I have time this week. I just finished making a bootable backup of my Mini using SuperDuper. I already have a USB Flash drive with Catalina, made with DiskMaker. I guess I'm torn (as usual) between just letting the OS do the Update using the Update button in System Preferences, or doing a clean Install of Catalina using the thumb drive.

Clean Install: I like the idea of starting fresh and clean and it being like getting a new Mac, but I don't necessarily like the idea of setting everything up (like preferences and saved passwords and logins) from scratch. I'd also take the opportunity to only install 64 bit versions of apps I'll actually use regularly.

Software Update: Sure would be easier. But then I'd have to go through all my apps and delete the older 32 bit versions. Not a huge deal, but in the olden days, I could run something like Disk Optimizer aftterward to defragment the drive and recoup some of the wiped off space. Or is that not even a thing any more?

Anything else I should consider that I'm not thinking of? As much as I was planning on doing a Clean Install, now I'm leaning toward the easier Software Update. I'm still keeping an eye out for a 16/512 M2 Mini, so whatever I end up doing with this one could be somewhat temporary, depending on how soon one becomes available.

Thanks for your thoughts.

clean install is my choice, despite the huge pita.

I have a goog doc that has various info for resetting prefs and all the little bits, etc.
It's no faster, but it's easier.

---

!#$@@$#!

Quod suus via crustulum saxum

I just press the "update" button, go have a coffee. I've not had any issues with it.

Defragging is no longer a thing with SSDs - in fact, it will decrease their lifespan. You can still do it on spinners but not if they’re formatted APFS.

It took me a long time to let go of my buggy whip maintenance routine but I haven't suffered any ill effects.

---

Well, it's done. I took the easy way out and used Software Update. But it was a bit of an adventiure. It went through the download process easily enough, but after it downloaded, I kept waiting for it to install but nothing happened and I just got the same exact window to download again. So I did. And again nothing happened. Third time's the charm, right? Wrong. Same thing. Finally did a search on my computer for Catalina, and there was the installer sitting there. Double-click and away I go. A half hour or so later and here I am looking at the Catalina desktop and several icons in my Dock with a slash through them, but I expected that.

I updated Firefox, and will likely do the same for Chrome. Haven't decided on the 2019 Office for Mac for $25 yet. I'm hearing varied reports about whether 2019 will work on an M2. In the meantime I may just see if I can open my one or two docs with Pages and Numbers.

Thanks.

-- edit --

So far, so good on opening existing Excel and Word files with Numbers and Pages. I'm not doing a lot of writing or creating spreadsheets, just needing to access older stuff and it seems to be working.



Edited 1 time(s). Last edit at 07/15/2024 03:40PM by wurm.