MacFixIt has posted guidelines “aimed at reducing common issues that occur during as a result of the [Mac OS X Leopard] upgrade process, including pre-update preparation, proper installation, and post-update maintenance.”
Topics covered include:
• Backing up your data
• Preparing your startup disk
• Other pre-update precautions:
– Make sure all devices are synchronized prior to updating
– Disconnect all external devices, update firmware
• Install options:
– Upgrade
– Archive and Install
– Erase and Install
• Upgrade applications to Leopard-ready versions, if they are available
• Disable plug-ins and other application add-ons (or upgrade them)
• Check for, and delete, corrupt .plist files
• Do not run DiskWarrior and other directory utilities after updating
Full article here.
See also, “Installing Leopard to an external firewire drive,” here.
the only issue I’ve ever had installing a new mac os was when I didn’t unplug an external hd. other than that it’s been fine over the years.
They forgot the most important one: Wait until 10.5.2 before installing Leopard.
Why does any body need a “preparing guide” for OS X?
I’ve en using Mac OS X since the leopard, cheetah, tiger, etc and NEVER, but NEVER need it to “prepare” anything. You just insert the disc, if you do not want to loose your data, select upgrade, and if you already have a backup, format and reinstall everything and that is it. Only Windows losers, sorry, users need “Preparation” but not for the installation, but for the resignation of the windows “upgrade” disaster.
Hah! Fool! You would install such an early version? Everyone knows you should wait until 10.5.3!
Viktor, if you’ve never had a problem, count yourself fortunate, OS X is great and wonderful, but most people will run into problems eventually and MacFixit just gives some nice hints (mostly common sense).
Most won’t have problems, but 10 to 20% probably will, Apple can’t test for the millions of set ups out there.
If you like to live dangerously, fine, but don’t come crying to MDN or Macfixit if something goes wrong and you lose all your data.
What you’re saying is akin to someone saying “Backsups? Hah. I don’t need backups. I have used Macs for years without a hard drive failure.”
“OS X is great and wonderful, but most people will run into problems eventually…”
“Most won’t have problems, but 10 to 20% probably will,”
So are most people going to have problems or not then?
Macfixit does it right, but you Viktors or whatever your name is, dont.
It’s ignorant not to backup files and aybody should know.
I am sorry for all AppleCare staff, who has to listen to whining and complaining customers not saving important files before installing Leopard.
The hotline has far better things to do than educating dumb people.
I think I’ll do a combo of the two approaches.
Back up first then just do the upgrade. I also have never ran into issues upgrading OS X but backups are essential either way.
And I will be in line tomorrow too. What can I say, I Iike Mac t-shirts
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He said “eventually” most people will run into problems. The 10-20% figure was for each OS upgrade, the “most people” was cumulative.
Or…I can just get the OS for free when i buy a new Macbook Pro….
Slapped every update-panther to tiger, tiger incremental updates-on as soon as it became available without a single issue.
Will do the same when I get my copy of leopard tomorrow.
If I break it, I will fix it-no whining, crying and pointing my finger at everyone else blaming them for it.
Is this a joke? Since when is upgrading from OS X to OS X dangerous? It’s always just worked, almost perfectly, maybe a few minor hiccups. You should have a backup anyways, but I wouldn’t agonize over it.
This guy must being coming from the Windows world, where upgrading OS can lead to all sorts of disaster. It can be difficult to break old Windows habits.
I’m with Viktor, never had a problem and I’m sure I never will, always do an Archive and Install, cause an upgrade takes too long. Guys it’s a Mac, not Windows, yeah human error can slip in, but for gods sake how long have Apple been sitting on Leopard, if the Install doesn’t work there’s something far wrong. And waiting for .2 or .3 ain’t gonna help the install any, cause you’ll need .0 first!
Be warned: Little Snitch is very incompatible to the point of kernel panics.
Consult the publisher’s website for more details.
I’ve done every update and upgrade since 1984…I’m ready for this one too!
Every one is right, I may be lucky because I never had problems installing or upgrading. But installing Windows is ALWAYS painful and dangerous. So may be this is not “lucky” it is simple that statistically speaking, it is a lot more probably that you will run into problems upgrading a windows computer that a Mac one.
Should I buy 1K copies of Leopard or a Porsche 911 Turbo?
1K copies of Leopard, save money and buy the family packs!
a porsche is such a mid-life crisis cliché, don’t u think?
The three most important things you can do: backup, backup, backup!
You guys reckoning that upgrading an OS is always going to be flawless have obviously never ever worked with a broad spectrum of Mac users in a tech support/repair capacity. You may be right that your own installs –just like my own– have been problem free for the most part, but you’d be surprised at the crapware that people install in their Macs over time which causes no end of headaches when the upgrade comes along.
Furthermore, a point update (eg. 10.4.4 to 10.4.6) is far more likely to be problem free than a change of cats, like from Panther to Tiger for example. People do all kinds of stupid things with their machines, and I thank the folks at MacFixIt for being kind enough to take the time to try and help people out.
In fact, Viktor, Ultra-Visitor, and the rest should read those words of advice and take them to heart. How easily we forget the FireWire drive firmware disasters of the past; how little we know of the idiots that try to run DiskWarrior 3.0.0 on a Tiger system right before updating to Leopard for example, or those with haxies up the ying-yang that go blaming Apple when their “upgrades” don’t work. Most Mac users –yes, Mac users– haven’t got a clue of the difference between an “update”, an “archive and install”, and a complete wipe and “clean install”. These are the people MFI are trying to help.
So cool your jets, boys, and thank MacFixIt for being good net citizens.
Viktor,
Yes, there will be issues.. You can count on it.. You don’t believe me? Take a look at the MacFixit and Apple’s Leopard discussion boards over the next couple of weeks. Preparation and preventitive measures such as the ones listed above will avoid the majority of upgrade disasters..
Remember when Panther came out and thousands of people lost all the data on their external Firewire drives? I do, I was one of them…
I learned the hard way to always disconnect drives and any external devices before doing any OS upgrade.
I’m waiting for 10.6 … just to be sure … maybe I should wait for 11 … yeah that would be really safe …
“…Most Mac users –yes, Mac users– haven’t got a clue of the difference between an “update”, an “archive and install”, and a complete wipe and “clean install”. These are the people MFI are trying to help.
“
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I agree with you, however, it would be nice if Apple provided a bit more guidance when it comes to updates.. A fail safe upgrade requires a few more steps than sticking in the DVD and clicking “install” as Apple would like us to believe.
Can someone explain “Archive and Install” to me again? For about two months my system’s been on the blink about 5% of the time… basically since I installed the third-party program UNO was horrified by the effects on non-GUI items and then uninstalled it.
So I want a pretty clean install here. Something that will wipe away all the junk, but ideally keep user preferences, documents, etc.
Is that what “Archive and Install” would do? Or would I be better off to backup (of course), erase and install, and then maybe use the migration assistant?
Any suggestions are appreciated!
Leopard not compatible with Filemaker. The same Filemaker that Apple owns? There’ll be no installation here. First, Leopard delayed while the developers worked on the iPhone. Now this.
Apple, take some of the groovy cash you’ve made and hire more employees! You’re understaffed!
Now back to your regular programming.
Should I buy 1K copies of Leopard or a Porsche 911 Turbo?
I’ve had a few problems over the years from the first OS X to Tiger when upgrading, but I always backup all my data and I always buy the new OS when it first comes out and install it.
The original OS X was a problem, slow, buggy and missing features, so I kept a dual-boot of OS 9 and rarely used OS X. However, as OS X matured into Puma and Jaguar I lost OS 9 and forged ahead, always backing up, always happy.
If doing an external firewire boot turns you on, go for it! But if you back up, why? Unless there are some more widespread incompatibilities in Leopard that in previous releases, I don’t see the reason except to get your geek on.
I’m looking forward to all Leopard has to offer.
JoeL
The only problem I ever had was when Apple forgot to mention that an upgrade was going to shutdown my USB speakers.
Just my $0.02
Get prepared? – you better, better prepare for proper computing with a new WINDOWS computer. Install new OS? – everyone knows it’s better to buy a new computer with the OS preinstalled by a CERTIFIABLE Microsoft partner. Keep a spare computer handy so you can still surf the web for all those MAC helpful websites that help MAC lemmings who can’t make their computer even surf the internet tubes.
You MAC lemmings make me laugh though it’s not funny really, it’s pathetic. After all the iPhone hype and aftermath you should have learned but, well, you’re just lemmings after all. One million? – no, just over a quarter, 1.3 million – ah yes but 300,000 of them have been hacked. Ever heard of a quarter of Windows installs being hacked? Thought not. Apple will probably have one of those stale ‘only 24 hours to go’ teasers up just to get your bits all of a wobble.
In six months time we’ll hear that Leopard has five million installs, a mere quarter of what Microsoft had stuffed in to the channel a millisecond after its launch.
Rushing to the Apple store to get a free black tee-shirt, pathetic. Black tee-shirt, $2, is that how much your soul is worth? Remember Steve Jobs only wears and dictates black tee-shirts so that he and his staff won’t see their reflections in those damned glossy screens.
Though Linux crackers, patent stealing thieves all of them, and MAC lemmings have persuaded some of the press that you to run Vista, the glorious, you have to buy a supa – the bomb – mega-computer from a Microsoft partner, and why not I ask you, Vista runs great on older hardware, if you like molasses and don’t need printer drivers – ask Walt.
Gadzooks, I put all this effort in to trying to educate you and still you rush to the nearest cliff (Apple Store) to jump off the edge. When will you learn? Get across to Microsoft Daily News http://www.microsoftdailynews.com/ (sorry the html is too difficult to do) and there you will learn what real computing, Microsoft Style™ (not an oxymoron), is like.
God that was exhausting, I had to retype it twice because my computer blue-screened, the effort I go to to help some ungrateful people. I’m going to take a rest now.
Your problem, Our PROFIT™
MagicWord (hahaha that’s a joke, magic on a MAC, hahahaha, try Halo magic, hahahaha) systems, if only you lemmings knew what a single system is. Once you had done that you could go through the process to learn how to network.
This is how I’m preparing my Mac for Leopard. All I’m doing is repairing permissions. Thats it. I’m loading it all the way baby! I’m so confident it will work perfectly that I have zero fears whatsoever. Unlike those Windows XP users quiver and peeing in their pants during their Vista Ultimate edition installation nightmares. LOL
FileMaker has announced a November 19th Leopard compatibility fix via free download. Yes, they should have had it for premiere day, but a 3-week wait shouldn’t hurt too badly.
The thing I need to prepare for Leopard is getting the two 1 TB hard drives that I ordered last week so I can update my drive that is running out of space and have a Time Machine back-up drive.
Oh, and I guess actually buying Leopard tomorrow would help too.
Loading Leopard now!
2.15pm Australia 26th October 2007
You all still don’t get it!!!!! WAIT FOR 10.5.11!!!!!
I have, since Panther, the habbit to make a clean install on a second drive or partition. With over 20 pro apps, i can’t afford having the slightest time wast with non-compatible older apps…
On my mac with multiple drives, I do a clean install on a spare drive and copy my settings and files with migration assistant. If the install goes bad then I have the original setup. On my powerbook with its single drive, I back up the user folders and do an upgrade.
In most cases, the install will be perfect, but once my drive went bad and the install revealed some fatal errors. On that occasion I hadn’t done a full backup. I got most things but it was pain to piece everything together.
For regular use, I have no problem with installing a brand new MacOS X. Usually Apple release 10.x.1 soon after if there were a few annoying bugs. Nowadays most apps work without needing updates, so I see no need to wait for x.2 or 3.
Looking forward to playing with the new os tomorrow
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Yes!!!….just got mine for 99 bucks.
Why do we always get this appalling scaremongering?
Is it the Trolls who come out to play and stir? Likely.
Every time this happens the results are the same, no hassles, it just works and it all quiets down again.
I will be backing up and installing as I have with every other OS X new version and I’d put 200 bucks down with anyone in my office that it will work just fine…
I love it.
“time saved up front by using the basic upgrade option may result in time spent troubleshooting later. “
“After you have performed the Archive and Install process, you will be left with a set-up that is surprisingly similar to your old configuration.”
“First, attempt and Archive and Install, and if you are still having issues, you can perform an Erase and Install process later. “
So I have a choice, choose the basic upgrade and expect problems and troubleshooting, or accept the Archive and install process and get an upgrade which is “Surprisingly Similar” to the system I had before I did the upgrade, and if that doesn’t work, install from scratch.
Next time it’d be nice to have an installer which ended up with a system that still had everything installed giving no problems and didn’t require erasing the system or hand copying of stuff across.
leopard just arrived!! WOO!!!!!
“Why do we always get this appalling scaremongering?
Is it the Trolls who come out to play and stir? Likely.”
These trolls are inspired and encouraged by their green monster mother, Jealousy.
Leopard installed here – beautiful and snappy. Like a new computer!
Many more little touches than have been advertised which make it a great upgrade.
@ Gow: You said, “Viktor, if you’ve never had a problem, count yourself fortunate, OS X is great and wonderful, but most people will run into problems eventually and MacFixit just gives some nice hints (mostly common sense).”
Nope, MOST people DO NOT run into problems. Just those who do are a very vocal minority, making it seem like most people.
That said, it certainly can’t hurt to prep your Mac. I usually don’t do much other than clean off the drive (cleaned off about 40GB of crap stuff last night), and back up important data. It IS possible for there to be a power failure or something during the upgrade. And one thing I do agree with is not running disk utilities like Disk Warrior after the update. They’ve been known to be incompatible in the past and have clobbered some drives.
I never back up. Backing up is for pussies, the kind who wear those dorky helmets when riding their bikey-poos.
I’m locked and loaded 15 minutes after UPS guy left my door and all I’ve got is the spinning gear. Should have read this, I guess.
@shogun “Can someone explain ‘Archive and Install’ to me again?”
The Archive and Install option is very useful. I use it when I am trying to set a system straight again after some piece of it got trashed or when there’s some elusive bit of crapware stuck in it that causes the Mac to act badly. It’s also useful for things like recurring kernel panics, assuming they aren’t caused by hardware (i.e. RAM) problems that is.
Anyway, you should read the Apple TIL article about this. Find it at:
http://docs.info.apple.com/article.html?artnum=107120
One thing to be aware of is that certain apps like Final Cut Studio or even Adobe’s power apps might not get all their bits put back in the right places. This has been happening less and less as MacOS X has matured, so most people won’t have any problems at all.
Once in a while, I have to go digging through the old Previous System Folder to find missing fonts, etc; but usually the A&I;approach leaves a great working system with all your previous prefs and files intact. When you start up again, it looks identical to your old system.
You should also run Disk Utilities from the Install DVD before doing the A&I;to make sure the HD is fine and the directory info is good.
IMPORTANT NOTE: Immediately after doing the Archive and Install, you should log in and run ALL the software updates (from the Apple menu item). This will include the Combo updater for the main OS, as well as ancillary software. After the Restart, do it again. And again until there are no updates left. Then and only then should you go ahead and use your system. Also, do not try to be a clever sod and “repair permissions” and DiskWorry.er your Mac before doing all your Software Updates: youʻll have nothing but problems. Just let it do its thing.
After a week or so of running with the new system and testing things out, you can delete the old Previous System Folder to save HD space.
These are just a few of my thoughts on doing A&I;and so on; if any others have more to add, please do. Hope this helps a little.
Thanks, Dr!
“Why do we always get this appalling scaremongering?
This time it appears to be justified. It appears that Leopard upgrades are a complete disaster.
For Nuts (“I’m locked and loaded 15 minutes after UPS guy left my door and all I’ve got is the spinning gear. Should have read this, I guess.”)
Can anyone help Nuts? Probably someone has seen a support link on this site or somewhere else. I’m getting this spinning gear too, on a Powerbook 12 inch that just barely scraped through the system Requirements.