Can't get Migration Assistant to migrate account

P

PPmac

Registered
I have an iMac 20 running 10.5.6 to which I'm trying to migrate my user account from a G4 Quicksilver running 10.4.11.

I have tried using TDM (Target Disk Mode) on the G4, but Migration Assistant never sees the drive. Spotlight does and it was busily indexing the G4's drive, until I stopped it.

I then tried doing the migration via an Ethernet crossover cable between the two machines. After entering the code on the G4, the iMac eventually listed the accounts but it took a long time to show the list. I selected the account I wanted and clicked Continue. After about 20 minutes, I got the checklist that let me select which items to migrate. A further long wait and I got the next list. After clicking Continue again, I got a message about Preparing...

An hour or so later, I went to bed and left them to it. In the morning, the same message was still showing, so I stopped the Assistant on both machines.

This morning I tried booting the G4 in target mode, and the iMac can see the drive via Firewire with no problem at all. If I can't get Migration Assistant to work I will simply copy my files manually and sort out preferences and settings manually.

I'd like to know if anyone has experienced this problem and what I should look at to fix it.
 
Sounds like you might need to do a little bit of maintenance on the target PPC machine (permission check while booted from it, Disk utility check when booted from OSX Install CD), and make sure it's got any firmware updates that might affect FW Disk Target mode.

While I have heard of the odd rare issue with Migration Assistant, in most cases it works like a champ, and you're going to be SO grateful if you can use it as opposed to a manual copy over of file to a new account (Trust me, I've experienced both).

If you have to do it manually, I recommend making a new account of the target machine with the same Short Name and Full User Name, and user account status –Admin/non-admin– as the target (this preserves permissions and avoids most hassles). Then you'd mount your source user directory from the source machine in FWDTM and carefully copy the contents of the various folders in the user directory folders and sub-folders over. The complete contents of the Documents, Movies and Music folders are an easy copy. You might want to be a little more careful with the contents of the Application Support folder, and the Preferences folder. As I said earlier, MUCH easier if you can let Migration Assistant do its thing, even if it takes hours (or even DAYS for a huge User account).

Good luck!
 
OK, I checked permissions and repaired the drive on the G4, with no reported problems to fix.

I have got Migration Assistant to work now by starting the target mode on the G4 before starting Migration Assistant. It sees the drive and accounts and the migration works. Great!

I don't know if that's what everyone else has done, but I was just following the instructions in the assistant for when I turned it on. Obviously, starting it earlier is the thing to do.
 
…so that Migration Assistant can see the drive. That was likely your only issue.
Glad you were able to resolve your issue.

May I also suggest setting up an additional Admin account as well on the new machine, if you do not already have one. I have found that some accounts brought over from older versions of Mac OSX don't always get allocated the same privileges as ones created on the new machine. This could be handy if you need to do any further trouble shooting.
 
You must log in or register to reply here.
Back
Top