The return of free data transfers with a new Mac?

[Kirsten Hollerd]

A buddy of mine is buying a new iMac this week and asked me about whether or not she should get the One-to-One membership (for the occasional lesson, but mostly to transfer huge amounts of data from her old PC).

I was going to tell her go for it but noticed this week that apparently Apple will do it for free now. I've attached a screen shot of what it says on the website on the "Personal Pickup" splash page.

Anyone else going to take advantage of this? I'm not sure if this is part of a holiday promotion or if One-to-One is dropping the data transfer as part of the paid service...

 

[jertronic]

I believe that my comments may be helpful to your friend. Recently I bought an a new iMac. I bought one to one as I am new to Mac. Like your friend I was Looking for a pc-Mac data transfer.

First, let me say that I am pretty stoked about my new iMac. The buying experience was not quite as fullflling, but let me stick to the topic.

The geniuses in back did the data transfer. My HP laptop was in rough shape and would barely stay powered on for longer than 10 min. So, the transfer was finished and I scheduled a one to one "project" session so that I could play with my new Mac and realize the dream of having all my data perfectly on place.
I had exactly one duplicate of each of my 3,600 songs to make a total of 7,200 songs on my iTunes on new Mac. The photos and videos were all lumped together and appeared in multiple places on the finder and in I photo.

Advice: take the pains to transfer yourself. I am still happy that I purchased one to one because I go in and sit there for hours at the project table and transfer. With help from the apple specialists i transfer properly and use all kinds of totally cool tips and hints.

Dont get one to one soley for data transfer and don't be fooled into thinking that your data will be transferred with care. More like carelessLY. "we don't have the time back here to drag every file into each proper place or app or folder.". Well no kidding. But, I like the help I am getting now. I still have a ways to go in terms of getting everything over into the proper place. I live 15 minutes from an apple store and I am in between jobs so time is no issue for me.

Get the one to one, don't expect anything more than a massive data dump, kaplunk on your pretty new iMac. Instead , transfer yourself with the help of professionals who have been promoted from the back room out to the floor.

 

[Kirsten Hollerd]

Interesting... my friend bought her Mac and told the Specialist (who was awesome by the way) that she wanted files transferred from her old Dell that she brought with her. She was told "oh no, that's only with the One-to-One I told you about". She then showed her the Apple website that said they would in fact transfer files from your old computer during the Personal Setup. The girl went and conferred with her manager(who looked kind of incredulous) and they eventually agreed to the transfer.

I asked the manager about it and he said that he wasn't aware that the website promised that and that it must be something new.

Is this new or have they always done data transfers during the setup part?

And again, why would someone pay for the $99 transfer?

 

[ancelrick]

A buddy of mine is buying a new iMac this week and asked me about whether or not she should get the One-to-One membership (for the occasional lesson, but mostly to transfer huge amounts of data from her old PC).

I was going to tell her go for it but noticed this week that apparently Apple will do it for free now. I've attached a screen shot of what it says on the website on the "Personal Pickup" splash page.

the operative term here is "show you how". When you pick up your mac they will show you how to do various "getting started " sort of things. If you want them to do it for you, you'll need to buy One to One for $99

 

[SDColorado]

Or it may be something old. I have stumbled onto some dated pages for things like the old ProCare, pre-Join Venture split via web searches, that can't be found directly through Apples web site.

I don't think there is any reason why you would want to pay $99 for One to One, if your only reason for purchasing One to One is for data transfer. You can do that yourself easy enough. One to One can be a worthwhile purchase if you are new to the Mac world and would like some training on Mac apps that you may not have used before, such as the iWork suite, iPhoto, Aperture, etc. If I recall the terms, you can do 1 hour of training a week for the year + a personal project session. If you are just looking to get up to speed quickly after making the switch, or trying to do something you are having learning on your own, it can be a bargain for some folks. For just transferring data? I wouldn't bother.