Install Mavericks on fresh SSD

[bhowell23]

Simple question: I just bought an SSD to replace my current HD, and I want to start real clean. (I've not upgraded from Snow Leopard since I bought the Mac 3 yrs ago, so I'm sure there's plenty of junk on the HD.)

Can I simply download the installer to my HD, run it to install Mavericks on the (temporarily external) SSD, copy data and install fresh versions of my apps on the SSD, then swap the two drives?

If not, then what?

 

[yjchua95]

Simple question: I just bought an SSD to replace my current HD, and I want to start real clean. (I've not upgraded from Snow Leopard since I bought the Mac 3 yrs ago, so I'm sure there's plenty of junk on the HD.)

Can I simply download the installer to my HD, run it to install Mavericks on the (temporarily external) SSD, copy data and install fresh versions of my apps on the SSD, then swap the two drives?

If not, then what?

Yes, you can do that.

When I made the switch from HDD to SSD, I made a bootable Mavericks installer with an SD card first. After that, I took out the HDD, put the SSD in, booted from the SD card, reformatted the SSD and installed a fresh copy of Mavericks on it. After that, I connected the HDD to the Mac via a Thunderbolt enclosure (USB3 enclosures also work) and transferred all my stuff over.