Clean install or Upgrade ML

[andy8]

Clean install is, well, "cleaner".

I have encountered macs with strange problems after upgrades, that just completely went away after a clean install.

WARNING - Clean install is only beneficial if you are going to stick with it. A clean install followed by a time machine restore is NOT a clean install.

I always do a clean install and have never experienced ANY of the reported problems with SL or Lion after people upgraded. YMMV. *shrugs*

This is real important:
"A clean install followed by a time machine restore is NOT a clean install."

I was wondering about this. Thanks for that.

When we say clean install do you mean that I should not attempt to use Time Machine backups
after installing Mountain Lion but transfer all data manually later ?

I plan to do just this because my data spans to only about 90GB and not into Terabytes.

 

[iFanboy]

This is real important:
"A clean install followed by a time machine restore is NOT a clean install."

I was wondering about this. Thanks for that.

When we say clean install do you mean that I should not attempt to use Time Machine backups
after installing Mountain Lion but transfer all data manually later ?

I plan to do just this because my data spans to only about 90GB and not into Terabytes.

Clean install is certainly a manually transfer of data afterwards unfortunately.

Time machine restore is great, but if there is any problem contained in your existing install it WILL transfer it to your clean install, thus negating the clean install entirely.

I've experienced several macs with unexplained problems that I was starting to think was hardware related after restoring with Time Machine. When I did a clean install and transferred my data over manually, the problems evaporated. YMMV of course, but I've always found a careful clean install to be the most problem free approach.

 

[andy8]

Clean install is certainly a manually transfer of data afterwards unfortunately.

Time machine restore is great, but if there is any problem contained in your existing install it WILL transfer it to your clean install, thus negating the clean install entirely.

I've experienced several macs with unexplained problems that I was starting to think was hardware related after restoring with Time Machine. When I did a clean install and transferred my data over manually, the problems evaporated. YMMV of course, but I've always found a careful clean install to be the most problem free approach.

That's true. I share your views too. Transferring data manually works great for me; mostly because I don't have huge data size to worry about. Mine is just about 90 over GBs. I also do installations of necessary applications Quickly after installing OS. Just gives a peace of mind.

 

[IzzyJG99]

So far with Lion I've always done a factory re-install of 10.6.2. Use migration assistant to reinstall a user created many, many moons ago from a Time Machine backup. Nothing else but the USER's piddly 19.00MB's. Then upgrade Snow Leopard to the max. Then I download and install 10.7.4.

The primarily reason for this is many, many moons ago when I first got a GMail account I set up Mail.app with it. Two accounts, in fact. For some reason it never showed all those asinine folders. Just two inboxes and nothing more. And I like it to look like that. None of that crap where it downloads all the messages in those various folders. It's annoying. It's ugly. I don't care for it.

Now I've never tried importing that user (with the weird and enjoyable mail quirk) into Lion. Only Snow Leopard.

Another reason why I've gone from SL to Lion instead of just Lion over the boot partition is cause I don't want to miss any fonts from SL. I'm weird like that, I guess.

So what I'll probably do is wipe my disk, install Lion over the web and import that user that way. If it works out great. I haven't ever gotten around to testing that out yet. If it works super. Then from there I'll upgrade to Mountain Lion.

Personally I don't think Apple would put out major OS updates that can be "upgraded" over pre-existing OS's unless it was acceptable. But I can understand why people do the clean installs just to avoid any kind of "ghost in the machine" kind of file problems.

Besides I don't plan on getting Mountain Lion until at least 10.8.2. Had too many problems at the start with Lion to ever Day 1 update again.

 

[brentg33]

Hi all,

i have a late 2011 iMac. It initially came with Snow Leopard. I did a clean install of SL days before Lion's release. I don't seem to have any issues. Its a 3.4 i7 w/ SSD and 2 TB reg drive and 16 GB of ram. However, i was thinking of doing a clean install this time around. My question, my iTunes, iPhoto, aperture, etc data is on the 2nd drive in the iMac. I'm thinking i can keep that drive the way it is. I should be able to just point iTunes, iPhoto etc to the old libraries after the install, no?

Or i might just get lazy and see if the upgrade route causes any problems and take it from there.

However, i am disappointed to read that MLion doesn't seem like it will work on my early 2007 MBP.

 

[IzzyJG99]

For the hell of it I did a clean install of just Lion over the recovery partition. Much faster than upgrading over SL. There are slight changes I've noticed between Lion and Snow Leopard. Things that were carried over from SL into the "update" of Lion. Namely the "Show View Options" preferences are different. The "Arrange by" and "Sort By" preferences are now nearer the top of the window instead of at the bottom. Interesting.

Everything is WAY faster, too.

As I hoped the carried over weird mail.app glitch I have been preserving all these years did work fine with a straight introduction of that user file via Time Machine during the set of this new, clean install of Lion. Interesting stuff.

It's a butt ton faster. Interesting, too. Instead of taking around 30-35 minutes to install over 10.6.8. It only took 15 minutes from start to finish to install it. The downloading thing was really interesting, too. It started at 107 hours, 23 seconds and then went to a more reasonable countdown. Then when it was done it said...and I kid you not "-255,3563,3663 seconds remaining" and then restarted.

Having learned all of this I think I am leaning towards favoring clean installs. So if they give me the option after downloading ML to do a boot recovery partition like they later did with Lion? I am going to do it.

 

[dcorban]

I started with Leopard, went to Snow Leopard, and then Lion, all strictly via upgrading. After a few days with Lion, I tried the recovery method to to a clean install. There was no difference. I'm planning to never waste time like that again.

 

[TenneyThe2nd]

When I upgraded to Lion, I did this:

1. Create a bootable backup disk (using SuperDuper! or Carbon Copy Cloner)
2. Boot to the external backup disk.
3. Erase the internal disk using Disk Utility.
4. Open the Lion Installer and tell it to install Lion on the internal drive.
5. Boot to newly installed internal drive.
6. On first boot, Lion saw the old OS on the External Backup Drive and asked me if I wanted to import all my apps and settings.
7. Let it sit overnight.
8. Wake up with new OS, clean install, totally restored settings.

Obviously, this could import any settings that have been corrupted over time, but I'm pretty sure I would have trashed prefs as issues arose anyway.

 

[omr]

...question answered

 

[OS X Dude]

If I get my 512GB Crucial M4 around the time ML comes out, it'll just be easier for me to do the clean install anyway.

Otherwise, I just upgrade the OS, then use programs like Monolingual and Onyx to clean it up

 

[branthe]

I always recommend a clean install. I've never had good experiences with upgrades and have always reverted to clean installs the few times I've tried to take the easy way out. This is the case for both Windows and Mac.

I will make a bootable clone to another hard drive, format the drive and install ML. I'll then copy data (docs, pictures, music, etc) from the clone to the clean install, but manually download and reinstall any applications, and manually reconfigure all settings.

Upgrading an OS: Serenity Now, Insanity Later.

Go with the clean install. It's a pain but so worth it.

 

[SirithX]

Clean installing is such a pain for me, and my system still runs pretty fast despite upgrading to SL, to Lion, and now to ML once it comes. The main thing for me is Windows, setting up the partition, installing Windows 7, then installing all my Windows programs, that literally takes me a day. This makes me wonder, how much of a pain is it going to be for me once I upgrade to a retina MBP or something without a DVD drive? I guess I'll be forced to get an external Thunderbolt drive unless Microsoft comes out with alternative ways to install Windows 8...

 

[slynger]

after reading through this thread, I find myself a little confused. I have a 2009 Macbook (white unibody) and it was upgraded to Lion. I have been reading about "clean installs" for the past week and decided I will wait for ML.

Which leads me to this: If a time machine backup is not a clean install (as some sites led me to believe), what is the order of doing things so I can get rid of any glitches and at the same time, carry over my data??

 

[NZed]

ML will be clean install for me. Moving music would kill me though, i kept the music in 2 other drives and my mac's hard drive. Ugh.

 

[chevalier433]

It depends on how careful is with your system if you install a ton of apps and third party plugins clean install if you have 15 compatible upgradable apps you work then upgrade .

 

[Killerbob]

I have never really understood the reason to clean install. As I have previously said; I install a fresh OS, and then I migrate Apps and User from TM/TC. That hasn't failed me through Leopard -> Snow Leopard -> Lion -> Beta Mountain Lion.

I do have spartan systems, and of course I have apps, utilities, and games that I have deleted manually, but how would I go about (using Onyx) making sure no crap was left over?

/Bo

 

[chevalier433]

I have never really understood the reason to clean install. As I have previously said; I install a fresh OS, and then I migrate Apps and User from TM/TC. That hasn't failed me through Leopard -> Snow Leopard -> Lion -> Beta Mountain Lion.

I do have spartan systems, and of course I have apps, utilities, and games that I have deleted manually, but how would I go about (using Onyx) making sure no crap was left over?

/Bo

I think an app delete utility like appzaper or appcleaner will do the trick

 

[DJJAZZYJET]

Clean

Ill back up all my data and then do a clean install. Everything feels ' snappier ' after a clean install (sorry i couldn't resist ) but seriously, I find everything works faster after a clean install.

 

[James Godfrey]

Hi all

I am also going to try and go for a clean install, however, as I am new to the Mac game, I am not 100% on how to do it....

Could anyone tell me? Also at present when i hold down cmd+r after the start up tone, I enter the recovery partition, will the Install Lion change to Install ML after the clean install of ML.

Thanks

James

 

[CrisisCore]

Hi everyone. First post here.

I bought my MacBook used, and as such, it didn't come with a Snow Leopard disc, or an iLife '11 disc or an iWork '09 disc. Or any discs, really. This particular computer has Lion already installed on it, and I'm looking forward to the Mountain Lion release. My question is this: If I were to do a clean install, how should I go about getting iLife and iWork back on this computer? If I do a total system backup, that'd mitigate any benefit I get when I restore the system after a fresh Mountain Lion install.

Thanks for your help in advance.

 

[Arelunde]

What about doing an upgrade install and then a full restore cmd-R style? Would this work as well?

I did this with Lion and had no problems, but I DID re-download all my apps. Took a long time, but all is working well at this point.

 

[James Godfrey]

What about doing an upgrade install and then a full restore cmd-R style? Would this work as well?

I did this with Lion and had no problems, but I DID re-download all my apps. Took a long time, but all is working well at this point.

I would like to know if this can be done also???

 

[Taz Mangus]

I always do a clean install of major OS X releases (10.2, 10.4, etc.). To make clean installs easier for me what I did was partition my boot HD into two partitions. One partition is where OS X and applications are installed. The other partition is where I place all the user accounts. With this, I can clean install OS X and not disturb any of the user accounts.

 

[WhackyNinja]

I was wondering this same question. Upgrade or Clean. I would do a clean install because I have my pictures, music, and videos on a USB backup. And my apps that I was installed are saved on the App Store, especially iLife '11. But the thing is, I have other apps that I bought and I probably won't get back. For example, Microsoft Office.

 

[Arelunde]

After I restored my Lion, I went to the Microsoft Office website and re-downloaded the Office suite. You will need the information emailed to you when you bought it (order number, login info). Takes time and, of course, you have to re-do the settings. But it works.