I would strongly advise against using Migration Assistant. It would be far better to simply transfer your personal files. Anything else you move will likely be incompatible on an Intel Mac.
Here is a list of where your important data are stored ("~" stands for "Home"):
In your Home folder copy the contents of Documents, Movies, Music, Pictures, and Sites.
In your ~/Library/ folder:
~/Library/Application Support/AddressBook (copy the whole folder)
~/Library/Application Support/iCal (copy the whole folder)
Also in ~/Library/Application Support (copy whatever else you need)
~/Library/Keychains (copy the whole folder)
~/Library/Mail (copy the whole folder)
~/Library/Preferences/com.apple.mail.plist (* This is a very important file which contains all email account settings and general mail preferences.)
~ /Library/iTunes (copy the whole folder)
~ /Library/Safari (copy the whole folder)
I would strongly advise against using Migration Assistant. It would be far better to simply transfer your personal files. Anything else you move will likely be incompatible on an Intel Mac.
Here is a list of where your important data are stored ("~" stands for "Home"):
In your Home folder copy the contents of Documents, Movies, Music, Pictures, and Sites.
In your ~/Library/ folder:
~/Library/Application Support/AddressBook (copy the whole folder)
~/Library/Application Support/iCal (copy the whole folder)
Also in ~/Library/Application Support (copy whatever else you need)
~/Library/Keychains (copy the whole folder)
~/Library/Mail (copy the whole folder)
~/Library/Preferences/com.apple.mail.plist (* This is a very important file which contains all email account settings and general mail preferences.)
~ /Library/iTunes (copy the whole folder)
~ /Library/Safari (copy the whole folder)
Migration Assistant is a very useful tool, but like any tool its usefulness is limited. If you are migrating from one machine to another and both machines are running the same version of OS X, then the Migration Assistant makes such transfers easier to effect. However, the Migration Assistant does not have any way of knowing whether transfers to another machine are feasible. For example, Migration Assistant cannot determine if the machines are PPC or Intel. It also cannot tell if the versions of OS X involved are incompatible.
It's not a matter of "liking" or "disliking" Migration Assistant. It's a matter of using the proper tool for a particular job.
So if I have an old Mac and I want to use Migration Assistant to transfer my information over to a new Mac, I have to update the old Mac to the same version of OS X before I can use Migration Assistant successfully?
And if my old Mac is PPC and the new Mac Intel then Migration Assistant doesn't work?
Well, not quite. I think you are looking at it as a black and white decision when it's more like shades of gray.
Migration Assistant can be used to transfer just a user folder, only preference settings, the Applications folder, or more. It's a matter of being aware that what you transfer may be incompatible or contain elements that are incompatible. For example, if you transfer the Applications folder of PPC Mac to an Intel Mac, guess what? You replace all the universal binary applications installed by OS X with PPC applications. Now those PPC applications will work but they all require Rosetta to run resulting in higher memory usage and slow performance. Not a good idea, right? Another example: Suppose you are transferring from a machine running Jaguar to a machine running Tiger and both machines are PPC Macs. Of course the software will work but you end up replacing current software versions with older versions, some of which may no longer be compatible. Again, not a desired outcome.
It's really a matter of considering what you transfer and if what you transfer will adversely affect the new machine.
I used Migration Assistant when I transferred from my G3 Indigo to my Intel Mac and it left my Applications folder alone, putting all things OSX into a folder "Files from Mac OS X" and my OS9 stuff in "Files from Mac OS 9". This folder I, naturally, trashed because OS 9 doesn't work. Everything came across fine for me.
Oh great!.. I used Migration asst and I hoped it would intelligently decide what to do with OSX apps..
How can I tell if it has replaced the intel apps? My intel imac is horrendously slow generally, so I think this may be whats happened, but I have 180G of data on here, its my main business machine..
Select an application and press COMMAND-I to open the Get Info window. It should tell you at top if it's PowerPC or Universal.
If you migrated everything including the main library folders you probably have replaced a good deal of Intel code with PowerPC code. I would recommend you consider doing an
Archive and Install. Hopefully, you didn't reformat the hard drive.
Select an application and press COMMAND-I to open the
Get Info window. It should tell you at top if it's
PowerPC or Universal.
If you migrated everything including the main library
folders you probably have replaced a good deal of
Intel code with PowerPC code. I would recommend you
consider doing an
Archive and Install. Hopefully, you
didn't reformat the hard drive.
Thanks for your helP!
All of the key osx apps seem to be universal still.
Will doing archive and install wipe out my files or just the code for the apps that I may have overwritten?
In other words, will all my mail, and so on, still be there?
