Should I upgrade to Mavericks from Mountain Lion myself or take it in to the Apple pros?

I found it to be very easy to do

Mavericks was also a painless upgrade for me. But I'm a moderately experienced Mac guy. Allan is a very experienced Mac guy.

But here's a few things to consider:

1. Any new OS has some bugs and incompatibilities with old software and hardware. If you are uncomfortable with basic Mac troubleshooting, then perhaps waiting would be a better strategy.
2. If you have any mission-critical software or peripherals, make sure they are compatible first.
3. Mavericks does not play well with some old/bad software and hardware:
   1. Crapware: anything that purports to "clean", "monitor", "protect", or "accelerate" your mac. Unnecessary on Macs and often harmful. Examples: CleanMyMac and MacKeeper (the King of Crapware).
   2. antivirus software.
   3. WD hard drives.

So if you have CleanMyMac and MacKeeper and antivirus software on your WD hard drive (they're all very popular), I'd say don't.

You'll have to give the local pros your Apple ID and password so they can install Mavericks linked to your Apple ID. Otherwise you won't be able to update to future builds.

Personally, it's so easy to do it yourself that I wouldn't want anyone else to do it unless it was an Apple store and the were aware thatlinking to your Apple ID is necessary. As long as you've got Time Machine working and have a current backup you're pretty well protected from problems.

OT

Juts have a complete, bootable clone in case anything goes haywaire.

That means an external drive with a complete clone that can starttup your system.

I did 3 upgrades. All went flawlessly. My issues post upgrade were minor. Two machiens are old.

Grant