iMac SSD OSX Install Options

Discussion in 'macOS' started by _Refurbished_, Jul 19, 2016.

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  1. _Refurbished_, Jul 19, 2016

    _Refurbished_ macrumors 68000

    _Refurbished_

    Joined:
    Mar 23, 2007
    #1
    After doing some research, it looks like I have a few option to get OSX back onto the computer following an SSD upgrade. From what I'm following, I can use the OSX Internet Recovery system to install the default OSX version that came with the iMac originally, or I can create a bootable USB install disk. I don't think I have the original install disk that came with the computer.

    My question is should I use the internet recovery system and then upgrade to El Capitan? Or is it smarter to create a USB boot disk? I'd rather not create the boot disk if I don't need to, I'm perfectly content sitting through two installations of OSX. Would one have an advantage over another? Thanks in advance.
     
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  2. keysofanxiety, Jul 19, 2016

    keysofanxiety macrumors 604

    keysofanxiety

    Joined:
    Nov 23, 2011
    #2
    Few additional options:

    1) If you have a TM backup, you can restore that directly to your SSD.

    2) If you can access your old HDD through a USB SATA dock, you can boot into the recovery OS there & reinstall a fresh copy of the OS version which was on your old HDD.
     
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  3. hwojtek, Jul 19, 2016

    hwojtek macrumors 65816

    hwojtek

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    #3
    Why not use CCC or SuperDuper! and just clone the existing installation intact to the SSD?
     
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  4. DJLC, Jul 19, 2016

    DJLC macrumors 6502a

    DJLC

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    Mooresville, NC
    #4
    I don't think there's any real benefit either way, aside from the fact that creating an ElCap boot drive would give you a faster install.

    That said, you could easily also do this if you have access to the old drive: boot into the Internet Recovery system, bring up a Terminal, and use asr to clone the drive. Much easier way of doing it IMO and it will successfully clone your recovery partition, too.
     
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