I just purchased the 21" iMac. I already have the 15" MacBook Pro. What is the easiest, most direct method for transferring/copying the entire contents from the MacBook to the iMac?
If your MBP has thunderbolt:
Get a thunderbolt cable
Put the MBP into target disk mode
Connect the cable to the imac
run migration assistant on the iMac.
Transfer the users from the MBP.
(I personally prefer to reinstall apps and other bits on new systems, so don't use the other options in Migration assistant to migrate settings, apps, etc... You can if you want, but I like my new systems as clean as possible)
If your MBP only has firewire, you'll need the thunderbolt firewire adapter, the can do the above.
I just purchased the 21" iMac. I already have the 15" MacBook Pro. What is the easiest, most direct method for transferring/copying the entire contents from the MacBook to the iMac?
Is ethernet faster than using a firewire 800 to thunderbolt cable?
Wouldn't a thunderbolt cable connecting the two computers result in the fastest download? If so, approximately how long would it take to transfer about 150 gb of data using a thunderbolt cable with migration assistant?
I'm going to be doing the same as the OP, but getting the 27' iMac and transferring from MBP 17 -2009.
I'm unfamiliar with migration assistant. Basically all I want to transfer is my eMail, iTunes and the docs/music/movies directories.
Does migration assistance allow selective restore, or is it 'all or nothing' ?
Connect the two machines together with a ethernet cable and run Migration Assistant.
Is this also true when wanting to transfer files from a PC/Windows to the imac?
Is this also true when wanting to transfer files from a PC/Windows to the imac?
Migration assistent's primary goal is to let all your settings function again on a new mac. On a windows machine everything is organised different, and apple does not offer a service to organise that into mac-locations.
Easiest is to share your drive on the windows machine, connect over IP, and see the windows machine pop up in the finder.
Yep... it works pretty much the same. You need to install the Windows Migration Assistant program from Apple from here. There are some limitations what comes over from Windows depending on version.