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Dannydematio

macrumors member
Original poster
May 17, 2016
52
13
Hi,

just being careful here. I need to connect a legacy FW800/USB drive to a new iMac 2020 (back up previous machine) so I’m using USB, I don’t have TB3/FW adapter.

I was about to go ahead and connect via USB, but since I don’t want to “not connect” on first start up, I want to be 100% sure that I don’t need a USB3 to older USB2 adapter cable.

I know you need USB-C to old USB adaptor.

As far as I was aware, I’m good to go, but so many variants of USB standard it’s a bit confusing, so worth checking.


I happen to have a new 1 TB Sandisk external SSD which has a USB-C cable with a USB2 dongle on the end to allow connections. I guess I could go that way too.

Can anybody confirm please.

I know Apple pair everything but do they also charge up the mouse/keyboard for out of the box set up? No indicators of state of charge on either, so how do you know?

thanks.
 

casperes1996

macrumors 604
Jan 26, 2014
7,593
5,764
Horsens, Denmark
You don't need any adapter at all. You could plug in a USB 1.0 device and it'd work even though speeds would of course be limited to USB 1.0. You don't need a USB-C to USB-A adapter either; The iMac has both USB-C and USB-A (regular old USB)

Keyboard and mous/trackpad should automatically pair when launched, but if they don't work immediately, just plug the bundled USB->Lightning cable into the iMac and the peripherals one at a time and they'll pair. They should be at around 80% charge on the battery out of the box.
 

Dannydematio

macrumors member
Original poster
May 17, 2016
52
13
You don't need any adapter at all. You could plug in a USB 1.0 device and it'd work even though speeds would of course be limited to USB 1.0. You don't need a USB-C to USB-A adapter either; The iMac has both USB-C and USB-A (regular old USB)

Keyboard and mous/trackpad should automatically pair when launched, but if they don't work immediately, just plug the bundled USB->Lightning cable into the iMac and the peripherals one at a time and they'll pair. They should be at around 80% charge on the battery out of the box.

Yes thanks, I figured it was backwards compatible. I charged the mouse/KB for an hour just in case.

I am now waiting for migration assistant to do its thing. I have the “starting up” message on the screen for several hours now, so it’s really slow. No moving progress bar, just undulating bar, so I don’t know how long it will take. I selected what I wanted and left out folders/files so settings and apps area coming across only, but I guess the USB is just slooooow.

I’d rather Apple put a progress bar and something more descriptive than “starting up” whilst MA is copying from my back up of the old iMac. Otherwise your wondering if something is wrong with the BU drive, except I know it’s a good FW800 drive with no bad sectors etc.

I have read that MA can be very slow but I haven’t done this before. To be frank, at this rate, it’s probably faster to drag n drop files and reinstall apps/settings, but let’s see how smooth a final outcome I get.

thanks.
 

casperes1996

macrumors 604
Jan 26, 2014
7,593
5,764
Horsens, Denmark
Yes thanks, I figured it was backwards compatible. I charged the mouse/KB for an hour just in case.

I am now waiting for migration assistant to do its thing. I have the “starting up” message on the screen for several hours now, so it’s really slow. No moving progress bar, just undulating bar, so I don’t know how long it will take. I selected what I wanted and left out folders/files so settings and apps area coming across only, but I guess the USB is just slooooow.

I’d rather Apple put a progress bar and something more descriptive than “starting up” whilst MA is copying from my back up of the old iMac. Otherwise your wondering if something is wrong with the BU drive, except I know it’s a good FW800 drive with no bad sectors etc.

I have read that MA can be very slow but I haven’t done this before. To be frank, at this rate, it’s probably faster to drag n drop files and reinstall apps/settings, but let’s see how smooth a final outcome I get.

thanks.

USB 2.0 has a maximum theoretical speed of like 60MB/s. That's quite slow even for spinning hard drives. And that's theoretical speed. There will likely be some overhead in there, so let's say 50MB/s. If everything you're copying over is in contiguous space you'll likely be able to achieve this all the time. If there are gaps, there will be periods where your transfer speed will basically be 0 as the drive is seeking. Now based on how much data you're transferring you can begin to make some rough estimates as to how much time you can expect it to take.
 

Dannydematio

macrumors member
Original poster
May 17, 2016
52
13
USB 2.0 has a maximum theoretical speed of like 60MB/s. That's quite slow even for spinning hard drives. And that's theoretical speed. There will likely be some overhead in there, so let's say 50MB/s. If everything you're copying over is in contiguous space you'll likely be able to achieve this all the time. If there are gaps, there will be periods where your transfer speed will basically be 0 as the drive is seeking. Now based on how much data you're transferring you can begin to make some rough estimates as to how much time you can expect it to take.


Well, 21 solid hours and counting....

I can accept that this is going to take a long time, but I wish Apple software engineers put a clear indication progress bar up, during the Copying over process so that you knew how everything was progressing.

All I see is a message box saying “Transferring your information” and “starting up” with a solid progress bar.

I have zero way of knowing if this is normal and everything is working as it should, or it’s “hung” frozen in time.

Apple used to be known for its finesse and attention to detail in the software visual interface, but no thought has gone into this from the end users perspective
 

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profcutter

macrumors 68000
Mar 28, 2019
1,548
1,296
In the past, I’ve used Ethernet to migrate instead of usb. It’s a much faster connection, if you’re using two machines with gigabit Ethernet, and it’s been quite reliable. Just a thought.
 

Dannydematio

macrumors member
Original poster
May 17, 2016
52
13
In the past, I’ve used Ethernet to migrate instead of usb. It’s a much faster connection, if you’re using two machines with gigabit Ethernet, and it’s been quite reliable. Just a thought.

Thanks, but the process has started now (I think) so I don’t want to cancel and waste the time elapsed, especially if it’s working despite the lack of clarity.

I just want to know that what I’m looking at is a snails pace but solid transfer of data rather than a hung macintosh with zero indication of that.
 
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