what to do with 4 internal drives from older mac pro to new mac models

[chipandegg]

Hi
I'm interested in buying a new mac, whether this be an iMac or a Mac Pro - not sure yet

I currently own an older 2007 Mac Pro, what I need to know is.....Has anyone had one of these machines (older mac pro) and then bought one of the above models....How did you go about transferring the4 internal drives.

Did you copy everything to external drives and then plug them into your new mac or use something like a thunderbay, transferring the older drives into this bay and then connecting it.

http://www.megamac.co.uk/products/owc-thunderbay-4
thanks

 

[mrhick01]

When I transitioned from the 3,1 Mac Pro 2008 to the 2013 version, I purchased an Oyen Digital Mobius 5-bay drive. Works well for me.

 

[ssgbryan]

I went from a 1,1 to a 4,1. 4x2TB making 2x4TB RAID0 - MUSIC (My iTunes Library) and Scratch Disc (My data drive).

Put the old drives on the new sleds, and went back to work. No muss, no fuss.

 

[bladerunner2000]

I went from a 1,1 to a 4,1. 4x2TB making 2x4TB RAID0 - MUSIC (My iTunes Library) and Scratch Disc (My data drive).

Put the old drives on the new sleds, and went back to work. No muss, no fuss.

Another advantage of being on a classic Mac Pro

 

[h9826790]

Something like this, USB 3 is good for Ext HDD bay. Anyway, I have this, but not the new Mac Pro yet ^^!

 

[Average Pro]

I went from a 2008 MP to the new MP. I pulled the drives and placed them in a AkitioThunder2 Quad External 4-Bay Enclosure. I then turned it on and saw all the files on the drives. Done.

 

[fuchsdh]

Hi
I'm interested in buying a new mac, whether this be an iMac or a Mac Pro - not sure yet

I currently own an older 2007 Mac Pro, what I need to know is.....Has anyone had one of these machines (older mac pro) and then bought one of the above models....How did you go about transferring the4 internal drives.

Did you copy everything to external drives and then plug them into your new mac or use something like a thunderbay, transferring the older drives into this bay and then connecting it.

http://www.megamac.co.uk/products/owc-thunderbay-4
thanks

I'm not familiar with the Thunderbay and if it *has* to work in a RAID. If it doesn't, then you could buy it without hard drives and put your old ones in, no muss or fuss. Alternatively I'm sure there are other 4+ bay options that would give you that ability. If not or you're wedded to the Thunderbay, I'd say the best option is to buy a SATA to USB3 dock along the lines of something like this: http://www.amazon.com/StarTech-com-Drive-Adapter-Converter-USB3SSATAIDE/dp/B00D76J1KO

That'll make transferring the contents of the old HDDs to another location or your Mac easy and fast.

 

[monokakata]

I went from a Mac Pro 5,1 to a retina iMac. I figured I had to go all-in on Thunderbolt, so I bought a OWC Thunderbay 4 drive housing, and put the Mac Pro's disks in it. The whole task took just a few minutes (unscrewing and screwing) and then the same drives appeared in Finder.

And no, the Thunderbay does not have to be configured as RAID.

 

[hfg]

I have had good luck with the Thunderbay enclosures and have several now. They are NOT hardware RAID but are simple JBOD disk enclosures which will present your disks to your computer exactly like they were in the cMacPro environment.

These are, of course, using the Thunderbolt interface which I much prefer after having had issues with USB 3.0 external enclosures in the past.

 

[sigmadog]

If you want to keep your drives as JBOD (Just a Bunch Of Disks) and not as a RAID, then I'd go for a USB3 enclosure. I don't think you'd get much bang for the buck using a Thunderbolt enclosure and spinning hard disks without RAID. The price difference between Thunderbolt and USB3 enclosures is notable.

 

[haralds]

Hi
I'm interested in buying a new mac, whether this be an iMac or a Mac Pro - not sure yet

I currently own an older 2007 Mac Pro, what I need to know is.....Has anyone had one of these machines (older mac pro) and then bought one of the above models....How did you go about transferring the4 internal drives.

Did you copy everything to external drives and then plug them into your new mac or use something like a thunderbay, transferring the older drives into this bay and then connecting it.

http://www.megamac.co.uk/products/owc-thunderbay-4
thanks

Just unbolt the drives from the old sleds and put them on the new ones. Boot. Done!

Later, you might update one of the drives to a newer, larger one. You can insert the new one, remove one that is not the boot drive, then Carbon Copy Clone the boot drive. Remove the boot drive and reinsert the other and move content as needed.

Finally, you might consider setting up a Fusion drive. All the convenience of a large drive with the overall performance experience of an SSD. But use backups, since the potential for failure will be increased.

I have gone from a 2007 to 2008 to mid 2010 - and kept all of them. Not worth selling for what they can do! They all run Yosemite, they all have Fusion drives.

 

[chipandegg]

I went from a Mac Pro 5,1 to a retina iMac. I figured I had to go all-in on Thunderbolt, so I bought a OWC Thunderbay 4 drive housing, and put the Mac Pro's disks in it. The whole task took just a few minutes (unscrewing and screwing) and then the same drives appeared in Finder.

And no, the Thunderbay does not have to be configured as RAID.

I'm looking at a Retina iMac right now as it goes, would you recommend thunderbolt over usb 3? cheers

 

[chipandegg]

I have gone from a 2007 to 2008 to mid 2010 - and kept all of them. Not worth selling for what they can do! They all run Yosemite, they all have Fusion drives.

Yeah will keep this Mac Pro as well