Use Migration Assistant via a Hard Drive

[jaded-mandarin]

I'm about to switch jobs between companies who are part of the same group of companies.

Unfortunately my director has dug his heels at me leaving and refused to let me take my machine upstairs and cross charge my old company for it.

I have the same machine on order for upstairs, but I'm unsure whether I'll have to give up my old one before I receive the new one. I was hoping to use Migration Assistant to just port everything on to the new one and carry on as normal, but with me being unsure of time scales, I was wondering whether it is possible to use a hard drive with Migration Assistant instead of Mac to Mac (old Mac to HD - HD to new Mac)?

 

[tobefirst ⚽️]

Pretty sure I did this with a Time
Machine backup. I just backed up my old computer and restored the new computer from Time Machine. Can someone else confirm?

 

[CoastalOR]

I'm about to switch jobs between companies who are part of the same group of companies.
Unfortunately my director has dug his heels at me leaving and refused to let me take my machine upstairs and cross charge my old company for it.
I have the same machine on order for upstairs, but I'm unsure whether I'll have to give up my old one before I receive the new one. I was hoping to use Migration Assistant to just port everything on to the new one and carry on as normal, but with me being unsure of time scales, I was wondering whether it is possible to use a hard drive with Migration Assistant instead of Mac to Mac (old Mac to HD - HD to new Mac)?

I assume you have a current back up of your Mac to an external HD. What kind of backup is it (current Time Machine or clone)? If it is a full backup to an external drive then Migration Assistant will work fine. I have done that many times.
Here is a Apple link that has more information:
https://support.apple.com/en-us/HT204350

 

[satcomer]

I'm about to switch jobs between companies who are part of the same group of companies.

Unfortunately my director has dug his heels at me leaving and refused to let me take my machine upstairs and cross charge my old company for it.

I have the same machine on order for upstairs, but I'm unsure whether I'll have to give up my old one before I receive the new one. I was hoping to use Migration Assistant to just port everything on to the new one and carry on as normal, but with me being unsure of time scales, I was wondering whether it is possible to use a hard drive with Migration Assistant instead of Mac to Mac (old Mac to HD - HD to new Mac)?

Does your company use a NAS or a VLAN setup?

 

[jaded-mandarin]

Thanks all for your replies.

Good news, my employer has said they'll keep the MacBook as is until my new one arrives. I'm working between companies for a month as a transition and to tie up loose ends anyway so it would have been clueless of them to wipe it.

In regards to the external HD, I thought about Time Machine but haven't really kept my pulse on all things Apple for a few years now and wasn't sure that way would work.

What I'll do to be sure is do a full Time Machine backup to my Ex HD and then I should be good to restore my new Mac from that if anything happens?

 

[Weaselboy]

What I'll do to be sure is do a full Time Machine backup to my Ex HD and then I should be good to restore my new Mac from that if anything happens?

Yep... that will do the trick.

 

[hallux]

As @Weaselboy said, it'll do the trick. Migration Assistant can do a migration using a TM backup as the source.

https://support.apple.com/en-us/HT204350