Best and easiest way to transfer to new machine

[grahamie]

So basically, I'm trading macbooks with my friend. All my stuff is backed up in bootcamp and on an external hard drive.

What's the best way to transfer EVERYTHING - applications, Safari bookmarks, iTunes library, etc. in the easiest way possible?

When I get his laptop, I will wipe it clean and install my things, but I want to do it in the best way.
Any advice?

Thanks

 

[Orlandoech]

So basically, I'm trading macbooks with my friend. All my stuff is backed up in bootcamp and on an external hard drive.

What's the best way to transfer EVERYTHING - applications, Safari bookmarks, iTunes library, etc. in the easiest way possible?

When I get his laptop, I will wipe it clean and install my things, but I want to do it in the best way.
Any advice?

Thanks

You answered your own question lol.

 

[mgipe]

Migration Assistant

 

[Ledgem]

I'll echo Migration Assistant. It's the fastest and easiest way to get a new or transferred system up and running exactly as your previous system was. You can have Migration Assistant transfer things off of your Time Machine volume (although if you've excluded any directories from Time Machine backups, make sure that you transfer those manually), or if you clone your drive using software like SuperDuper! or Carbon Copy Cloner, Migration Assistant can pull the data off of the backup as well.

The only downside to Migration Assistant is that it'll transfer over everything, including files from old programs that you have since deleted. It shouldn't really cause a performance issue, but the benefit of installing everything fresh is that you leave all of that junk behind. (I always use Migration Assistant regardless.)