Mavericks Migration Assistant - Migrate user data to a separate user drive?
I have a question about upgrading to Mavericks with a separate user drive that I haven't been able to find an answer to, so I thought I'd ask for some guidance before actually trying to attempt it.
I have a late-model Macbook Pro (A1260) running 10.8.5 happily with 2 hard drives inside - a smaller SSD boot drive let's call BOOT 1 DRIVE, and a larger drive I use for my user folder which I'll call USER DRIVE. Now it's time to upgrade to a little larger SSD let's call BOOT 2 DRIVE. I have Mavericks already freshly installed on it (10.9.1) with a temporary blank user account. The MBP boots fine into the drive connected externally so I know it's all ready to go - all I have to do is swap out the drives and I'm good on the OS.
Now the tricky part: I want to transfer my user data from my old system 10.8.5 to the new 10.9.1 and ultimately have it reside in the same fashion - on the larger USER DRIVE. How do I do this? A few scenarios I ponder:
A) I'm assuming because this is migrating from an older system to newer system, you can't just create a new user in 10.9.1 with the same user name and point it to the existing home folder in USER DRIVE, but instead have to use Migration Assistant to transfer and update 10.8 user data to 10.9 user data?
B) Locially, you would boot into BOOT 2 DRIVE (10.9.1), and use Migration Assistant to transfer user data from the old 10.8 system (the system knows that the user data resides on USER DRIVE) to the new one but there's not enough space on the new BOOT 2 DRIVE to house all the data and even if it could, then what ? - transfer the user folder directly to a clean USER DRIVE and then point to it?
C) I have both BOOT 1 DRIVE and USER DRIVE cloned on separate volumes, so I could boot into BOOT 2 DRIVE, wipe clean USER DRIVE, and then migrate from the cloned drives - except in Migration Assistant, it says to transfer from "another Mac or Time Machine, or a startup disk". Would I be able to pull from the USER DRIVE CLONE and then have Migration Assistant write to the freshly wiped USER DRIVE?
Perhaps I'm overthinking this? Google pointed me to this post which seems to have some of this information covered even though it feels dated. Reading through it makes me believe that Senario A is actually my closest bet with some user account name swapping or something? Is it that User data doesn't need to be "updated" for the newer OS and you can just create a new user account with the same name and point it to the older USER DRIVE?
Any advice from the mac smarts out there would be appreciated.
Thanks!
SOLVED!
In case anyone stumbles upon this and is wondering what I did:
My hypothesis was correct - waaayyyy over thinking it.
I installed BOOT 2 DRIVE, swapping out the old BOOT 1 DRIVE. Then I renamed the new account to the same name as my previous account, users -> advanced options -> and pointed to the same home folder on USER DRIVE.
DONE
Initially, I made a new account and screwed things up a bit - after reading the post of the above, understood that the new user account should have the same UID as the previous one....
Anyway, all good now - happy camper.
Similar Messages
-
Using Migration Assistant to Move Data Files from one Account to New User
Is it possible or recommended to use Migration Assistant to move data files from an old user account to a new user account on the same volume/hard disk?
Migration Assitant cannot be used as a simple file transfer utility. MA can transfer an entire Home folder or entire Users folder but not individual files.
In general files in one user account cannot be moved to another user account as this would violate built-in security measures.
What you can do is to copy the files to an external device like a hard drive or flash drive. First log in to the old account. Then configure the drive to ignore preferences by Pressing COMMAND-I to open the Get Info window and check the Ignore permissions on this volume checkbox at the bottom of the window. Copy your files to the device. Log into the new account. Verify the external drive is still configured to ignore permissions (reset it, if not.) Copy the files from the external device into the Home folder of the new account. I would create a temporary folder for these files. If you still end up without the proper permissions you will need to make modifications that are easier done if all the files are in a single folder. -
There isn't enough space on the Time Capsule to create a separate backup of the data on the new MacBook. And I am reluctant to delete old backups of the old MacBook to create space to backup the new machine. This occurred about 3 weeks ago so the data on the two machines are now out of sync. If I start over by formatting the new MacBook and rerunning Migration Assistant to pull data from the Time Capsule, how do i preserve the last 3 weeks of data on the new MacBook, considering that I didn't keep track of which files changed in the last 3 weeks?
All the rest of the stuff is where it should be. As best I can tell. I have been going through my programs one at a time to see what works. With the change in the OS (Launchpad? What the heck?) I am finding a significant number of my old programs are not working. Some I have found upgrades. But without a working mail program, the machine is pretty useless for work.
The Apple techies had me run through 3 hours of 'stuff' (holding down keys and restarting, etc, etc). It still does not launch. I think we are waiting for a 'miracle', but I need to know now if they should just come get this piece of junk or if they really are able to find a solution in a timely manner. -
Can't update migration assistant to transfer data to new mac
Just bought a new MacBook Pro and want to use Migration Assistant to transfer data from my Macbook OS X 10.4.11 The new MacBook Pro says i need to update Migration Assistant on the source computer, but when i run software update on the source computer it says there is nothing that needs updating. Any ideas on how to get this done?
Right, there is no update for 10.4.11, only 110.5.8 & up.
If the old MacBook has Firewire you can put it in FireWire target disk mode...
http://support.apple.com/kb/HT1661
So you only need MA on the newer one.
If no FW on the old one you'll need to clobe the old one to an externak drive tahat can be moved to the new one.
Get carbon copy cloner to make an exact copy of your old HD to the New one...
http://www.bombich.com/software/ccc.html
Or SuperDuper...
http://www.shirt-pocket.com/SuperDuper/ -
Migration Assistant: Problems transferring data from PC (XP SP3) to new Mac Pro 2012 - can not get Migration Assistant to work as PC will not display verfify passcode
Hello, I am having problems migrating data from my old PC running XP (SP3) to my new Mac Pro 2012 using the Migration Assistant.
- I downloaded and installed the Windows Migration Assistant from Apple
- My Mac recognized PC and displays passcode
- The sasscode does not show / display on my PC
- My Mac is then stuck in "authenticating" loop and the PC is stuck "waiting for Mac to connect."
- Both computers are connected on same network (have connected PC on WIFI and using ethernet to Reuter)
I have looked on support site and only response I saw says to reinstall Windows Migration Assistant (which I have done)
Any ideas? If cant get this to workare there instructions for manually bring across relevant data eg itunes music and apps, photos, picasa data etc?Why not turn off the Windows firewall and uninstall any other firewall software you have installed?
If you are using a Norton product uninstall it and discard it. To fully unistall most Norton products you have to go to the Norton website and download a soecial program to completely get rid of it. The normal uninstall feature built into the program will not remove all of it. -
I used the Migration Assistant to move data from my Time Machine to my new Mac. Most data seems to have been transferred successfully but none of my iPhoto pictures have been transferred.
My Time Machine now shows the earliest available Back-up to be after the Migration Date. My iPhoto pictures seem to have either been lost in the migration process or are locked in my Time Machine prior to the earliest back-up date now accessible.
Any advice on recovering my old iPhoto pictures would be greatly appreciated.First go to iPhoto Preferences, look in both General and Advanced tabs to make sure that things are set to import from camera into iPhoto.
Then if that doesn't help, connect the camera and open Image Capture in your Applications > Utilities folder and see if you can use Image Capture to reset the import path from the camera to iPhoto.
Image Capture: Free import tool on Mac OS X - Macgasm
Message was edited by: den.thed
Sorry John, I didn't see your post when I clicked the reply button. Dennis -
After Using Migration Assistant Can't Log On With That User Account
I used Migration Assistant to move only my Settings and Users from my Power PC (User name RLE 5) to my Mac Pro. Because of what I have read in these forums I did not migrate applications or and files/folders. I will do that manually. After migrating I tried logging in to my user account RLE 5 on my Mac Pro, but it is telling me I am using the wrong password. I used the same password I used on my Power PC, but with no luck. On my Mac Pro I went into System Preferences>Accounts>RLE 5 account and changed the password. I then rebooted and tried again. No luck.
Can somebody help me with this problem?
Thank you.Hi jenaS, sorry to hear that you're havig an issue after refresh of the system, if ur logged in using a live account it shouldnt change or remove the pin, if you are usin a local account the issue there might be in the profile on the system it might be corrupted, do you have a screen shot of the issue?
Dont fake the funk............ -
I replaced the original hdd in my early 2008 iMac. I can't move my files that were backed up with Time Machine to my new hdd using Migration Assistant. When prompted to select the "from drive", the ext. hhd does not appears as a selection. Please help!!
I'd recommend staring over, Pondini has created an excellent guide on how to use Setup Assistant. I'd recommend begin reading Pondini Setup Assistant tips where he talks about "Second Chance." Assuming your Time Machine backup is sound the restore should be very smooth.
Roger -
Migration assistant to transfer data from PC - Windows 7 to MAC Book Pro running Mavericks
Hello Gurus,
I am having toruble using the migration assistant to transfer my data from my PC windows 7 to MAC book pro Mavericks.....
The MAC window for migration assistant keeps searching the source computer..... and windows PC says waiting for the MAC to connect...I had the same problem, I solved it by turning off the firewall on both the PC and my MacBook Pro. It worked immediately after that. Hope that solves your problem too.
-
I am trying to transfer contents from old macbook running os 10.7.5 to a macbook air running os 10.9.1 using migration assistant but the destination macobook air says that migration cannot proceed (yellow triangle) because the os on the macbook is not up to date (assuming that eans 10.9.1). However old macbook cannot be updated to 10.9.1.
Can anyone suggest a way around this please?Try looking at this section in the Migration Assistant article.
Migrating using FireWire or ThunderBolt -
I have installed migration assistant on the pc. I am running it as administrator. It says waiting to connect to Mac. I am running MS on the macbook pro (brand new) and it found the machine but keeps saying looking for other sources and I can't move ahead. Any ideas?
Resolved. Someone told me verbally what to do.
-
Migration Assistant 90 GB from PowerPC to Intel user folder
This at first seems like it will only take 3 hours. Next thing I know I come back an hour later, it tells me 20 hours. I've verified the directory, even restored the original software on the Intel Mac, and use a dummy folder as my default user folder on the Intel Mac. Are the estimates realistic, or should I just let the machine spend the better part of a couple days trying to transfer if I have that much data?
I've turned off Energy Saver, Screen Saver, and use Macbrightness to dim the display so there won't be too much burn in.Anything in your Library folders. All your PowerPC applications if you overwrite those pre-installed on the Intel machine with those from your PPC machine. Any plug-ins, preference panes, contextual menu items, startup items, etc. If you overwrite Intel items with PPC items then they may not work at all or will cause the system to run very slowly.
I really don't know what happens if you do an Archive and Install of an Intel system that's been partially altered with PPC components. I don't know if the applications will be replaced or simply transferred. I've only done them on same version/hardware machines.
If you've migrated "everything" including applications then all the Intel software will be replaced by PPC software. Not a desired outcome. I always recommend not using Migration Assistant and simply transferring only personal files and data plus certain support files and preferences that will not affect the Intel system. Migration Assistant is convenient but it's better used when you are moving across machines that have the same OS X version installed and the hardware is the same (PPC or Intel.) -
Already migrated my data, settings, etc. to the new Maverick OS iMac. Then realized I had lots of CDs that I hadn't burned into iTunes, which I can do only on my old Mountain Lion iMac. Can I just choose "Data" if I invoke Migration Assistant? Will it move only the new stuff, which would be the new iTune playlist library? Don't want to reload the entire computer again!
What you should be able to do is simply copy everything that's in the home folder under iTunes from the old computer to the same spot on the new one - just drag and drop. That should bring over all your music & your playlists. You shouldn't have to use Migration Assistant for that.
I did that during one of my many moves from one computer to another, but I have not tried recently. It won't hurt to give it a try.
~Lyssa -
I need to move a user's home directory contents from an old Mac to a "Home Folder for a Local User" on Snow Leopard Server (SLS). I both the old Mac and an external drive, which was used to make a TimeMachine backup of the old Mac. Since SLS does not have Migration Assistant, what is the recommended method to a user's data to SLS home folders?
BillKSorry...not trying to be cryptic, but any of the methods you mentioned for copying would work. Simply mounting the sharepoint and copying the data would work. I didn't mention a specific method, because I wasn't sure what was available to you.
As to the permissions, once the data is copied, if you are moving form one Mac to another, and not using the same existing OD on both, the owner may be the same (depending on the name you use on the accounts) but joesmith on one Mac will not transfer permissions to joesmith on another Mac. So you will need to make sure the owner of all the data is set to the correct user on the new Mac. Using the command line, you could navigate to the home folder and use this command to make the owner of the files the correct user
sudo chown -R nameofuser *
nameofuser would be the name on the account that you want to give ownership to
then sudo chmod -R u=rwx *
to make sure the owner has full access to everything in his/her home folder.
Hope that's more helpful
Jeff -
I used migration assistant to transfer data from my old computer to the new
The problem is it transferred data from an old back drive so the data is not current.
Can I run migration assistant again to transfer data? Will it overwrite the data mistakenly transferred?If you migrate a user account that already exists by name, it'll force you/ask you for a name of this user... how many Username are on this Mac now?
Maybe you are looking for
-
WBS element in Material Document List Report
Hi Guru, I have a problem about WBS element which is not show up any data in Material Document List (MB51) movement type 281 and 281 Q event I add WBS in the document. Anyone know how can i config or do anything to let the system show up, pleas
-
I don't know what to do please help.
-
Error while doing the return delivery
Hi Experts, I had created an PO with describe requirement for 50 quantity and did partial confirmation of 30 quantity. While doing the return delivery for 10 quantity system is throwing error Line 1: No goods receipt possible for purchase order 42000
-
Im am using a labview RT with PCI-7030 DAQ board and a CB-68LP .This is urgent.can somebody please help?
-
Can I use standard RF Menu LM00 for IM Managed facility (No WM at all).
Can I use standard RF Menu LM00 for perfomring IM goods movement in IM Managed facility (No WM at all).