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Yes- This is Another Install Question

1.I just bought a brand new 15" Retina MBP and I want to know what is the best way to migrate "ALL" of my info and files from my older MBP.

Both have Thunderbolt. Yet I can't believe how much harder apple has made it to migrate. It used to be so easy by just using a firewire cable. Now it seems you can't even use this new thunderbolt technology which was designed to make things so much faster and easier. Ughhh Why???

2. I really don't want to wait 70 plus hours wirelessly to upgrade/migrate. Can I just target mode the old running 10.6.8 onto the New via disk utility THEN upgrade to Mavericks? Will that work or create more problems than good?

3. Mavericks comes already pre-installed on the New Retina, But how in the world do I get Mavericks re-installed if I have to format for any reason down the road? Apple doesn't supply any disk or media card with Mavericks on it.

Posted on Apr 3, 2014 1:11 AM

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2 replies

Apr 3, 2014 3:08 AM in response to biggest apple

I can help you with No. 3:


1. Before putting anything on the new mac, configure and take a full Time Machine backup - you can use it to restore the entire machine back to then. This means you don't need the Mavericks media, which actually doesn't exist as a DVD. Of course, if you leave Time Machine on, you can restore up to the point of your last backup. You will need an external drive for this purpose (USB, FireWire, Thunderbolt, Network)


2. You can use Internet Recovery in the case of the Time Machine backup/restore not working (unlikely). Internet Recovery will involve you downloading Mavericks from Apple (7 or 8GB worth, IIRC). You can prevent having to download it more than once by not proceeding with the reinstall until you have copied the installation image to another drive for use in the future.


3. If you haven't already got it, download Recovery Disk Assistant and make a couple of additional Recovery HD USB sticks. Do this in case of catastrophic disk failure and you can then boot from them to access either Internet Recovery or your Time Machine backup.

Apr 3, 2014 3:22 AM in response to biggest apple

biggest apple wrote:

Both have Thunderbolt. Yet I can't believe how much harder apple has made it to migrate. It used to be so easy by just using a firewire cable. Now it seems you can't even use this new thunderbolt technology which was designed to make things so much faster and easier. Ughhh Why???

What problem(s) are you having using Setup/Migration Assistant with a Thunderbolt to Thunderbolt connection? Are you following the instructions in OS X: How to migrate data from another Mac using Mavericks in the "Migrating using FireWire or ThunderBolt" section?

Yes- This is Another Install Question

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