David A. Cox: Today, I'm going to teach you the absolute best way to migrate
your data from an old Mac to a new one.
So if you're about to buy a new Apple computer, watch this video
before you migrate your data.
That's coming up next on Tech Talk America.
There are several different ways that you can migrate your data
from an old Mac to a new Mac.
Those methods include using migration assistant time machine target mode.
You can move it manually using an external hard drive or you can use iCloud drive
and then reinstall the apps manually just by signing into the App Store.
Let's talk for a moment about migration assistant.
There's no question it's by far the easiest method.
So trust me, I get the appeal.
Part of the reason why I wanted to update this video is because I've
had several clients of mine tell me that they've encountered these
really strange and annoying errors.
And the one thing that all of them have in common is they all used migration
assistant to transfer their data.
If that happened to you, the good news is that all you need to do is reinstall
the operating system, and that tends to resolve most of the glitches.
Most of the glitches, the glitches, if you need instructions on how to
reinstall the operating system on the Mac, that is actually the topic
of my next video and good news.
It's really easy and a really short video.
Once that comes out, I'll put a link to it down below in the video description.
The second method that I mentioned is of course time machine.
Now time machine is great when it comes to retrieving individual
files that you may have accidentally deleted, but it's not so great when it
comes to restoring all of your data.
I've seen several cases where similar to migration assistant, you
can end up with these very strange glitches that are usually resolved
by reinstalling the operating system.
So in general, I tend to not recommend using time machine,
unless it's an emergency situation.
Target Mode isn't something that's really used a lot these days, but it is good in
certain emergency data rescue situations
when there is no other form of backup.
To put your Mac into target mode, all you need to do is shut it down.
Then when you press the power button, you immediately hold down the T key.
You then connect it to the other Mac and you can access the data just as
if it were an external hard drive.
Like I said, this is a lifesaver in certain types of special case situations.
For example, if the screen is cracked, it's a great way to get at the data.
But if your Mac is functional, it's probably not the best method.
So we're left with two options.
You can either move your data manually using an external hard drive.
Or you can utilize iCloud drive.
I think using iCloud drive is in fact the best method because it puts
a lot less stress on the computer.
And a lot of times when people are buying a new Mac, it's because
their old Mac is starting to slow down and show ware and tear.
If you transfer a large amount of data all at once to an external hard
drive and that computer crashes in the process, it can corrupt data.
The nice thing about iCloud Drive is, if something does go wrong
with the computer, you literally just turn it off, turn it back on,
and it resumes where it left off.
The important thing that you need to understand about this process is that
there are several parts of the Mac that do not normally talk to iCloud.
So in just a moment, I'm gonna show you where to go to look for that data.
Before we begin.
I want to show you the settings that I have on my computer,
just to ensure that you have the same settings on your computer.
I'm gonna start by clicking on the Apple icon here at the top left, and
let's go into system preferences.
Now, just for quick reference, this video is coming out just before MacOS
Ventura drops later on this fall.
So once that happens, this area will be referred to as system settings from here,
I'm gonna click on Apple ID at the top.
I wanna make sure that iCloud drive is turned on.
And if we go here into options, I want to make sure that it's syncing files that
are on the desktop and documents folder.
One of the areas of user data that is by default outside of
iClouds grasp is the music folder, which contains the music library.
Now here's the thing.
If you are a subscriber to Apple music, you should know, you can
just go into preferences and tell it to sync your library.
By the way, if you do wanna find out more about Apple music, I have
a tutorial that I released not that long ago, and it covers all of the
most important aspects of Apple music.
If you want to check out that video, I'll put links down below.
If you do not subscribe to Apple music.
Here's what you'll wanna do.
We're gonna start with a little keyboard shortcut, make sure that
you've clicked on the desktop so that it says finder at the top.
And then on your keyboard, I want you to press command shift H that
will take you to your home folder.
Now, all you need to do is move the music folder into iCloud drive,
which is located here in the sidebar.
The next location that we're going to move to iCloud drive is the downloads folder.
And one of the questions that I get all the time from my client is they
want to know whether or not they should delete junk files before they continue
this process, or should they just transfer everything and then worry about
cleaning it up on the next computer.
In my opinion, I think it's best to just move everything and clean it up later.
Again, if your computer is slowing down, You don't really
wanna stress it right now.
One last thing on that topic.
If you do need help with cleaning up the downloads folder, you might wanna
check out my video from last week, which covers 40 of the most important
keyboard shortcuts for the Mac.
There are a few different tools that tend to work really well together,
especially when it comes to quickly sorting through and cleaning out.
Now that we've moved the downloads folder to iCloud drive.
Let's talk about messages.
If you want your old messages conversations to be available on your
new Mac, you just need to make sure that you have those settings syncing.
Just go into preferences, click on the iMessages tab and make sure that
enable messages in iCloud is turned.
Then click sync.
Now, most people don't have any data in the movies folder, but if you
do make sure you remember to move it inside of iCloud drive as well.
At this point, let's talk about applications.
I'd like you to go into the Apple icon and click on about this Mac.
Now let's click on system report.
In the left hand column, I'm gonna click on applications,
which is here under software.
This is a list of every application on my computer.
And at this point, I'm gonna sort this data by where it was obtained from.
You can just reinstall anything that says app store on the new computer,
by going into the app store, anything that says identify developer or unknown
will have to be manually reinstalled.
Included in this list will be any software that requires a serial number.
Examples include anything made by Adobe as well as Microsoft office.
Now on that topic, if any of you out there are paying an annual fee for
Microsoft office, when all you actually use is word Excel, and occasionally
PowerPoint, you should know you can get a lifetime license to office for Mac 2020.
Home and student edition for a one time payment of $86.
All you have to do is go to softwarekeep.com and then
use my special promo code.
When you're checking out, that will save an additional 20%.
That promo code is tech 20 Y T.
Migrating your email is a complicated topic so much so that I decided
to re-shoot this portion of the video, and yes, I got a haircut
between this shot and the last one.
Points if you caught that migrating your email is probably
gonna go down one of two paths.
There's a chance when you get your new Mac, that you'll be able to
sign in with your iCloud account and all of your other email accounts
will automatically transfer over.
Now, please be aware you will need to re-enter the password for those accounts.
So just make sure that you have those passwords handy, but basically after
you enter in that information, all of your old emails, as well as any
mailboxes should reappear or they don't.
And if they don't, my recommendation is that this is one of those things
that you should probably leave to a tech professional, whether it's
me one 800, my Apple or someone else with technical expertise.
When it comes to moving your contacts, calendars, reminders, and notes.
These are types of data that can sync through iCloud, but
they can also sync through other services like Gmail or Yahoo.
So let's say you get your new Mac.
And most of the data seems to be there, but there's something missing,
like maybe the majority of your contacts or half of your calendar
when that happens, that tends to be an indication that you have another
account that contains that missing data.
And it is not syncing
to your new Mac.
If you run into that type of situation, there's a short term fix, which is to
simply add those accounts back, or you can go with more of a long term solution
and merge all of that data together.
Now, if this is something that you need help with, please know,
that's another one of the common requests that I get from my clients.
It's really easy to fix, but it's a lot easier for me to do
it with you on your computer.
If you'd ever like to work with me one on one.
You can sign up for a little tech therapy session on my
website at TechTalkAmerica.com.
And while you're there, you can also check out some of my new handy
PDF guides, including the one from last week where I gave you my top
40 keyboard shortcuts for the Mac.
If you enjoyed this video, you can now click the super thanks
button, which allows you to leave a little tip of your choosing.
Otherwise, please take a quick moment and click the like button and let me know
in the comments section, if this video helped you migrate your data to your new
Mac and Hey, let me know which one you.
Thank you so much for watching everyone.
This is David A.
Cox with Tech Talk America class dismissed.