Mavericks Upgrade

[06Honda]

Well I have decided to upgrade to the Mavericks, MacBook Pro is backed up. Have never upgraded OS before, currently on SL 10.6.8,any tips or tricks to make it happen flawlessly. Thanks for any help, haven't been at the forum in a while so I am sure this has been talked to death, excuse me for asking just a little nervous about doing this. There are some apps that need this update for me to get and use.


Hardware Overview:

Model Name: MacBook Pro
Model Identifier: MacBookPro8,1
Processor Name: Intel Core i5
Processor Speed: 2.3 GHz
Number of Processors: 1
Total Number of Cores: 2
L2 Cache (per Core): 256 KB
L3 Cache: 3 MB
Memory: 4 GB

 

[saturnotaku]

Remove any software you know is not compatible with Mavericks. Verify the hard drive and scan/fix permissions. Download the installer from the App Store (can take a while, best to do during off-peak hours if you can). Follow the prompts and let the installer do its thing (can take 30-60 minutes depending on the speed of your computer and hard drive). Profit.

It's slightly more involved if you want to do a completely clean install (eg format your hard drive), but I did an in-place upgrade from Mountain Lion to 10.9.1, and it's been working great. The key is in the very first sentence above.

 

[DeltaMac]

The other prep before upgrading from SL to MavX - I think you should consider upgrading your RAM. Doubling to 8GB will make MavX much better than the 4GB that you have now.
If you are looking at also upgrading software that requires MavX, then you can even upgrade to 16GB, for even more fun.

 

[brdeveloper]

Well I have decided to upgrade to the Mavericks, MacBook Pro is backed up. Have never upgraded OS before, currently on SL 10.6.8,any tips or tricks to make it happen flawlessly. Thanks for any help, haven't been at the forum in a while so I am sure this has been talked to death, excuse me for asking just a little nervous about doing this. There are some apps that need this update for me to get and use.


Hardware Overview:

Model Name: MacBook Pro
Model Identifier: MacBookPro8,1
Processor Name: Intel Core i5
Processor Speed: 2.3 GHz
Number of Processors: 1
Total Number of Cores: 2
L2 Cache (per Core): 256 KB
L3 Cache: 3 MB
Memory: 4 GB

I upgraded to a SSD recently and installed Snow Leopard from scratch, then I stayed around a month this way, installed 10.9-incompatible software and after upgrading they were moved to another folder. However, if you have MacPorts or tar.gz packages compiled by yourself, it would be better doing a clean install before upgrading.

At the end of installation (100%), Mavericks keeps silent for long minutes (maybe almost 20-30). Don't reboot your machine pressing the power button. As saturnotaku, let the installation process do its job. Even with a SSD it takes time.

 

[06Honda]

Awesome, thanks. Will upgrade the Ram tomorrow before starting the upgrade. Great tips on the apps, is there a list of Maverick apps online or is it easier to check each one individually?

 

[brdeveloper]

Awesome, thanks. Will upgrade the Ram tomorrow before starting the upgrade. Great tips on the apps, is there a list of Maverick apps online or is it easier to check each one individually?

Check each one. For example, I had Crossover installed which was incompatible, so it was moved to another folder or didn't work at all. However, Crossover bottles associated to my user account were kept intact. Later, when I upgraded Crossover with a Mavericks-compatible version, my bottles worked as expected.

You have to check each case by yourself. Another thing is nVidia's CUDA framework (if you work with gpu programming). Until I know, only modern GPUs are now cuda-compatible in Mavericks, so it's better not upgrading further than ML 10.8.

Well, basically do a inventary of your must-have applications and check if they work with Mavericks.