Migrating from Intel iMac to M1 MacBook Air: My five-day journey

[RV_]

David has been using Apple computers for the last couple of decades and writing about it.

Excerpt:

"By David Gewirtz for DIY-IT | June 24, 2021

Can a man with an eight-year-old maxed-out iMac find happiness with a little M1 MacBook Air?

OK, let me set the stage. I have a bunch of very reliable, very functional, very old Macs. I have a 2013 iMac, three 2012 Mac minis, and a 2011 Mac mini. Some can run Catalina, one is stuck back at Mojave, but none can run either Big Sur or the upcoming Monterey. 

I also have a very powerful 2018 i7 Mac mini, which is my main desktop video editing machine and a 2015 i5 laptop. Both are able to run current software, so I'm sticking with them (although the laptop is going to my wife) for as long as they're supported.

I generally like to run my production Macs about half an OS generation behind, just because it usually takes half a year or so until the growing pains of the new release are overcome with bug fix updates. Certainly, I wouldn't say I like to fall two generations behind. At that point, applications and even web services start to fail, and they often fail at unpredictable times.

I've learned my lesson with that the hard way.

I've been putting off upgrading these machines because it's a hefty expense. Also, I wasn't entirely sure how the M1 would work for my projects because I'd been running Intel Macs for so very long.  

From iMac to M1 Macbook Air

Once WWDC was finished, and I realized there will be no new Macs for a while, I decided on an upgrade plan for my little fleet. I'll tell you more about that in a future article. But I decided to start with the very well-equipped (for 2013) iMac that moved from my office desk to the living room a few years ago and has served as my primary development machine ever since.

I decided to replace that 32GB iMac with a 16GB MacBook Air. I went with the Air because I want to be able just to unplug one port and take my development machine with me wherever I go. I haven't been able to do that with the 21 pound iMac.

Finally, my tactic for doing this was to spread it out over a few days so that I could get my regular day's work done as well. Once my regular work was done, I dipped into this project and moved it along a bit day-by-day."

Much more in the article describing each day 1-5 here:

https://www.zdnet.com/article/diary-migrating-from-an-intel-imac-to-an-m1-macbook-air/?ftag=TRE-03-10aaa6b&bhid={%24external_id}&mid={%24MESSAGE_ID}&cid={%24contact_id}&eh={%24CF_emailHash}