Hi Allen, A 'Erase' and 'Clean Install' of Snow Leopard is what is says... you wipe your hard drive and reinstall the Operating System. When you've been using your Mac for a while, installing and deleting lots of apps and Operating Systems & add-ons, and your hard drive has become littered with lots of unnecessary gunk and cruft: orphaned application-support and preference files, abandoned preference panes, and the like.
When you perform a Clean "Fresh" Install you don't want to use Setup or Migration Assistant to bring over everything from your backup. Instead, you should manually copy your personal data and then reinstall just those apps and add-ons you actually use. "Fresh" means no possibly corrupt TimeMachine, Migration Assistant, or Clone Restores. New OS X, programs and only vetted files returned. Allen, if you only have the one partition "Macintosh HD" (No other partitions) What I would recommend you do is: 1. Erase the entire drive of all partitions: That means selecting the 'entire internal boot drive', it has the Drive Makers name and size, do not select the indented names, those (or if only one) are just partitions on the drive, you need to erase the entire drive to catch everything, rebuild the GUID Partition Table and the Hidden EFI partition. 2. Click Erase > Security option > Zero All Data (will map off any failing sectors) this does take a long time, but improves your hard drives reliability and read speeds. Check under Partition: Options that you have a GUID and Format: OS X Extended Journaled, if not change it to those and apply. 3. Quit Disk Utility. You will be back into the 10.6 installer. You have erased the internal drive via the 10.6 disk and need to Install Fresh. 4. Install OS X 10.6 5. After installation completes and Reboots, Setup and use the same User Name & Password as before ... why? because you can place your user files from backup and your iTunes playlists, permissions etc work. Unless you don't want to use the same name, then you lose the playlists and have to recreate them, change the permissions for files etc. 6. Use Software Update to get up to 10.6.8 fully, repeat until clear. This is very important to do or you'll have problems later. 3: Install all programs from fresh original sources and compatible with 10.6.8 4: Once you have all your third party software installed (as best as you can of course) next is to connect your backup drive. Return the contents of those user files folders: Music, Pictures, Movies, Documents etc (NOT Library) to their respective folders in each account. NOTE: It is a Time Consuming project and a fairly daunting task, and if you don't feel comfortable doing it, I suggest you hire a consultant (I recommend MacWizardry-Daniel Kerr) to do the Erase and Clean Install / Setup / and transfer of relevant data and files for you. It will cost as it does take a lot of work. I know because I have done Erase and Clean Installs ;-) Cheers, Ronni On 12/10/2012, at 4:09 PM, Allen Gladwell <all...@amnet.net.au> wrote: > Hi Ronni > > Then that is what I will do next. Presumably the re-install will clean up the > system side but how much cruft will there be in my Home folder particularly > the ~Library? > > Is there any way to avoid bringing some of "cruft" in my Home folder back > from a backup without extensive knowledge which I don't have? > > Regards Allen > > > On 12/10/2012, at 12:50 PM, Ronni Brown wrote: > >> Hi Allen, >> >> Yes, an Erase & Install of Snow Leopard would be very sensible, there are >> problems on your current system, most possible brought over from previous >> upgrades. As I have mentioned before on WAMUG, left over "Clutter" from >> previous systems can slow your Mac down and also cause problems. >> Over time, your disk accumulates obsolete, extraneous, or otherwise useless >> files, often called “cruft”—hacker slang for digital detritus. Removing >> cruft increases the disk space available for the system and reduces the >> chance of software conflicts. >> I erased my Hard Drive and did a 'Clean Install' of Lion, and have not >> experienced any problems in Lion or now Mountain Lion (which I did just an >> upgrade install). >> >> A clean system installation brings the system software back to the standard >> configuration. This is necessary when system software is unusable or has >> been modified, preventing a normal installation. It is also useful as a >> final step in troubleshooting. >> >> Options to "Erase and Install" and "Archive and Install" are no longer >> present in the Mac OS X 10.6 installer. This was done for convenience, so >> that users do not accidentally erase and install their Mac OS X 10.5 Leopard >> partitions. >> However, "Erase and Install" remains available through Disk Utility, which >> is also included on the installation DVD. >> >> After you select your language and click the right arrow, an "Install Mac OS >> X" screen, this is where you diverge from Apple's standard upgrade script >> and erase your disk. Choose Utilities > Disk Utility. >> I would also "Repair the Drive" also before installing SL. >> If you need details how to preform the Erase and then installation of SL, >> post back. >> >> Point 1: >> Your TM backups and any other current backups will contain whatever is >> causing your problems. So you will have to be careful what you 'bring across >> from any backup'. First just bring across essential Data. Also installing >> any applications you require from the backup is much safer than dragging the >> applications across to a clean install. >> >> Point 2: >> After the erase and install of SL, download the Snow Leopard 10.6.8 Combo. >> Snow Leopard 10.6.8: <http://support.apple.com/kb/DL1399> >> (Note: there's a separate Snow Leopard 10.6.8 Supplemental Update: >> <http://support.apple.com/kb/DL1429> that is not included in the 10.6.8 >> "combo".) >> >> >> Cheers, >> Ronni >> >> 17" MacBook Pro 2.3GHz Quad-Core i7 “Thunderbolt" >> 2.3GHz / 8GB / 750GB @ 7200rpm HD >> >> OS X 10.8.2 Mountain Lion >> Windows 7 Ultimate (under sufferance) >> >> >> On 12/10/2012, at 10:39 AM, Allen Gladwell <all...@amnet.net.au> wrote: >> >>> Thanks Ronni >>> >>> Software Update now shows "No new software" >>> I have deleted the SIMBL folder from Library/Applications Support and >>> that's all I could find. I have no idea where it came from or when >>> I did a Restart and Safari is still the same >>> >>> It appears that I now have another problem. Yesterday I noticed that that >>> Time Machine was taking too long on the hourly backups, about 20 mins or >>> more. It used to be less than a minute. Last night I moved TM to another >>> fresh disc finishing about 11pm. This morning it went for 40 mins on the >>> new disc before I stopped it. It's taking a lot of CPU time and the >>> computer is getting hot >>> >>> I don't know if this is connected to the Safari problem but something is >>> not right >>> What I feel like doing is starting again, perhaps with help from the WAMUG >>> list, and I will have time this w/e. So:- >>> >>> 1- Make sure I have plenty of backups inc two TMs now and backup "user" >>> separately >>> 2- Use my Snow Leopard startup DVD to erase the Macintosh HD and re-install >>> OS 10.6.3 >>> 3- Update to 10.6.8 >>> 4- Check that Safari and TM are working properly >>> 5- Restore user files and other applications as I need them >>> >>> Is this a plan? Have I over simplified? It may sound a bit drastic but I >>> probably have accumulated rubbish from over the last 9 years (we didn't do >>> a clean install in 2006 from the previous MPB) >>> >>> Regards Allen >>> -- The WA Macintosh User Group Mailing List -- Archives - <http://www.wamug.org.au/mailinglist/archives.shtml> Guidelines - <http://www.wamug.org.au/mailinglist/guidelines.shtml> Settings & Unsubscribe - <http://lists.wamug.org.au/listinfo/wamug.org.au-wamug>
