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twanj

macrumors 65816
Sep 10, 2015
1,229
1,694
Pompano Beach, FL
I got to the screen to activate Face ID on the new phone, and it would not focus on my face. It said move the phone lower, so I did but then my face was out of frame. I made sure there was plenty of light in my room, but finally I was able to find an angle where it worked.


Next, it wants me to activate all my credit cards in my Apple Wallet by providing the CVV code. First card is up, and I take the card from my wallet and type in the CVV code. "Invalid Card: Check the information aon your card and try again." Ugghhhhhh

I'm skipping it now and will add it later, because I'm sure I'm entering the correct 3 digits lol.
I had the same problem with Face ID. I don't think it uses light in the room, it's infrared lasers?

I also thought the same thing about credit cards in the wallet. Not the right time. Thanks, that reminded me to set em up now.
 
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RabidMacFan

macrumors 6502
Jun 19, 2012
363
175
California
More frustration. It took about 30-40 minutes to progress the data transfer between phones using a USB4 cable to reach 2 minutes left, which is pretty close to what it estimated. It's been stuck on "2 minutes left" for a good 15 minutes now, then finally the new phone restarted and it says Transfer Complete. The older iPhone 15 Pro was 256GB and about half-filled.


I have a theory that my "activation" step was stuck because I'm not on a major carrier network, but use Visible instead. It shouldn't matter, since it had already connected to Wi-Fi and should only need to activate the phone. But the setup process is so finicky that any little deviation seems to mess it up. The correct way to transfer service for smaller carriers is to download the app and apply the correct eSIM.

Update: It attempted to transfer the phone number after the transfer completed, and correctly gave a message that the SIM is not supported to do the automatic transfer.
 

GreekFeeling

macrumors member
Dec 27, 2015
59
24
Aachen, Germany
I am using a 15 pro max with 1 TB. 600 gb of this is used for photos and videos. I'm wondering whether I should activate optimize phone storage in the settings under iCloud before transferring data. That should speed up the transfer to the 16 Pro max considerably, shouldn't it? I can select keep originals again after on the 16 PM
 

RabidMacFan

macrumors 6502
Jun 19, 2012
363
175
California
I am using a 15 pro max with 1 TB. 600 gb of this is used for photos and videos. I'm wondering whether I should activate optimize phone storage in the settings under iCloud before transferring data. That should speed up the transfer to the 16 Pro max considerably, shouldn't it? I can select keep originals again after on the 16 PM
I don't think the Optimize Phone Storage setting will do anything if you have 400GB free. It won't start deleting older stuff until you start running out of space.
 
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fraXis

macrumors member
Jun 25, 2007
42
42
I noticed that if you are doing a direct cable transfer, the "Transferring from" screen that the iPhone shows during the actual transfer process will say, "Keep your other iPhone connected to this iPhone and connected to power until the transfer is complete.". If it is transferring over Wi-Fi, this message will say something like "Keep your other iPhone near this iPhone..." so that is an easy way to tell if it is using the cable to transfer the data from your old iPhone to your new one.
 

Adora

macrumors 6502a
Jun 30, 2024
740
324
I wonder if Thunderbolt 3 or 4 cables exist that don't support 10 Gbit/s USB 3.x Gen 2. Maybe even with only USB 2.0 because it's just meant for Thunderbolt usage. I still didn't find one supporting USB 4 with 20 GBit/s.

There were TB3 cables with only 20 instead of 40 GBit/s, even very short ones. But I think every USB-C shaped TB cable I ever had was always also USB 3.1 Gen 2 with 10 GBit/s also the 20 Gbit TB3 cable.

And since the 15 Pro only supports 5 GBit/s it doesn't make much sense to use Thunderbolt at all for this case, only if you already have a cable.
 
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palemonkey

macrumors 6502a
Sep 26, 2013
581
893
I am using a 15 pro max with 1 TB. 600 gb of this is used for photos and videos. I'm wondering whether I should activate optimize phone storage in the settings under iCloud before transferring data. That should speed up the transfer to the 16 Pro max considerably, shouldn't it? I can select keep originals again after on the 16 PM

I don't think the Optimize Phone Storage setting will do anything if you have 400GB free. It won't start deleting older stuff until you start running out of space.
I have 230GB+ of photos/videos stored in iCloud Photos and yet they take up around 9GB on my phone, with plenty of free space remaining.

The wording in the settings app suggests it only optimises if you're low on space, but this doesn't seem to be the case.
 
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RichP74

macrumors regular
Dec 16, 2012
208
117
I am using a 15 pro max with 1 TB. 600 gb of this is used for photos and videos. I'm wondering whether I should activate optimize phone storage in the settings under iCloud before transferring data. That should speed up the transfer to the 16 Pro max considerably, shouldn't it? I can select keep originals again after on the 16 PM
Yeah if you have a ton of data on the phone, what I've found is just do the "basic" migration of settings from the old phone, and then restore the data over iCloud instead of doing a phone to phone transfer. That way you don't have to sit there and babysit the thing, and it will restore when it's on WiFi. Otherwise you're sitting there for hours with no phone.
 

GreekFeeling

macrumors member
Dec 27, 2015
59
24
Aachen, Germany
Just did the the optimize phone storage setting in icloud photos and now my photos went down from 600 GB down to 12GB 😊 so it has an effect, even with 300 GB what i had left from the 1 TB. Now the transfer should work faster! Don't think I need a thunderbolt cable! Will do it over WiFi Transfer. Will update this post on Sunday when i get my 16 PM
 
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Shirasaki

macrumors P6
May 16, 2015
16,271
11,768
Yeah if you have a ton of data on the phone, what I've found is just do the "basic" migration of settings from the old phone, and then restore the data over iCloud instead of doing a phone to phone transfer. That way you don't have to sit there and babysit the thing, and it will restore when it's on WiFi. Otherwise you're sitting there for hours with no phone.
But then the completeness of iCloud backup restore is worse compared to transferring between devices. So basically you wait longer, but you receive a complete transfer. I tried it once when getting my iPhone 15 Pro Max and the new phone was immediately useable after the transfer unlike iCloud restore which gives me a useless device that I can only realistically use safari until transfer is done, and it takes much longer too, almost a day in my case.
 

eastpointvet

macrumors newbie
Sep 6, 2014
28
29
But then the completeness of iCloud backup restore is worse compared to transferring between devices. So basically you wait longer, but you receive a complete transfer. I tried it once when getting my iPhone 15 Pro Max and the new phone was immediately useable after the transfer unlike iCloud restore which gives me a useless device that I can only realistically use safari until transfer is done, and it takes much longer too, almost a day in my case.
exactly how I feel. you can get to your Home Screen faster but it takes forever for all your information to download back to your phone with no real progress indicator. I definitely prefer the transfer between devices because when its done all you have to wait on are the apps to redownload and they already have all the info redownloaded to them
 

Shirasaki

macrumors P6
May 16, 2015
16,271
11,768
exactly how I feel. you can get to your Home Screen faster but it takes forever for all your information to download back to your phone with no real progress indicator. I definitely prefer the transfer between devices because when its done all you have to wait on are the apps to redownload and they already have all the info redownloaded to them
And in my previous case, I didn’t even need to wait for app to download I think. Everything was transferred, including apps, so when setup is ready, they are all installed And ready to use. It’s incredible.
 

RabidMacFan

macrumors 6502
Jun 19, 2012
363
175
California
And in my previous case, I didn’t even need to wait for app to download I think. Everything was transferred, including apps, so when setup is ready, they are all installed And ready to use. It’s incredible.
Thats strange. After my Thunderbolt 4 cable transfer, all the apps still needed to be downloaded.
Well, at least thats what it looked like (the alternative being that they just needed to install?). None of the apps were available to use yet, but if I tap-and-held on one, I could choose to prioritize specific apps first.

So besides the apps, once the transfer was complete almost everything was set up except for a few things. Messaging apps like Signal, Telegram, and Slack all needed to be re-authenticated.

Also, bluetooth devices do not transfer. However, the apps that used bluetooth devices don't even recognize that they are on a new device, so that causes all sorts of problems. Examples include glucose meters, blood pressure sensors, and car bluetooth.
 

Shirasaki

macrumors P6
May 16, 2015
16,271
11,768
Thats strange. After my Thunderbolt 4 cable transfer, all the apps still needed to be downloaded.
Well, at least thats what it looked like (the alternative being that they just needed to install?). None of the apps were available to use yet, but if I tap-and-held on one, I could choose to prioritize specific apps first.

So besides the apps, once the transfer was complete almost everything was set up except for a few things. Messaging apps like Signal, Telegram, and Slack all needed to be re-authenticated.

Also, bluetooth devices do not transfer. However, the apps that used bluetooth devices don't even recognize that they are on a new device, so that causes all sorts of problems. Examples include glucose meters, blood pressure sensors, and car bluetooth.
I guess this is the case of devil in the details. It’s not 100% carbon copy but better than iCloud restore, I suppose, at least for me. Also I don’t use non-Apple bluetooth devices so that smooths out things a bit.
 

huanbrother

macrumors 6502
Dec 20, 2012
322
300
CHINA
I utilized a USB3 (10Gbps) cable to transfer data from my 15 Pro Max 123G/256G to my new 16 Pro 256G. Initially, it estimated the transfer would take 30 minutes, but it actually took 45 minutes. Additionally, I need to wait another 30 minutes for the new iPhone to complete the app downloads.
 
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jamezr

macrumors P6
Aug 7, 2011
16,082
19,087
US
I used the USB-C cable that came in the box to transfer everything from my 15PM 256 to my new 16 PM 256. It took 25 minutes and every thing came over. Very little time to download apps and my phone did not get hot.
 
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BuggyGT

macrumors regular
Oct 1, 2019
176
165
Darn, I started the WiFi transfer... I did not see USB C as an option in the migration screens?
There is no option to select it but before you power on the new iPhone/start the migration, connect the cables and you will see this image of 2 phones connected that lets you know it is doing an wired transfer.

iphone-migration-not-working-1.png
 
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VSMacOne

macrumors 603
Oct 18, 2008
5,940
2,897
Just tried the cable transfer option with an Anker TB4 cable and I have to say so far it's moving faster than the direct transfer over the air like I've used in the past. The only downside that I see is that the phones are super hot for a few minutes. I'm looking at 41 minutes for just over 110 GB of data going from a 15 Pro Max to a 16 Pro Max. It actually ended up being just over 50 minutes which if I remember correctly from last year is faster than over the air.
 
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VSMacOne

macrumors 603
Oct 18, 2008
5,940
2,897
Just another helpful update after I’ve been using the phone for a couple of days. The direct transfer via cable is by far the best method, as I’m finding out that not only it was the quickest, but also the only one that kept the majority of my apps logged in.
Will definitely be using this one going forward.
 
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laserfan

macrumors regular
Jul 13, 2012
143
42
I was GOING TO upgrade from my iPhone 8 to my new 16 Pro in this way, but didn't have a Lightning to USB-C cable. I'd have had to use my Mac Mini as a go-between, and decided that was just "too much" work... 😵‍💫

Wireless was easy enough, though I'll never know now how many app re-logins I'd have saved. Oh well, I had to turn-on Face ID for many of them anyway...
 

VSMacOne

macrumors 603
Oct 18, 2008
5,940
2,897
If it’s any consolation, I believe it only works USB-C to USB-C so I don’t think you missed out on anything.
 
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