Upgrade vs. Archive & Install

[jfruh]

Hi all-

My copy of Leopard gets here Tuesday (yay!). I've been using OS X since the Public Beta, and I am somewhat shamefaced to admit that I have NEVER in all that time done a clean install -- I've always used the "upgrade" option. There was a change of machine in there, but I just used migration assistant to move my existing configuration over the new computer!

So I'm thinking I should probably do an Archive and Install once Leopard gets here. Of course, the reason I've just upgraded all this time is that I really don't want to retweak all my preferences to get things jut the way I like them. So, my understanding is that I can set Archive and Install so that all users and user prefs are maintained, right? And installed apps too? Is there anything I should watch out for? I know the systemwide Library folder is refreshed new, but I can't imagine anything I've done that would affect that folder ... still, pointers are appreciated. Thanks!

Josh

 

[summero]

I'm planning on purchasing Leopard within the next week or so and I would like to know as well! Someone please help us out!

 

[tyr2]

You might be interested in this discussion from a couple of days ago.

In the end I went for Archive/Install which worked fine, only a reinstall of the Cisco VPN client was required. There have been a few threads about people having problems with Upgrade today.

 

[Vanilla]

Well all I can say is that so far I have done an archive and install on my old Powerbook G4 without any problems.
1. I made sure I cleared out all obvious old files, applications etc. and used MainMenu to repair disk permissions, run cron scripts, update prebindings etc.before starting.
2. After you have installed it the system runs dog slow for a period of time as Spotlight updates its indexes.
3. Once I'd satisfied myself that all major apps etc. were working I deleted the "Previous System" folder, which gained me over 7gb of space.

I'm now installing it on a Macbook and experienced the issue of the missing Hard Drive...I waited and after around 7 minutes it magically appeared and so far the install is working fine.

Tomorrow I'll try my old G5 iMac and new 2.8ghz 24" iMac but so far I'm very happy.

Vanilla
PS: Quicklook is the killer function for me personally, it's awesome. Spaces is a close second.

 

[Vanilla]

Just to caveat my previous post, I'm now experiencing my first issue. On the POwerbook I had removed the Previous System folder and then ran Disk Utility...its coming up to 25 minutes now and I'm still on the candybar stripe, which is a bit worrying. I ran it on the MacBook and it took about 10 minutes but the Previous System folder is still there so I'm thinking maybe the removal of this folder has something to do with it...not sure yet but if so I'll have to bite the bullet and do a clean install which will suck big time, so I'm still hoping this will resolve itself.
Vanilla

 

[IzzyJG99]

Hi all-

My copy of Leopard gets here Tuesday (yay!). I've been using OS X since the Public Beta, and I am somewhat shamefaced to admit that I have NEVER in all that time done a clean install -- I've always used the "upgrade" option. There was a change of machine in there, but I just used migration assistant to move my existing configuration over the new computer!

So I'm thinking I should probably do an Archive and Install once Leopard gets here. Of course, the reason I've just upgraded all this time is that I really don't want to retweak all my preferences to get things jut the way I like them. So, my understanding is that I can set Archive and Install so that all users and user prefs are maintained, right? And installed apps too? Is there anything I should watch out for? I know the systemwide Library folder is refreshed new, but I can't imagine anything I've done that would affect that folder ... still, pointers are appreciated. Thanks!

Josh

I first did a simple upgrade from 10.4.1 to 10.5.0. Everything worked just fine. Then I thought maybe I should do a clean install. So I did. I backed up everything to my 160GB HD (Pictures & Songs) and straight installed 10.5. That went well but none of the applications I reinstalled worked. The iLife disc wouldn't install. Nothing seems to work quite yet at all (AOL, Diablo 2, etc, etc) on 10.5.

So I did a restore to 10.4 on my iMac G5 2.1GHz. I got all the software up to date and installed all of my applications under 10.4.10. I then upgraded and everything seems to be fine.

I don't think Apple would put an upgrade feature if it weren't okay to do. Also I would have done an archive and install, but I have had past bad experiences with it saving things, but them being corrupted.

 

[Vanilla]

Well the only thing to go 'wrong' with three archive and installs this weekend is that Repairing permissions takes an age to run, but it DOES conclude eventually. Gawd knows why its taking so long but I assume it will be resolved in later releases. Apart from that everything is cool, all installed apps work fine, including Adobe suites, its fast (once spotlight has done its thing) and I couldnt be happier.
Vanilla