Data Transfer
CHIL@Rice
chil home > lab only > polocies and procedures >

This page describes a procedure for creating an exact copy of an old computer's hard drive partition on a new computer. This procedure has been somewhat complicated by Apple's switch to Intel CPUs. See Part I for machines that both have PPC CPUs or that both have Intel CPUs, Part II for machines having different CPU architectures. Note that Part I instructions will fail on machines having different CPU architectures because it will copy the wrong version of OS X to the target machine, rendering it unbootable. If you do this, all is not lost: simply perform a clean installation of OS X.

Part I: Instructions for Congruent CPUs

  1. Make certain the new machine is turned off.
  2. Connect a 6-pin to 6-pin firewire cable to the old machine on one end, and the new machine on the other end.
  3. Turn on the new machine, holding down the "T" key as it starts up. This starts the machine into "Target Disk Mode", which enables it to operate as an external hard drive for a master machine.
  4. When it is ready, the monitor will display a large, yellow firewire logo on a blue field. This is what the firewire logo looks like:
  5. The hard drives and partitions of hard drives of the new machine should all show up on the old machine. If not, you may have to use Disk Utility and possibly also Disk Warrior to fix the drives.
  6. Make sure the new machine has the same number of hard drive partitions as the old machine. For example, lab workstations typically have an "OS 9" partition in the first 2 - 5 GB of the hard drive, and then another partition (e.g., "Nebula") in the remainder of the hard drive. Also change the names of hard drive partitions in the new machine to match that of the old machine. For example: if the old machine has "OS 9" and "Nebula", make sure the new machine has two partitions also named "OS 9" and "Nebula". Note that when Mac OS X detects volumes with duplicate names, it tends to show the volumes it mounted later as "OS 9 1" or "Nebula 1", for example.
  7. On the old machine, launch the application, "Carbon Copy Cloner". This application should be on every CHIL machine, but in case it isn't, grab it from the server: Public: Installers: OS X apps & updaters.
  8. Go into Carbon Copy Cloner's preferences. Make certain that "make bootable" and "repair permissions" are both selected.
  9. Select the old machine's hard drive volume as the source, and the new machine's hard drive volume as the target.
  10. Click the copy button. If Carbon Copy Cloner runs into errors and aborts the copy procedure, run Disk Utility on the old partition. Failing that, try Disk Warrior.
  11. When Carbon Copy Cloner has finished transferring all data, you may quit the program, drag the new machine's hard drive's icon to the trash to eject/unmount it, and disconnect the firewire cable. Now setup the new machine where the old one was, and remove the old machine.You may now start up the new machine.

Part II: Instructions for Incongruent CPUs

  1. Make certain the old machine is turned off.
  2. Connect a 6-pin to 6-pin firewire cable to the old machine on one end, the new machine on the other end.
  3. Turn on the old machine, holding down the "T" key as it starts up. This starts the machine into "Target Disk Mode", which enables it to operate as an external hard drive for a master machine.
  4. When the target machine is ready, the monitor will display a large, yellow firewire logo on a blue field. This is what the firewire logo looks like:
  5. The hard drives and partitions of hard drives of the target machine should all show up on the master machine. If not, you may have to use Disk Utility and possibly also Disk Warrior to fix the drives.
  6. On the new machine, launch the application "Migration Assistant". It should be on every Mac in /Applications/Utilities/. Follow Migration Assistant's instructions to copy all users, applications, network and machine settings, files, and volumes from the old machine to the new machine.
  7. When Migration Assistant has finished, you may quit the program, drag the new machine's hard drive's icon to the trash to eject/unmount it, and disconnect the firewire cable. Now setup the new machine where the old one was, and remove the old machine.
People   Facilities   Research   Projects   Miscellany   Search   |   Home  

Last modified 2003.08.29