 0 to 1
  3. Make sure Lion on 1 boots.
  4. Attempt to do clean install of ML onto 0.
  5. Copy selectively applications and data from Lion on partition 1 to ML partition on 0.
  6. Verify it's all working
  7. Delete contents of partition 1
  8. Absorb partition 1 into 0
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User profile for user: Lanny
Lanny
User level: Level 6
13,183 points

Oct 4, 2012 10:33 AM in response to Chase Ring

I thought you said that you were using Snow Leopard, not Lion. Please clarify.


If you're using Lion, that's a whole different ball game. Get back to me on this.


In any case your Step #5 is a waste of time. It would be far easier to use Setup Assistant to migrate your apps and data to the clean installed partition than selectively trying to copy them. Applications can have many background files that will need to be transferred and that you might miss.

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User profile for user: Chase Ring
Chase Ring Author
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Oct 4, 2012 10:34 AM in response to Lanny

My current installation is Lion, which WAS running Snow Leopard. In the first sentence I said that it was upgraded from SL to L.


Would it really be that much different to install ML onto a blank partition? I've read that if you run the installer from a partition that is running Lion, that there shouldn't be a problem. I was going to basically clone my Lion installation to the second (1) partition, and then run the installer from the running clone on 1 and have it install to the blank space that is 0.

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User profile for user: Lanny
Lanny
User level: Level 6
13,183 points

Oct 4, 2012 10:40 AM in response to Chase Ring

I'm sorry, I thought all this time that you were using SL.


So, I've changed my recommendation.


IMHO, There are no major differences between how Lion and Mountain Lion treat most applications and data. ML is mostly just an tweak of Lion. If I were you, I'd just install ML on top of your Lion partition and forget about adding a partition.


That being said, you should still get an external backup drive.

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User profile for user: Chase Ring
Chase Ring Author
User level: Level 1
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Oct 4, 2012 10:43 AM in response to Lanny

I agree with the external drive.. and that is something that I will definitely look into. Using the Airport Extreme would make it really easy to have it back up, and keep it seperate from the machine.


However, I do want a fresh install, because I want to get rid of the typical "extra crud" that comes with having an installation last over time.

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Somewhat migrating to Mountain Lion

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