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Migration Assistant cannot deselect items (greyed out) - WHY?

I recently bought a new iMac running OS X El Capitan 10.11.4

I need to migrate / transfer my documents from an old mac mini server 2011 running OS X Lion 10.7.5

When I open Migration assistant on the new Mac, all of the options in Migration Assistant are greyed out / cannot be deselected.

This is giving me a huge headache as I only want to transfer my mail and a few other things.

Apple - nothing is ever simple!

Appreciate any solutions to this problem as it would be very bad to migrate everything and clutter up a new machine with everything that does not work / I do not need!

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Posted on Apr 6, 2016 5:04 AM

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Posted on Sep 29, 2017 10:19 AM

I had this problem too and the solution was quite simple. Boot into the backup (which you would like to restore) and remove Server from the Applications folder. Then restart your new OS installation and try again.

13 replies

Apr 7, 2016 2:20 PM in response to nicholasberlin

Hello nicholasberlin,


Thanks for using the Apple Support Communities!


I understand that you would like to select the information to transfer while using Migration Assistant on your Mac, but the choices are grayed out. From looking at your screenshot, it appears that it is still calculating data. I would suggest waiting for that calculation to finish and then trying to make your selections.


Cheers!

Apr 12, 2016 2:44 PM in response to dialabrain

When I first tried the hard drive had enough space and the same thing... this has nothing to do with it... Trust me guys I appreciate any help a lot but if it were a simple problem, I would not be here... I'll post a new screenshot if you want proof with no red writing but the fact is everything is still greyed out... So, it's a bug! From reading further it has something to do with having the Server edition of LION.... :/

Apr 13, 2016 1:12 AM in response to dialabrain

Yes, @dialabrain I have tried both migrating from the original SSD hard drive that was in my mac mini (used as an external drive) and also using a time machine backup... same thing...


FWIW @ keg55 - the space thing has nothing to do with it... When I first tried to Migrate, My new Mac's hard drive was almost empty and had absolutely enough space... Now I have installed quite a ew apps so it doesn't. All the more reason why I would like to be able to deselect the APPS! I just want to migrate my Mail, documents, etc but it seems like I can't...

Jun 5, 2016 1:07 PM in response to nicholasberlin

I have a similar problem on a Mac mini that I'm rebuilding from scratch (clean install of 10.11.5, followed by install of Server 5.1.5). It previously has 10.11.2 and an earlier version of OSX Server.


Before starting, I made two separate copies of the mini's HD onto two different external drives, using SuperDuper.

Then erased the mini's internal 500 GB drive, installed 10.11.5, followed by OSX Server.

Next step was to run Migration Assistant in order to restore my /Applications folder, and a user home directory.

At first, Migration Assistant found the external drive holding the copy, but it displayed a warning:

"This source is an OSX Server, but your Mac is already an OSX Server. You must first demote your Mac".

It was not possible to select the external drive in Migration Assistant.


A cryptic comment in Charles Edge's TakeControl of OSX Server book suggested to delete from the external drive:

/Applications/Server

/Library/Preferences/com.apple.servermgrd.plist

/Library/Server (folder)


After doing so, the warning about the ext drive being an OSX Server disappeared, and Migration Assistant let me select the drive as the source for the copy. It then display the list of items that can be transferred, and unlike other reports here, I can select/deselect these as desired. But it refuses to actually copy anything: "Not enough space available to transfer".

  • The destination drive (the mini's internal hard drive) has 485 GB free.
  • The size of /Applications when I select it in Migration Assistant is just over 5GB. There's more than enough space available on the internal drive for the transfer.
  • The size of the user folder I want to transfer is 47 GB. There's lot of room for that too.


If I de-select everything in the Migration Assistant list except for Other files & folders (25 KB), it still complains that there's not enough space available to transfer.


Has anyone made headway on this? It appears to be related to the fact that OSX Server was installed on drive previously. What other cruft on the external backup should be deleted to erase all vestiges of Server on it?

Aug 22, 2016 5:38 AM in response to D.R.C.

D.R.C. wrote:


I have a similar problem on a Mac mini that I'm rebuilding from scratch (clean install of 10.11.5, followed by install of Server 5.1.5). It previously has 10.11.2 and an earlier version of OSX Server....



Has anyone made headway on this? It appears to be related to the fact that OSX Server was installed on drive previously. What other cruft on the external backup should be deleted to erase all vestiges of Server on it?


DRC's info did help me in a similar situation - a new MacMini running 10.11.5 would not allow a migration from any of a variety of TM backups of older machines that I tried (running 10.6 and 10.8) due to a "Not enough space available to transfer" error, even though there is lots of space on the new machine, and the TM backups are fairly small.


For my situation, only the MacMini had Server.app installed - the TM backups were of non-server machines. Once I removed Server.app from the MacMini's /Applications folder, everything worked as it should - it was unneccessary to remove any other server stuff from the MacMini and when all was finished I was able to just move Server.app back into place and relaunch it and everything seems to be working well.


I added this info to a stackechange question


http://apple.stackexchange.com/questions/164315/migrate-os-x-using-migration-*** istant-and-time-machine-not-enough-space…


This all seems related to nicholasberlin's inability to select/deselect items from MA's window according to Migration Assistant on Mountain Lion does not let me deselect anything

Migration Assistant cannot deselect items (greyed out) - WHY?

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