Sidebar Sidebar
Become a MacRumors Supporter for $50/year with no ads, ability to filter front page stories, and private forums.

Help in setting up new Mac Pro from old Mac Pro including Boot Camp Windows Partition

T

thetoness

macrumors member
Original poster
Jan 16, 2008
39
0
My new Hex Mac Pro is arriving on Sept 21 (ordered it on the 17th and shipped out within 3 hours!).
My problem is how to setup my new Mac pro. My current set up is as follows
1. System Disk-with data on it.
2. Photos
3. Music
4. Partitioned disk-used for backup and the 2nd partition contains Windows 7 using Bootcamp.
With my new Mac pro I will be using an SSD installed in my optical Bay and will have 4 2tb hard drives.
On the SSD I only want to have OSX and my applications with the data on another disk.
My questions are:
1. What is the best way to transfer my present system disk to my new SSD without transferring the data?
2. What is the best way to transfer the other drives to the new drives?
3. Is there a way to connect both machines and transfer it that way, using Carbon Copy Cloner or some other method?
4. Will I be able to transfer Window 7/bootcamp through this method?
5. Am I better off just biting the bullet and reinstalling all apps and making a new partition and reinstalling Windows7/Bootcamp?
Sorry for the length of this thread but I am trying to avoid spending a week setting up my new Mac Pro. I appreciate any thoughts and strategy you might have. Thanks
 
When your Mac Pro arrives, it will have 10.6 installed on disk 1 (labeled "Macintosh HD").

Boot it up.

Make the first user your "emergency" or "admin" user, and log in to that account.

Use Boot Camp Assistant to make a Boot Camp partition on Macintosh HD. (Boot Camp Assistant will only do it on the startup disk, even though you can put Boot Camp on any bootable drive.)

Install your Windows on the Boot Camp Partition.

Install your SSD, if you haven't already done so.

Boot back into Snow Leopard.

Use Carbon Copy Cloner to copy Macintosh HD to your SSD.

Reboot, choosing the SSD as the startup drive.

Make a new user, which will be your normal login account. Use Migration Assistant to copy your data from the old computer. This will all go onto the SSD, but that is okay, because you will move it all to Macintosh HD in a few minutes. If your SSD is too small to fit everything you are migrating, you will have to deselect some stuff.

Copy the entire home directory for your normal login account to /Users on Macintosh HD.

In the Accounts control panel, use the Advanced options to point your home directory to "/Volumes/Macintosh HD/Users/normal login".

Log out. Log back in as your normal login. Verify that your home is on Macintosh HD. If everything is good, you can trash the normal login home directory from the SSD.

Now you have a machine with boot/apps on the SSD, and your home on a mechanical drive. You can also log in using the SSD only using the emergency/admin account, if anything goes wrong with the mechanical drives. And, unless you delete the system from Macintosh HD, you can still boot from the Macintosh HD if need be. Plus, you can boot Windows from the mechanical drive (or use the BootCamp partition inside of Parallels).
 
You must log in or register to reply here.
Register on MacRumors! This sidebar will go away, and you'll see fewer ads.
Top Bottom
Back