Hello everyone. Thank you in advance for considering my question and any advice that you have. I know that this is not a new topic in TidBITS Talk, but it seems to have been a while since advice was given, so I thought I would ask for a fresh start. (if there is something quite current, I would be grateful if somebody could help me find it.)
It’s time to replace my family’s 2017 iMac. When we get a new iMac soon, I of course want to move everything over from the current iMac… well, not everything. I prefer not to move over all the stuff (a/k/a junk) in the library that’s left over from old deleted apps… some might even be from several Macs ago.
My hunch tells me that I should install fresh all the apps I use, of which there aren’t that many on this Mac, and templates I use in Microsoft Word, and then just move over documents, photos and music from my old iMac. Does this strategy make sense? I don’t know if the current version of Migration Assistant lets me pick and choose what to move.
I have three CCC backups running, and a very old Time Capsule backing up too (believe it or not).
Please share your thoughts and what you suggest I do to get something as clean and fresh as possible without too much hassle.
Thanks very much. Mrs W has been way too patient for way too long… she really does need a new computer.
I’ve wrestled with this over the years, especially as time wore on.
As more of the data I created ended up on various cloud systems or on Raid backups or both, moving to fresh installs became an easier choice. Logins and software authorisation have become easier to move around too.
It’s the interdependencies, the watch folders, the scripts, Hazel and Automator macros that fall down. So my main iMac which is half built out of these has been Migration Assisted for a long time. My lengthy startup time I attribute in part to accumulation of cruft. My MBPro is a fresh install and after a busy day and a week of adding in as needed is flying it.
I completely understand the desire to “clean out the cruft,” but if you have no issues you can pin on carrying old stuff over, the benefit of doing a from-scratch build of a new computer might not be worth the effort it takes to do it. Migration Assistant does a relatively quick and (usually) flawless job. OTOH, a clean build requires you have all the required resources such as product keys, installer packages, stored preferences, etc. and the time it will take to find and install/rebuild them.
Again, if like @tommy you have a specific issue you hope to mitigate with a clean install, it may indeed be worth it. But if it’s more of a “what’s all this crap from five Macs ago still doing here?”, you may want to just look the other way and push the easy button with MA.
If you have a fresh Time Machine backup (IMHO a very good strategy) then you can do a clean install and then use Migration Assistant to just transfer your data and settings.
Check everything works and then go about deleting unnecessary apps and data (or do this on the 2017 iMac before using Time Machine).
This worked for me moving from an Intel iMac/Mojave to an M2 Macbook Air running Sonoma.
Many years ago I started keeping license keys for apps in a text file to facilitate these kinds of os evolutions.
Then about 20 years ago I started using a password manager and keeping track of the license keys and app passwords there.
I now use 1Password, it has a specific category for software licenses (sure others do also) making it easy to track the license #, purchase date & price, urls for download and support, attach receipts, etc.
This has made migrations, upgrades and software reinstalls much less stressful, having all needed info in one place. Also eases responding to software update/upgrade notices by tracking version nums and purchase dates.
Only addresses one part of your question, but I recommend this for any of the methods. Particularly good for iPhones which don’t seem to transfer licenses and app passwords (assuming you don’t keep them in keychain, as I don’t).
I used to always set up a new computer clean, and reinstall and reconfigure all my apps. My theory was that way I don’t carry problems into the new computer.
But that was just so much work that some years ago I gave up and switched to using the Migration Assistant. It’s not perfect but it makes it so much easier that I’m never going back.
For example, if you are doing a clean install and setup, you run into problems such as…
Not able to reinstall an application because the vendor no longer provides the download*
Not able to reinstall an application because the installer no longer works (such as, a 32-bit installer of a 64-bit app)
Not able to reinstall an application because the vendor’s licensing site no longer works
Having to find all the license keys, even though you were sure you saved them but apparently not
Have to go through all of the settings and reconfigure them back to how they were, but since your old computer is gone, you don’t remember how it was configured
Application or system bugs that you worked around before through some obscure procedure but now you can’t find the documentation of how you did it even though you must have saved that because it would be crazy not to, right??
Moving data used by applications where this is not a simple procedure. macOS Mail is an example
* I’ve been burned before so I keep a copy of the most recent download
I’ve done clean installs on my Macs for the last 15 years, and I’ve found it fairly easy… except for this situation Michael mentions above.
Certainly for Mac Mail; while I’ve now got methodologies that get me through it, it took a while to figure them out. And while it’s been much less painful in the past few new Mac purchases and/or macOS upgrades, the previous problems have left me cautious – which means I spend an extra hour or 2 after the migration, reviewing the local mailboxes to make sure everything made it over OK.
I haven’t encountered the application installation concerns others have mentioned; combination of having serial numbers, passwords etc. all in 1Password, and keeping an archive volume for storing the latest 3rd party software installers. But Mail is still the main hill that needs to be climbed each time.
Hello everyone! With heartfelt apologies for the delay… thank you, thank you all! for the quick, thoughtful and useful advice. It is all much, much appreciated.
The move to the new M3 iMac went well. I did the usual set of backups, then used Migration Assistant, then deleted apps we just don’t use (after printing and saving a “Print Window” list of apps to refer to), then did some of my own careful pruning of caches and preferences files. We used the new Mac for a week to see if I had cut a bit too deep. When everything we do use seemed to be working just fine, plus a few more days, I wiped the old Intel iMac and reinstalled just the basic set of apps I figured I or my kids might use when they visit us.
Again, thank you all for your advice and support. I learned a lot and it really helped.
The next question is – what to do with the old Intel iMac. (Both daughters seem non-plussed at using the iMac for anything.) I thought about bringing it to the studio to use as a side screen for my old MacBook Pro, and even successfully tested Duet Display to make it happen. But my IT lead balked for some legitimate reasons, so that was a dead-end.
I can sell it here in Japan (for a very small amount) to a service that will send someone around to pick it up. They appraise and send their offer (which is easily estimated online). It’s worked for me in the past, but I’m hesitant… it just seems that there must be some use for it around here, but what could it be? Any suggestions you have will be much appreciated. It’s clean, and the screen quality is still great.
I’m sorry not to have thanked you all sooner. You gave me the confidence to stick with Migration Assistant first, and the links you provided helped me do some careful cleaning.
If you do anything with Linux, it would make a great host for VMs. Linux doesn’t require nearly as much CPU power or RAM to be useful (especially if you use a lightweight desktop like Xfce or LXDE).
To keep their resource footprint low, you can configure them to run without any GUI, remote-login from your new Mac and have any graphical Linux apps send their output to your new Mac’s screen via an X11 server like XQuartz.
I have an old(er) iMac maxed out at Catalina happily purring away in an upstairs bedroom, serving my beloved Jazz Groove streaming station throughout the house, as well as serving videos on demand to my Apple TV. It just runs and runs. Can’t even remember the last time it was restarted.
Same here - a 2015 iMac is my main media server for Homesharing to Apple TV and iPads. It is also my emergency back-up if my office Mac goes down. I use Chronosync to ensure it has critical data if this happens, as well as some “legacy” apps.
Regarding remembering how to set up a new computer, many years ago I started a web page where I recorded my own tips. It has grown quite large but I must admit many of the apps are no longer with us!
While upgrade in place updates are usually successful, with Apple removing everything that isn’t compatible, that isn’t always the case. After updating to a newer macOS, one Mac that had some old plugins or extensions in one system folder that were causing things not to run or crash, until I removed them. A clean install would have prevented that.
Thank you @Sebby, @Shamino, @fischej, and @mpainesyd for the “what to do with the Intel iMac” ideas, @Brian for the cautionary tale, and @mpainesyd for the link to your web page about set-up tips (useful if I decide to commandeer the iMac over to another OS).
@Sebby, I used to be okay with Windows but it’s been so long since I last really used it. I will definitely keep your idea in mind… if I can think of something I would do there that I won’t do on it as a Mac…
Similarly, @Shamino, I wonder what I would do with a local Linux machine around the house. It sounds very cool… I think I need to do some research into what I’m not doing that I could be doing, which sounds like proving a negative but hey, who knows what I’ll find.
Jazz Groove, @fischej, sounds great! I wonder what having that set-up brings me better than listening to things on the HomePod mini or Alexa, or on those via my iPhone, or watching things directly through the Apple TV.
It seems that I lack a blend of creativity and knowledge about what I could do with that hardware. “main media server for Homesharing” sounds very useful, but I need to get my head around why!
They make great servers. For files, printers, web, mail, whatever. Assuming you need/want one.
I have two Linux systems (an old Dell PC and a Raspberry Pi) that provide the following services for my LAN:
DNS
DHCP
Apache (web server)
SSH (remote login)
Having a local web server is actually useful. I log-in to them to update the pages and can read the results from any device running any operating system. It was my “notes” system long before Apple introduced their Notes app.
If you’re so inclined, it’s not hard to install the MediaWiki software to create your own Wiki, so everybody on your LAN can add/update pages without a lot of work. I did this on a system for my employer, and I plan on doing it at home some day.
Linux is also a really good platform for software development, or learning how to develop software, if that’s something that interests you.
It may not fit your use case. For me, I have an Apple TV in the living room, a Mac in my office, and a couple of Bluetooth speakers (one portable, and a pair mounted on my patio). Running Rogue Amoeba’s Airfoil on the spare iMac and using either their complimentary Airfoil Satellite or just a straight Bluetooth connection, means that one audio source plays perfectly synchronized across all receivers simultaneously, should I want them all on at once.
Both Ventura and Windows 10 will get approximately one more year of vendor support, so I don’t think trying Windows 10 will be worthwhile, and Windows 11 is not officially supported on your machine.
You might consider using OpenCore Legacy Patcher (OCLP) to run a more current, unsupported version of macOS on your old iMac. For example, macOS Sonoma should work well on your old iMac, and I know that some people have Sequoia running via OCLP on even older iMacs than yours. OCLP is not for everyone, though, since it is not a solution that is supported at all by Apple, and, depending on the targeted machine, it may require varying degrees of security relaxation. If you do decide to try it, I strongly recommend backing up your old Mac first, completely erasing its drive, and using a clean installation of whatever OS you choose. There are lengthy threads in the MacRumors Forums about OCLP support for Sonoma and Sequoia.
FWIW, I recently tried running macOS Sonoma 14.6.1 on a mid-2012 13" MacBook Pro. It worked very well, though there were some caveats. Performance truly felt comparable to Catalina on the same machine, but occasionally the fan would turn on at full speed, especially when macOS would try to do some background tasks, like analyzing the Photos database. Also, some machines aren’t able to support all features under OCLP, though at first glance, your old iMac seems fine. On my old MBP Pro, however, virtualization is fatally broken under OCLP-Sonoma, so VMware and Parallels are out of the equation for me.
If you’re interested in Linux and are technically inclined it can be a lot of fun, and it has the advantage that several major distributions just came out with new “long term support” releases that will receive security updates through 2029 or even longer in some cases. Linux Mint is a very popular choice, while Debian, Ubuntu, and others also are very good.