Migrating from a 2008 Mac Pro to iMac 5k

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Level 2

255 points

Migrating from a 2008 Mac Pro to iMac 5k

I'm finally retiring the Beast, the 2008 Mac Pro that has served me well for going on eight years. I have a 27" iMac 5K on the way, but I have a few questions I'm hoping to answer before it gets here.

1) What's the best way to connect the two machines for Migration Assistant? Will Ethernet work? Will it work if I have them connected through a router, or do I need to connect them directly?

2) I have four hard drives on the Mac Pro, which I'd like to continue using in one fashion or another. These drives include a Time Machine backup drive, a Windows boot drive, a drive used to house my iTunes library and the current active drive, which is a 256 gig SSD.

a) If possible, I would like to back up the iMac to the Time Machine drive on the Mac Pro, leaving that running as a headless server. Is this possible?
b) I'd like to continue to house my iTunes library on the Mac Pro as well.

c) Any ideas about the Windows drive? Should I just create a Boot Camp partition on the iMac's 2 TB drive or make use of a 256 gig My Passport external drive?

I appreciate any thoughts or suggestions from people who have gone through similar transitions.

Mac Pro, OS X El Capitan (10.11.1)

Posted on Nov 20, 2015 8:00 AM

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Answer 1

rkaufmann87

Level 10

140,568 points

Nov 20, 2015 8:21 AM in response to Dan Radmacher

Dan,

The easiest and most efficient method is to backup your MP to either Time Machine or to create a bootable clone using either SuperDuper or Carbon Copy Cloner to an EHD. Once you have the backup created, connect that to the new iMac and launch Migration Assistant and migrate from the backup. This works and is VERY simple, one word of advice IMHO using a USB connection from the backup EHD to the new computer is the most reliable method.

When you backup the MP using Time Machine make sure TM is also backing up the data stored on the EHDs if you want that data to reside on the iMac. I do just that with my iMac, I have my iTunes library on one EHD, my photo library on another EHD and my movie library on a third EHD. I have Time Machine backup the internal drive and the three externals. So then when I eventually migrate to a new Mac I know that my migration should be seamless.

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Answer 2

Dan Radmacher Author

Level 2

255 points

Nov 20, 2015 8:26 AM in response to rkaufmann87

Thanks. Copying the SSD drive to an EHD is doable.

Moving forward, should I pull the Time Machine drive and drive my iTunes library is on from the Mac Pro and put them in a Thunderbolt or USB 3 enclosure, or can I keep them in the Mac Pro?

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Answer 3

rkaufmann87

Level 10

140,568 points

Nov 20, 2015 8:37 AM in response to Dan Radmacher

Dan Radmacher wrote:

Thanks. Copying the SSD drive to an EHD is doable.

Moving forward, should I pull the Time Machine drive and drive my iTunes library is on from the Mac Pro and put them in a Thunderbolt or USB 3 enclosure, or can I keep them in the Mac Pro?

Put the TM drive that currently resides inside the MP into a Thunderbolt or USB 3enclosure, then connect then connect the enclosure to the new iMac. I noticed your new iMac has not arrived yet, this is ideal. When you unbox it and turn it on for the first time, connect the TM backup from the MP to the iMac. Part of the setup (it is called Setup Assistant) of the new machine is it will ask if you are migrating from another Mac, select yes and follow the on-screen prompts. The advantage of migrating using Setup Assistant over using Migration Assistant is that SA will not create another user account. SA and MA are almost identical except MA will create a new user account which some people find a nuisance.

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Answer 4

Dan Radmacher Author

Level 2

255 points

Nov 22, 2015 4:04 PM in response to rkaufmann87

Thanks. I have an enclosure on the way for the Time Machine HD.

Another question: Is it worth hanging on to the Mac Pro as a server, or should I just put the hard drives in enclosures and use them as needed and sell the Mac Pro for whatever I can get for it?

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