Can one use Thunderbolt and Migration Assistant to transfer data to a new Mac?
MacBook Pro, OS X Mountain Lion (10.8.2), 2.7 Mhz Thunderbolt USB-3
Yes but you'll need an adapter firewire/thunderbolt for the old Mac if it has no Thunderbolt
Both MBPs have Thunderbolt ports and SSDs. My experience has been, when the two MBPs are directly connected with a Thunderbolt cable, you can only use Target Disk mode to access files on the other Mac. It appears that Migration Assistant (MA), currently, can only connect two macs via Wi-Fi or Ethernet through your LAN. You cannot use a direct connection via Wi-Fi, crossover cable or a Thunderbolt cable to connect between two Macs and use MA. This is a shame. When transfering via Wi-Fi over my LAN, MA says it will take 29 hours to transfer 400 GB of data. Apple should update MA to use a direct connection via Thunderbolt for fast data transfer.
Message was edited by: Mac MD
Not so, according to this article
Interesting. I did not seem to have that option. I note the article is for Lion. I am using Mountain Lion on both machines. It is certainly possible I have this wrong. I will try again.
macjack, Thanks! This worked perfectly. Transfer time is now 47 minutes!!😎
Just to add this piece of information. I tried using MA between a 2009 MBP and a new retina 13 in MBP this morning. I connected them with a firewire 800 cable and a thunderbolt adapter. Tried once myself. Tried a second time with apple advanced support on the phone. Never could get the macs to see each other, even in target disk mode.
Gave up and used MA over my wi fi network and it started right up. So I'm left to wonder about why the firewire 800/thunderbolt adapter cabble didn't work? Anyone have a similar experience?
Just like "hammersb" wrote, I would like to know if there is ANY issue with using the THUNDERBOLT/FIREWIRE adaptor between a 2011 MBP and the retina-MBP, while using Migration Assistant.
Also,
The 2011 MBP is running Snow Leopard.
The 2012 retina MBP is running Mountain Lion.
Macjack,
Thanks for linking to the kb on this issue...I didn't find it searching outside the Communities. Appreciated.
I was (finally) able to move my files from a 2012 MBPR 13 to a 2013 MBPR 15. Both laptops were running Mavericks. When I connected the PCs with the Thunderbolt cable and ran Migration Assistant, it connected the two computers....then started the transfer over WiFi. There was no indication it was using WiFi.
I was transferring about 460 GB of programs and data and it suggested it would take 25 hours! Searching on-line, I found the comments about needing to go into Target Disk Mode on the source computer. I did that, and moved all the data over to the new MBPR in about 20 minutes.
Apple certainly could have, and should have, made this more clear in the Migratory Assistant software.
It took me a lot of tries to finally move my files from a 2011 MacBook Air 2011 to a 2014 Mac Book Pro 13". Both laptops were running Mavericks. I connected them via Thunderbot and ran migration assistant. It failed a handful of times until I rebooted both machines. Once they found each other and started the migration it was doing transfer over WiFi. It did not indicate it was using WiFi.
It orignially said it would take 45 hours! After searchign a number of places on-line, I found the comments above stating that I needed to go into Target Disk Mode on the source computer. I did that, and moved all the data over to my new MacBook Pro in about 10 minutes.
It seems to me that you MUST go in to Target Disk Mode for Migration Assistant to work properly.
Thanks for all of you who helped with a solution.
Thunderbolt and Migration Assistant
