Upgrading to Mountain Lion - What will TM save?

[0000757]

So I'm debating between doing a clean install or just a straight upgrade. The things that are most valuable to me that I need to keep are:

My iPhoto Library
My iTunes Library (Music & Movies)
My iMovie Projects & Events
My Final Cut Pro Projects & Events
All of my iLife Apps
All of my Microsoft Office Apps
All of my Adobe CS6 Apps & Utilities

Which of these can Time Machine save? Would it be better for my system (Which I recently reinstalled [Mac OS X Lion] on 6/18/12) to clean install and then put everything back, or will my system perform just fine with a standard upgrade? (I come from a Windows background [my first mac], so upgrading is always hell to me)

 

[Cougarcat]

TM backs up all of that, but an upgrade will be just fine.

 

[clukas]

clean install or just a straight upgrade

Which of these can Time Machine save?

Ok this is very important, performing a clean install followed by a time machine backup does not count as a clean install. You will not see any performance gains, as time machine puts all the crap you have deleted back.

If you want to see real performance gain, backup all your stuff manually onto a external hard drive, and perform a clean install (with no time machine backup). If you don't want to go through all this hustle just do an upgrade.

 

[eddjedi]

Agreed, doing a clean install and then Migrating just takes you right back to square one. As long as you do a bit of house keeping now and again (eg don't have a 100GB Library folder) then a clean install really isn't necessary.

 

[0000757]

Agreed, doing a clean install and then Migrating just takes you right back to square one. As long as you do a bit of house keeping now and again (eg don't have a 100GB Library folder) then a clean install really isn't necessary.

My Library is only 8GB, so I should be good.


Just to double check, upgrading will not affect my iPhoto and iMovie projects, correct? (Too many projects lost upgrading with Windows.....)

Also, will upgrading to the GM version affect anything, or will it upgrade normally?

 

[Jelite]

If you only installed Lion less than a month ago then there is even less reason to do a clean install, nothing will be lost or changed upgrading to the GM.

 

[ixodes]

Although it's more work, I always wipe the drive and do a clean install. Starting from ground zero, just like it came out of the box when new, has always served me very well. My ongoing desire to continue to improve my setup and optimization techniques, can only be practiced when starting fresh.

 

[eddjedi]

Just to double check, upgrading will not affect my iPhoto and iMovie projects, correct? (Too many projects lost upgrading with Windows.....)

Also, will upgrading to the GM version affect anything, or will it upgrade normally?

As with any upgrade or major system change, do a backup first, preferably with Time Machine. Then if anything goes wrong, one click and you're back to where you were.