On Apr 8, 2005, at 3:30 PM, Wade Tinney wrote:
Tom wrote:Would it be a bad idea to drag the entire Users and Applications folders from the old OS over to the new one? Or would replacing the entire folders like that risk bringing bad old (broken) OS-X stuff with it?
It's a bad idea.
Here's what I would do:
Backup your old Users folder to the new drive under a new name.
Install fresh copies of your applications. Run each application once, then locate its preference pane in your new Home folder. Replace it with the old one. If anything goes sproingy, you know that particular preference file is corrupt.
You could also use this as a chance for a fresh start, sort of like spring cleaning for your computer and applications.
--
Wade Tinney
Well drat, Wade, your warning is a little too late: I already dragged the old OS-X Library and Users folders (but not the Applications) from the messed-up hard drive over to the new OS-X installation (on a different hard drive) and replaced the new ones with them, after first stashing the new ones in a backup folder, figuring maybe I could get them back out if needed. Sort of an experiment.
I was thinking that since I already have another working OS-X on an exterior hard drive, which I can boot from if necessary, if I messed up this installation by using the old folders with it then I could just trash it and install X fresh again. So far, the experiment is working fine, and the desktop looks just like it did with the OS-X that crashed---all my mail and Safari settings and so forth are there and seem to work fine. It's like having the old pre-crash OS-X back again, very convenient. But, is it a ticking time bomb, doing things this way?
My update disk only takes X up to 10.3.3, so at the moment I'm downloading the updater to 10.3.8 with Software Update (which takes hours with a dial-up connection). After that 's installed, the system should be just the way it was before the big crash.
So, am I living in a fool's paradise here, expecting this new OS-X installation to work fine using the old OS-X's folders? If you were me, would you wipe it all off again and install X fresh, then do as you recommended above? Or leave well enough alone, since it's apparently working?
Thanks for the help!
Tom
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