Help Transferring All My Old Mac Info To A New Mac?

[beau21]

Hey y'all.

So I'm getting ready to sell of my current macbook in favor of a new one. However, I would like to be able to copy all of my files and applications over to my new macbook when I get it.

I will be selling my current macbook and then using that money + some extra for the new macbook so I will not have the current one available when transferring.

I have an external hard drive that I'm hoping I can use to "copy/clone" my current macbook and then load it up to my new macbook somehow.

Can anyone offer and help as to what programs I need? Or how to do this? Etc.

Any and all help is appreciated!

Thanks!
Beau

 

[204467]

Okay, if you have a firewire cable, you can transfer files directly from one computer to another. Just connect the computers, have the new one on already, and when you turn on the old one, hold "T" (I think) to put it in target disk mode. The new computer will see the old one as an external HD from which you can move all files from one computer to the next.

 

[beau21]

By the time I get the new macbook though I won't have the old/current one.

I'm selling the old/current one and that money is going towards the new one.

 

[204467]

Well then, can't you just backup your stuff with time machine? When you turn on a Mac for the first time, doesn't migration assistant ask if you want to move your stuff over from an old time machine backup? That certainly seems easiest to me.

 

[redmeister]

yea use timemachine if you can, that'd be the easiest way. if not, an external hd will just work as well. transfer files to hd, then sell comp, buy new one, hook new one up to hd and transfer

 

[alphaod]

Can't you just use Migration Assistant?

 

[204467]

Can't you just use Migration Assistant?

That's what I told him. I think, anyway. Does migration assistant allow you to use a previous time machine backup?