Hello all. I’ll be moving from Windows 10 1803 to a new M3 iMac (16GB/1TB) in a couple of weeks, and I have a lot of concerns about the move that I hope I can get assistance with. I’ve used Windows for decades, but MacOS is terra incognita to me (well, since 1995 anyway; my very first computer was a Mac Classic used for DTP).
Here are the details:
1) My C: drive has ~260GB used. I have a portable 2TB HDD (exFAT) on which I keep an up-to-date copy of everything in C:\Users, so copying data over manually should not be an issue (other than time-wise) in case that turns out to be preferable to migration. (I also have AOMEI and FileHistory backups, but assume they’re irrelevant here. I’ll have a good backup strategy, so no need to get into that.)
2) The PC has two user accounts, which I want to replicate.
3) I have an iPhone with my Apple ID, while my wife has an iPhone and an iPad on her own Apple ID. We have iCloud (shared 50GB) already, with pretty much everything backed up in it. We don’t use iCloud Drive or Apple Music.
4) We both have Apple Mail, but mainly use multiple Xfinity email accounts with Thunderbird. With several decades’ worth of downloaded emails in TB, I think (for now anyway) that I’d like to keep using it on the iMac. However, if I don’t lose anything, including folder organization, by putting it all into Apple Mail I would consider that.
5) We use multiple browsers on the PC, each with its own profile(s). I haven’t decided whether or not to just import (from html) all the bookmarks to Safari and call it a day, so for now I think I’d like to install them on the Mac (they all have MacOS versions) with their own profiles if possible.
6) The PC contains a backup of all our photos and videos, hand-sorted into numerous folders. I’m concerned that if setup downloads all of them from iCloud and then copies over all the folders too, it would end up as a big mess.
7) On my PC I use Audacity and save WAV files to various folders. I want to make playlists on my iPhone for use in my car, but I don’t know much about the Music app and wonder where all those WAV files would/should go during setup.
8) We don’t use Outlook, iTunes, or MS accounts (so no OneDrive to worry about). Also, there's no calendar info or contact lists (aside from our TB address books) on the PC .
9) I’m planning to use Pages and Numbers instead of Word and Excel, or at least see how that goes. If it’s not satisfactory, I’ll deal with it later.
10) I use an older Brother MFC printer that works with AirPrint, so I’m not concerned about that for now.
I’m thinking that my situation is too complicated for a clean Migration Assistant process. On the other hand, I really don’t know to where I would copy much of my data (music, browser profiles, etc.). Given all the above, should I migrate, or install apps then migrate, or install apps then copy all my data over? Or am I overthinking it all? I’ve done a lot of reading, but at my age things just don’t stick like they used to. What do you think is my best way forward? I would greatly appreciate detailed advice and assistance. And sorry for the long post.
Here are the details:
1) My C: drive has ~260GB used. I have a portable 2TB HDD (exFAT) on which I keep an up-to-date copy of everything in C:\Users, so copying data over manually should not be an issue (other than time-wise) in case that turns out to be preferable to migration. (I also have AOMEI and FileHistory backups, but assume they’re irrelevant here. I’ll have a good backup strategy, so no need to get into that.)
2) The PC has two user accounts, which I want to replicate.
3) I have an iPhone with my Apple ID, while my wife has an iPhone and an iPad on her own Apple ID. We have iCloud (shared 50GB) already, with pretty much everything backed up in it. We don’t use iCloud Drive or Apple Music.
4) We both have Apple Mail, but mainly use multiple Xfinity email accounts with Thunderbird. With several decades’ worth of downloaded emails in TB, I think (for now anyway) that I’d like to keep using it on the iMac. However, if I don’t lose anything, including folder organization, by putting it all into Apple Mail I would consider that.
5) We use multiple browsers on the PC, each with its own profile(s). I haven’t decided whether or not to just import (from html) all the bookmarks to Safari and call it a day, so for now I think I’d like to install them on the Mac (they all have MacOS versions) with their own profiles if possible.
6) The PC contains a backup of all our photos and videos, hand-sorted into numerous folders. I’m concerned that if setup downloads all of them from iCloud and then copies over all the folders too, it would end up as a big mess.
7) On my PC I use Audacity and save WAV files to various folders. I want to make playlists on my iPhone for use in my car, but I don’t know much about the Music app and wonder where all those WAV files would/should go during setup.
8) We don’t use Outlook, iTunes, or MS accounts (so no OneDrive to worry about). Also, there's no calendar info or contact lists (aside from our TB address books) on the PC .
9) I’m planning to use Pages and Numbers instead of Word and Excel, or at least see how that goes. If it’s not satisfactory, I’ll deal with it later.
10) I use an older Brother MFC printer that works with AirPrint, so I’m not concerned about that for now.
I’m thinking that my situation is too complicated for a clean Migration Assistant process. On the other hand, I really don’t know to where I would copy much of my data (music, browser profiles, etc.). Given all the above, should I migrate, or install apps then migrate, or install apps then copy all my data over? Or am I overthinking it all? I’ve done a lot of reading, but at my age things just don’t stick like they used to. What do you think is my best way forward? I would greatly appreciate detailed advice and assistance. And sorry for the long post.