Installing Tiger
Wednesday, May 4th, 2005
In the old days it was a rough job to try to do a clean install and then move all of the components of applications over to the new system. Yes, we had fewer problems with permissions (no unix core back then) but those issues have proved less problematic with utilities like SuperDuper! that take care of copying and restoring permissions.
Still, getting all the old stuff moved without messing up new stuff and figuring out what’s the latest version of what… this has been messy.
Apple has finally made this process a lot better with a utility called The Migration Assistant that can be run as part of the installation process on the new system, or, any time as it lives in the Utilities folder as a stand alone application.
Aside from my documented iCal problem I had no issues moving my old stuff onto a clean install of Tiger.
Apple recommends one of two ways to install a new system:
Archive and Install does everything for you using temp space on your hard disk. It will make a copy of your system, clean out the old space, install Tiger, move the necessary stuff of yours back, and tidy up. It’s actually quite an amazing set of scripts and most people have little problem with it.
A clean install puts some responsibility on you to correctly backup your data so it can be added back to the new, clean install of Tiger. If you do not have a good backup strategy that you know and trust, you may not want to go this route. However, a clean install gives you the opportunity to do some useful housekeeping: completely erase and test your hard disk so that Tiger will get installed on a clean space.
I would guess that among those who know better, this is the preferred method but again, it puts responsibility on you, the user to back up your important files.
Backing up important files first requires that you know where they are so you know what you are backing up and what you might be restoring. Without going into too much detail here, your personal directory is all that you probably need to backup unless you’ve been installing things lower down, say in the applications or utilities folder. If that’s the case, then you have to dig a bit deeper.
I try to keep even the applications I install within my user space so that backing up my user space will get everything that’s mine. If you have not had a consistent method up until this point, you might consider using this time to move things into your user directory so that you know where everything is.
Here’s what I did:
1. Poke around in in old system and all folders to get rid of “cruft” (stuff that’s old or not needed). How deep you go here is up to you but remember, you’re installing a completely new system so don’t bring over stuff that you know you don’t need.
Take this time to reorganize and touch your files and maybe toss things that aren’t useful anymore or make a folder for old stuff and burn it on a CD and get it off your machine. For instance, I did not install OS 9 so I figured there was no reason to keep my old HyperCard stacks around as they only run under Classic and that’s over for me. So, onto a CD they all went.
2. Use a utility like SuperDuper! to make a complete backup of your entire hard disk: system, files, the works. Boot from that external hard disk to make sure it works and then poke through it to make sure it has everything you think it has. If you’re really conservative (I am) then make yet another complete backup on another external hard disk (I did) and test it (I did). When done disconnect the external drive from your computer to be safe (you will be erasing a volume, hopefully not your backup volume).
3. Insert the Tiger DVD (yes, it’s not a CD, it’s a DVD and you’d better have a DVD player in your computer). Reboot from Tiger.
4. Once in the installer, go to the File menu and find Disk Utility and run it. You are now going to initialize your hard disk for a clean install. You can do this as part of the install but I prefer to use Disk Utility as it gives you other options, like partitioning and verification. Go ahead and erase the hard disk. Oh boy, now you’re feeling rather insecure, right? If you have confidence in your backup, no worries. If not… well, worries.
5. Install Tiger. The great thing about a DVD vs. a CD is that Tiger fits on a single disc so that there’s no swapping. Once you get it started, the installer won’t stop until it’s done.
6. When the install is done, continue through setting things up until you are asked if you want to migrate data from an old computer. In your case the answer is yes (and this is what you’d do if you had just bought a new computer as well and were moving things from the old one) although you are not looking for a computer, you’re looking for a hard disk. Connect the firewire cable (as per instructions) and your external hard disk will mount and you’ll see some checkboxes letting you control how much of it to migrate. This is where your knowledge of where your stuff is will come into play. If it’s all just in your directory, that’s all you need to check.
7. Once the migration is done you are instructed to disconnect your external hard disk and you’re asked a few more questions to finish the install, then you’re back in the finder ready to eject the Tiger DVD and start poking around.
8. Before you go too far, make sure all of your stuff is there and that everything runs. This may take a while but remember, unless you have unlimited external hard disks, you will eventually erase that backup so before you do make sure you don’t need it.
As stated above, in this process I found that iCal did not run and I worked through a conflict. Then in solving that I found I could not burn a CD so I had to dig deeper. This is a big upgrade and will affect a lot of things so don’t take it lightly. Test, dig, poke, and test some more.
What I wish
This entire process is such a breath of fresh air compared with the old days it’s hard to really ask for more. But, here I go:
I wish that Apple would extend the migration assistant to do a bit of spring cleaning: make a list of “cruft” from the old system that it believes might not be needed and let me decide. Make sure that every app I just copied over has all of it’s parts if that can be ascertained, and make sure that spare parts with no apps are brought to my attention so I can dump them. Ideally I’d like to do this process before the upgrade but any time is better than not.
I love OS X and always have but this upgrade is the best yet: it feels stable, strong, fast, and secure and it feels this way on both my new PowerBook and my wife’s iBook. Not bad Apple.
Richard, I really appreciate that you’ve written so well, and in such practical detail, about the way to prepare and execute the installation of Tiger. It’s helping me now as I get ready for Tiger, which arrives here in a day or two. Thanks!
Glad to help. While you wait why not pick through what you have installed and get rid of the cruft and consolidate photos, folders, etc. Make sure everything is in the gary directory and it will be a piece of cake.
Then, later, when you do the transfer, just take the gary folder and the network settings and you’re done.
god I am having all sorts of problem with it did a fresh install and most of the application are crashing pretty much unusable, I am going to bring it back to apple and see what they say. maybe I did something wrong but I do not think so.
Bring what back to Apple? Your computer, Tiger, what?
How did you install it? What was the process?
Edward — are you sure you did an absolute clean install? are the applications that you are having trouble with Apple’s or 3rd paarty?
I hignly doubt that the Apple store will be able to help if its all software.
I did a clean install and did it 2 time and the aplication that are crashing are both apple application and third party application and the machine is very very slow. surfing the web is so slow I think merri machine is faster (old g3) then this one.
I bringing back the machine, to apple well maybe on of there genious can help me.
I installed it clean and then used the migration utility…
Are you sure all of your third party apps are compatible? Did you check them all out online to make sure they work?
Sounds like either a bad install, a problem hard disk (bad formatting) or a third party app conflict. Sorry this is happening to you Edward, my experience has been great so far. Aside from my iCal problem I’ve found no problems at all and my computer seems a lot faster overall. I’m loving it.
Richard: I need to make sure that Classic and all my fonts and Classic apps are retained on my 17″ G4 Powerbook when I upgrade to Tiger. I was told by the Apple Store in Burlingame, California that need only do a straight upgrade. They said evrything will be left in place? My concerns are: Will I need to have serial numbers handy for my Adobe Creative Suite, Quark 6.5, etc. and will my Airport wifi connections still load OK. Bottom line … do you agree with the Apple Store. Thank you for a great blog — Martin.
Martin: thanks for the kind words about my weblog. When the store says “straight upgrade” are they saying install Tiger OVER the existing system, archive and install, or a backup and clean install like I did? I’m guessing they meant install over to reatain all of your existing stuff.
In days of old that’s what most of us did: installed the new system right over the old and let the installer figure out what to replace, what to toss, etc. I think the Tiger installer supports this (although I did not do it so can’t speak from experience) and there is little downside except that you don’t get a chance to clean up your hard disk and you will undoubtedly be left with some leftover crud that may not cause problems but will just take up space.
If you have a backup method that you really trust (I can’t recommend SuperDuper! enough) then you can backup, install Tiger over what you have, if all is well then call it a day and be happy, if not then revert to your backup and try another method.
The clean install method will retain all of your network settings, ID settings, and I’m sure transfer software registrations. I can’t speak for the Adobe software you use as I don’t use it but all of my commercial software registrations got moved with no exceptions and even my keychains worked without fail after the upgrade.
I’ve also heard that certain older fonts are not compatible with Tiger and you may want to look into that.
When you transfer network settings, that includes AirPort settings and any system level settings you have for your computer. Your user folder will transfer all other prefs (desktop pattern, dock order, window styles, etc.
The key to all of this, no matter which way you go, is to have a good backup method that you completely know and trust. If you have that then you can feel secure in trying various methods.
From what I read, the method I used (clean install) is the preferred method among those who appreciate what it means. Apple recommends archive and install probably because it’s all within their control; the user doesn’t need a backup application or an external hard disk and Apple can’t vouch for people’s stupidity when backing up or how reliable backup software is. That’s why I stress how good SuperDuper is and how much I trust it. For me, the backup piece is the key to doing it right and SuperDuper is the key to backup for me.
I ramble, sorry, not enough coffee yet this morning. Keep us informed as to what method you used and what happened.
Is there a way to install Tiger without a DVD drive, if you have another mac on the network to read the DVD? Either create a disk image or boot from the other machine as the startup?
Thanks,
Thomas
I’m not sure about that. I do know that you can order Tiger on CDs from Apple but installing from a networked or firewired machine I’m not sure about. Sorry.
Hi, I’m fairly new ? to the world of macintosh- about a year or so- and I don’t have much in depth knowledge of computer maintainence. I do video editing as a passtime on FCE and also lots of Digital photos. I am now a total mac convert and windowsxp crashes and freezes are a thing of the past. I have a dual 2g g5 and a powerbook 1.67g networked with airport extreme and a firewire lacie external drive. Both machines very stable and working well. I’ve bought tiger(family pack) and started searching for some info before doing the upgrade. I found your article very useful and I also read many others and am getting very confused as to what the best way is for me to move to tiger. I had come to the conclusion that archive and install was the way forward for me ( in view of my limited experience with computers) until I read your article; I don’t feel confident to do a clean install after a proper back up. Could you let me know what your thoughts are regarding the pros and cons of an archive and install as opposed to a clean install? What I want really is for someone with experience to tell me what to do!!
Jacque, no problem, glad to help.
Apple recommends archive and install because the entire operation takes place on your hard disk; you don’t need an external hard disk to back up onto. The archive part of the script makes a copy of your entire setup in a folder on your machine, and the install part installs the new system (in this case, Tiger) right over your old system, getting rid of things that are not needed (hopefully) and cleaning things up. Then, the archive is moved back into the install so you’re left with a tiger upgrade and all your stuff in place.
A clean install is you doing about the same thing with an external hard disk (or an unused partition of your internal hard disk).
You first back up (archive) your entire hard disk. I do this onto an external drive using a great utility called SuperDuper which you should get no matter how you install Tiger.
I did this twice just to be ultra safe but most would consider that a bit over the top (two different backups).
Next I started up from the Tiger install disk and erased my hard disk, nowing that I had an exact copy as backup. Then I installed tiger (clean in that I was not installing it over the old system). I prefer this method as it assures that what I have running is just Tiger, no old stuff that might cause problems.
Lastly, I used a great relatively new part of the intaller to move the parts of my backup into tiger that I wanted to save: my folder/directory and all of my network settings and any other folders that had stuff in them that I wanted. As long as you don’t erase the backup until you fully test your new tiger install and all your stuff, you can aways dig through it looking for more but I doubt you’ll need to.
Now, all of that said (again), either method will be fine and these days there is little downside to archive and install. I’m just knowledgeable enough to do it this other way, which I think is better in that it leaves more of the old crud behind. But, as you may have read here elsewhere, I ran into one problem with iCal and that was from something that came from my old system. One more reason to clean things up first. Of course, others who ran into similar problems eventually did archive and installs and solved them that way, so that shoots my theory all to hell.
Bottom line: you should have a reliable backup methor for both machines and with that you can try a clean install the way I did and then if you’re not happy with it you can restore your old system and stuff and do an archive and install.
I seriously doubt you’ll have problems with a clean install. Just make sure you do a complete backup first.
Good luck and let us know how it goes. I’ll be in and out all day tomorrow so may not get back to you if you ask questions here. Hopefully others tracking this weblog will.
Very helpful comments. I really am grateful to all the people like yourself who go out of their way to help . I shall be away for the weekend and will not be doing anything on the computer until monday. I shall then take a deep breath and do a clean install following your instructions. I’ll let you know how I get on.
Jacque, I’ll be home most of Monday so feel free to either post here, email me at richard at ldresources dot com or ping me via aim .
Have a great weekend and don’t worry, be happy, Tiger is worth the hassle and I’ll bet it goes smoothly.
Richard, I installed Tiger today, and experienced no problems during the installation or after. I deleted unwanted files and applications well before intalling Tiger, and I used Super Duper for backups. I had intended to do a clean install, but having read a number of reports of various problems and locked up macs, I opted for the Easy Install.
All of my main applications are running, and iCal works fine. I synched my Palm IIIc after the installation, and it recognized the Palm. Tiger also responded to my wireless mouse, and email and the Internet worked as usual. I may discover a glitch at some point, but so far all seems to be working nicely, and I like Tiger a lot. Dashboard is great, especially that dictionary.
Try the dictionary application, not the widget, you’ll like it better.
Thanks, Richard. I will. Flashy Dashboard had attention when I posted that. I have lots to learn about Tiger. So far, seems to be a lot more stable than Panther, and I’m happy with changes to Mail and other Apple programs.
I agree, for me, Tiger feels more stable and in fact I think is. it has its issues but nothing I can’t live with. Apple does seem to be moving in the right direction: migration is easier, good tools, etc.
Richard, just a short note to say that I followed your instructions as above and Tiger is running sweetly on the G5. Backed up everything on the firewire drive using superduper and also backed up everything on dvds and cds and then did an erase and install. No hitches at all and all my stuff migrated back using the setup assistant _ apart from virex. Have not had a lot of time to play with Tiger yet but so far so good. spotlight brilliant as are the widgets. I will use it for a few days then report back. Thanks once more for your vey detailed advice- without it ,I would have opted for an upgrade… speak to you again
This is great news Jacques, glad it worked out. Don’t forget to test all your applications, like iCal and the like and burn a CD to make sure all is still working.
So far so good. All seems to be working extremely well and faster. I have tried all my apps and they all work; burnt a cd and a dvd with no problems. The only glitch seems to be the Lacie firewire drive icon which at times appears on the desktop and at times not. It seems to disappear sometimes when I use fast user switching. If I unplug the firewire lead and plug it back in again its icon reappears on the desktop; it never disappears from the system profiler though. Is this a tiger problem or a hardware problem? Otherwise everything is working brilliantly and faster with tiger including the printer and scanner.
thanks once more for your help.
I am now exploring the ways to share my files and printer between the 2 computers as it is not long since I’ve had the powerbook. No problems so far using airport. Any security issues I should be worried about?
I doubt this is the reason your external drive is disapearing but an issue with Tiger and spotlight is turning off indexing on external drives that you do not want to be indexed. Every time I mount one of my external backup drives spotlight immediately starts grinding away indexing it… ugh.
So, here’s how to stop that.
Open system preferences
Click on Spotlight
Click on the privacy tab
Drag your external hard disk into the window: “Prevent Spotlight from searching (and indexing) these location.”
As long as you don’t rename the drive you’re set.
Richard,
I have a 17″ Platinum G4 PowerBook currently running 10.3.3; 1.5 GHz processor. I replaced another iBook that died in my school’s lab (long story of student abuse). I have a copy of installer disks for iBook G4 and iMacG5 for Tiger. Does it matter which one I use to install Tiger? I’m not worried about licensing because I’m putting the software on the 17″ and keeping the iBook for parts, should I need them later.
Your site is great! I would appreciate your thoughts on this.
Deb: I’m pretty sure that the software install disks that come with machines are only for those machines and the generic Tiger install will install on any machine capable of running Tiger. It’s not a matter of licensing, it’s a matter of the resources for one machine not being on another machines’s install/backup CDs or DVDs.
Use the Tiger DVD if you can as it will work on anything.
Richard,
Thanks for the input. That’s what I was thinking. I sure hate to have to buy it when I have a copy just sitting here unused. I guess I will put off the upgrade a little longer.
Thanks again!
I formatted my disk and installed tiger on my ibook g3 800. Things are working beautifully fine.
I forgot to back up my photos and bookmarks. Any wizardy that can help.
I am unable to use the recovery disks to reinstall apps like world book and the games that came with my ibook
any suggestions.
Sathya,
Did you backup your photos and bookmarks before you formatted your disk? If not, they’re gone forever.
I think you can install just pieces of the original iBook CD to get world book and games but are you sure they are compatible with tiger? Be careful.
I am going to archive and install on a powerbook G4, 10.3.9 presently with some OS 9.2 applications that I need to continue to access via Classic. When I do intall Tiger is there a protocol that I should adhere to to make sure that I do not lose the ability to access those OS apps.?
Thanks!
Bob: I don’t think so but I don’t know much about the archive and install script and how it deals with system-level stuff. You might want to look into that before you do it.
I also don’t know if OS 9 drivers are essential for running classic or only for booting into OS 9 (which you may or may not be able to do on that PowerBook depending on its age).
Apple recommends the method you’re using as it is least prone to problems. I just don’t use it so don’t have direct experience with what gets archived and what does not.
Good luck and if possible, let us know how it went, what happened and what didn’t. Thanks for the comment.