My 2017 iMac developed some severe problems and was at the end of a stream of many migrations from prior Macs. I decided to go manual to set up my new Mac mini. My setup is not complex and I do not have any apps with complex preferences or anything like that. I downloaded all my apps from the vendors and I manually transferred data from backups. I kept a log as I was going along, which helped me make sure I had everything covered.
I had to move the “On My Mac” mail folders manually to my mail client, Postbox, on the new Mac. It simply accepted them. I did have to set up all my IMAP email addresses. Some trouble with the Music app and my music library, but I discovered that the library was corrupted on the iMac. Remember when Apple was proud of iTunes?
As someone suggested above, I set up screen sharing so I could control the mini from the iMac. I could drag-drop some files across to transfer them, which worked most of the time, but it was slow and so only suitable for the occasional small file.
As the author of the original query, I felt I should close the circle on this.
Last week I received our new Mac mini, and finally made the migration from our 2012 MacBook Pro running Mojave.
After updating the Mac mini and making a final MacBook Pro Time Machine backup, I used Migration Assistant to transfer my data to the new machine. My doubts about all the barnacles that had built up on my System (I’ve not started with a completely clean install since my Mac LCII) were unfounded - but I was surprised that Migration Assistant transferred all my legacy 32-bit apps into the new install without any comment or option to exclude them.
Anyway, a very speedy migration (both were using SSDs) and I was up and running within a few hours. My second Time Machine backup, onto a HD, took quite a while longer, and then fell over as there was some iCloud sync problem with my wife’s account. A restart cured this.
After this, some judicious and cautious pruning of the Applications and Library folders saved over 30GB, and in the process I said goodbye to all my Adobe applications. As I’m retired, I can no longer justify Adobe’s extortionate subscription fees, but Serif’s Affinity suite seems a worthy (and far cheaper) replacement. I’ve had to upgrade Office to 2024, and the only thing I haven’t found a direct replacement so far is for Acrobat Pro. There are a whole slew of PDF applications, PDFgear seems to be covering most things at the moment. Everything else seems to work just fine, without even resorting to Rosetta.
In short, a migration from 32-bit Intel to Apple Silicon went far better than expected. Up and running within a few hours, two sets of Time Machine backups and a software cleanup within three days. Kudos to Apple - everything still “just works”.
One final dilemma. Apple’s packaging is now a marvel of completely recyclable elegant paper engineering. Beautifully designed. I have no real use for it, but it seems almost criminal to put it in the recycling.