Transfer data from old internal HD to new HD

[bhsu21]

I'm going to buy a new internal HD (Scorpio Blue 500GB) for my Macbook Pro.

My question is how to take everything I have on my old HD and put it on my new HD.

From searching I've seen people talk about SuperDuper. Exactly how would I use it?

Also I've seen some mention using Time Machine. If I use that way, do I put in my new HD first, then install Leopard, then go to Time Machine and put everything back onto my new HD?

I want to make sure I know what I'm doing so when I get it, I know which method I will use.

Thanks for your help!

 

[jmann]

What you need to go is buy an external hard drive and use time machine to make a backup onto the external drive, and then when you put the new drive in, put the OS disc into the computer, and hold "c" and boot up from it, and choose disk utility to format the new internal drive, and then you can install leopard and use the migration assistant to transfer all your data and settings onto the new drive. Or you can use SuperDuper and make a "bootable clone" and do the same thing, but just plug in the drive and hold "c" and boot from that drive, and then you can format the drive and install the OS then transfer the data. It might sound overwhelming but if you search there are a lot of guides with your options.

 

[thesmoth]

What you need to go is buy an external hard drive and use time machine to make a backup onto the external drive, and then when you put the new drive in, put the OS disc into the computer, and hold "c" and boot up from it, and choose disk utility to format the new internal drive, and then you can install leopard and use the migration assistant to transfer all your data and settings onto the new drive. Or you can use SuperDuper and make a "bootable clone" and do the same thing, but just plug in the drive and hold "c" and boot from that drive, and then you can format the drive and install the OS then transfer the data. It might sound overwhelming but if you search there are a lot of guides with your options.

So you...

1) with the old hard drive in your computer, plug in an external USB hard drive, make a time machine backup.

2) take out old drive and put in a new drive. The new drive is blank, so you put the snow leopard disc in the drive, turn on the machine while holding c, and you'll boot from the snow leopard cd

3) Choose disc utility, format new drive (even though it is already blank, format it properly for the new OSX install).

4) Use migration assistant to install a fresh copy of OSX leopard onto the new hard drive WHILE the external USB hard drive is connected to the computer, so that it can grab your settings and applications from the time machine backup and install them while installing snow leopard?

Isn't step 4 kind of redundant since you could just do a regular install of snow leopard, and then just use time machine with your external drive to revert back to your previous state? Doesn't doing that just basically copy over all of your applications and settings just like you're saying the migration assistant does?

 

[jmann]

Isn't step 4 kind of redundant since you could just do a regular install of snow leopard, and then just use time machine with your external drive to revert back to your previous state? Doesn't doing that just basically copy over all of your applications and settings just like you're saying the migration assistant does?

You have to format the drive either way. The end result is going to be the same. There are many options to do this.

 

[palmerc2]

to add a little side note of the above replies.....

when you are installing Leopard, it will go through "what language do you speak" "what country are you in" etc etc

One of the last options is something around the lines of: 1) is this a fresh install? 2) would you like to pull all information off of a time machine backup?

Choose that, it will take a couple of hours depending on how much data you backed up / have



Also, just out of my sheer curiosity, isn't it possible to backup everything (documents, settings, applications, etc etc) on multiple DVDs? If the OP doesn't want an external HDD other then this sole purpose, wouldn't the cheaper route be to get a bunch of DL DVDs?? Just wondering how that would work out for when you want to put everything on the new HD (such as labeling the disk 1, 2, 3, etc).....

 

[ttran88]

Hello everyone,

I was planning on updating to the new hitachi 500 gb 7200 rpm drive. I have an external enclosure I bought off ebay. Can I install the new drive, format, and just plug in my old drive with the external enclosure? Can i do this without using time machine etc..

Thanks and happy holidays to everyone.

 

[erratikmind]

Hello everyone,

I was planning on updating to the new hitachi 500 gb 7200 rpm drive. I have an external enclosure I bought off ebay. Can I install the new drive, format, and just plug in my old drive with the external enclosure? Can i do this without using time machine etc..

Thanks and happy holidays to everyone.

I just installed the same new hdd.

Yes, simply let Superduper do all of the work. I cloned bootable hdd in some 1 hour and 15 minutes. The new Hitachi hdd works like a charm.

 

[coast1ja]

I would go the SuperDuper route... it's much faster than Time Machine in my experience.

 

[Forum-User]

Or you could use Carbon Copy Cloner

I've used Carbon Copy Cloner from bombich.com several times to clone hard drives on my Macs. It's very easy to use, and has worked very well for me.