Apple Providing Free Data Migration With a Mac Purchase or Repair (macrumors.com)

Apple is now offering data migration services for free when customers purchase a new Mac or need to have a Mac replaced for repair reasons. Prior to this month, data migration was priced at $99. From a report: Beginning April 2, there will be no cost for Data Migrations with the purchase of a new Mac or Data Transfers with a repair. Data migration was included as a feature in Apple's One to One program, which was shut down in 2015. One to One allowed customers to pay $99 when purchasing a new Mac to get a year's worth of instruction and help. When Apple ended One to One, data migration was still available as a one-time $99 service.

Comments

Tricky service

[SuperKendall]

I sure wouldn't want the responsibility of transferring everything from an older computer to a newer one on a regular basis. Easy for a system migrator to miss something a user stuck in an odd place... or if apps don't work on the new system in the same way, you have to talk through all the changes with the user.

So my hat is off to the techs that have to handle this...

Re: Tricky service

[tysonedwards]

Itâ(TM)s more âoeweâ(TM)ll run Migration Assistant for youâ.

Re: Tricky service

[Cmdln Daco]

Too bad it only runs with Apple hardware. And Apple software. If you confine yourself to a little world, you get to use the highly integrated features in that little world. And feel very safely cared for by the patriarchs in that little world.

Re: Tricky service

[v1]

Migration assistant is one "consumer option", recovering from a time machine backup is another easy option that most users can pull off without much trouble.

When the computer won't start up anymore (and no time machine backup is available) is where the techs usually need to step in. I've personally removed hundreds of hard drives from dead computers over the years, sometimes needing to run various tools to repair damaged directories or recover as much as is possible off a failing hard drive. Usually it just migrates over after an easy repair, but often times I'd have to just plain copy files over for the user to pick through.

I don't know how aggressive the Apple Geniuses handling this are, but my prior experience is they're (sadly) not much better than the Geek Squad staff. I'd be willing to bet they're not trained on anything beyond the basics of time machine and migration assistant, so if you have a failing hard drive or a damaged directory they may be helpless. It really depends (1) on how good the actual tech is, and (2) whether or not they're allowed to go the extra mile. I've worked with MANY former Geek Squad techs that left because of the intense frustration of threat of being FIRED if they went any farther than using the approved geeksquad repair CD on customer's machines. (because if that didn't fix it, it was a mail-in to their repair center, and that was a LOT more expensive) So don't hate too hard on geeksquad techs - a lot of them are smarter than they look because they're being forced to be stupid to keep BB's profits high. I hope Apple isn't taking the same approach.

Our AASP store charged $50 for data migration assuming there were no complications, that was usually handled by the sales staff. Beyond that it was just service time for a tech, usually an hour or so, to repair directories or pry data off failing drives, or up to a couple hours if it required a lot of effort. Before I left I think they had transitioned up front to free data transfers with purchases of a new computer though.

I personally get a new time machine drive every few years, and set the old one up on the shelf in the closet beside the others. Those are my "archival backups". I've only needed to get one out once to retrieve one file I couldn't find on my current system, but it's good to know I have it.

It's a shame Windows has gone so long without having a bundled migration solution. Most users are simply resigned to starting over with their new computer, short of what files they could drag and drop to floppy or now ext hard drive or flash drive, and drop onto the new computer. Macs have had firewire target mode since the late 90's, and even could do SCSI target mode before that. Windows users on the other hand often having to buy migration kits that include bubbles with usb A cords out each end and special included migration software. (or take it to a tech to drag and drop what they can - not really a proper migration of things like bookmarks etc) And migrating windows apps from one computer to another usually is not going to work. I prefer the macs for their migration - you get all the accounts, exactly as they were on the old computer, and almost all apps also migrate. Basically the computer appears 100% identical, except for a new app or two, and often with a newer OS.

Macs have gone from being able to migrate over scsi, to over firewire, to over thunderbolt, and now can even migrate 100% over ethernet. But then again, it's in Apple's best interest to make upgrading as easy as possible, seeing as they're a hardware manufacturer and want you to refresh your hardware as frequently as possible (every 3-5 years is actually a reasonable rate IMO) so they're going to make it as painless and transparent as possible. At this point it's so easy to do and so complete that literally anyone can do it. But I suppose if they're going to do it for free, sure, why not, go for it.

Re: Tricky service

[AmiMoJo]

Assuming the reason for it not booting is not that some other item of soldered-down hardware is broken.

PRISM

[PopeRatzo]

In a cost-saving measure, Apple will be contracting out the data migration tasks to the NSA.

Re:PRISM

[Cmdln Daco]

How cozy-n-safe is that!

Apple solution

[hcs_$reboot]

Data migration -= 99
Mac purchase += 99

Re: Apple solution

[Anonymous Coward]

It's been a built-in feature in OS X for at least over a decade, I think you could even do it over FireWire back before gig E was standard.

More likely if they wanted to shuffle this cost around sneakily they'd take it from the trade-in price on your old Mac since you've already brought it to the store... of course they will remind you about the trade-in or recycling.

Re: Apple solution

[Theaetetus]

It's been a built-in feature in OS X for at least over a decade, I think you could even do it over FireWire back before gig E was standard.

Can confirm. You boot the old machine in target disk mode by holding down T, plug it into the new machine via Firewire, and it mounts as if it was a drive. The Migration Assistant application can transfer all your data and settings from that machine.

Re: Apple solution

[AmiMoJo]

Hopefully that doesn't work any more, otherwise it would be a massive security hole. Fortunately Firewire is long dead.

Re: Apple solution

[Theaetetus]

Hopefully that doesn't work any more, otherwise it would be a massive security hole. Fortunately Firewire is long dead.

If someone has physical access to your machine, and you don't have full disk encryption, then you already have a massive security hole.

Has always been free for iPhones

[WillAffleckUW]

Every time I buy an iPhone, they migrate all the data for you from your old phone.

So doing it for the Mac computers isn't really that much of a deal.

Re:Has always been free for iPhones

[WillAffleckUW]

Why are you using an iPhone? You poor underprivileged loser.

Because I stopped using my flip phone

Re:Has always been free for iPhones

[Theaetetus]

Has always been for free for Macs, too. There's an application called Migration Assistant that is included in every install and can transfer data from a prior machine. It's even fired up during the first run of a new OS install, asking if you want to transfer your data from another machine or drive. It properly installs everything, including preferences, settings, etc.

My only question is how it's ever worth $99.

Oh yes!

[SuperKendall]

I found out later that this person had the (very bad) habit of "hiding" ALL their "Document" files in C:\Windows\Temp (!!!!!!!)

That is exactly what I mean, very possible a user has stuff some unexpected things in a system directory somewhere that you (or a migration tool) did not touch. I've seen similar things a lot of times from untechnical people so I do not think it's even that rare.

That's what I mean, dangerous...

[SuperKendall]

run Migration Assistant for you

I agree that's probably all they are really doing... but then after that to claim that the person is safe to wipe the old system? I sure would not claim that without having a real careful look at the completeness of the migration, I think I've had it miss stuff before that I wasn't even keeping in some strange place.

I can't even bring myself to wipe a system I used 20 years ago out of fear I forgot to copy something forward. The scary thing is sometimes I look through really old drives and still find some files I would have sworn I moved but cannot find anywhere else.

Re:That's what I mean, dangerous...

[GrandCow]

You can be sure that it's in the fine print or the customer is notified verbally not to wipe the old device until they have confirmed all of their old data is on the new device.

Migrate from what?

[manu0601]

Will they cover the data migration from my PDP 10 tapes for free?

Re:Migrate from what?

[TeknoHog]

Yes, but only to Compact Cassettes. Hipsters love tape and they wouldn't want your data to lose their warmth and roundness.

Re:Migrate from what?

[hcs_$reboot]

Will they cover the data migration from my PDP 10 tapes for free?

It's not mentioned. So you could ask Apple to migrate a data center if you wish.

Re:Migrate from what?

[hawk]

That sounds fine and dandy, until you look at how much it costs to spec out a Mac with that much storage!

hawk

Apple Service

[jennyrathor]

Apple Service Is Good! There is more worth loving than we have strength to love, Here Data Migration is Up! Simply Apple Is Good Product

Just pull the drive from the old box.

[Cmdln Daco]

When I want to 'migrate' my data from an old system, I just take the drive out of it and put it into an external hard drive case that has a USB interface. Then you can delete the unwanted executables and libraries, etc, and your data files are there in the folders where they were. You get a portable drive for your effort, and an external enclosure is about a $15 purchase.

You say your hard drive is glued or soldered into the old machine? What kind of shit company did you buy your system from??

it's an apple no drive to pull or upgrade

[Joe_Dragon]

it's an apple no drive to pull or upgrade

Hmm, interesting way to gather data

[AxisOfPleasure]

Now, I'm sure Apple won't actually look at user's data ( ahem ) but there's no harm in gathering some, well a absolute ton, of interesting stats about file types, amount of data, number of websites visited, number emails, apps used, the sort of metadata it's not always easy to get people to agree to let them look at with telemetry services.

Louis Rossmann

[Pezbian]

I'm sure Louis already understands it's an empty gesture. I'm becoming similarly jaded.

Suspicious

[ilsaloving]

Apple tends to not do stuff without a specific reason. It may not be a good reason (Stop trying to make laptops thinner FFS!), but they have a reason.

If it involves introducing a free service, that really makes me wonder what's going on behind the scenes. Apple doesn't do things for free, simply because they don't have to. Their last quarter saw a 2% drop in mac sales. They've since released some yawn-worthy refreshes of their hardware, so I'm wondering if we can expect to see another drop in quarterly mac sales.

I know I won't touch any of their new MBPs, and will never consider them again, until they pull their collective heads out and accept their current generation of keyboards are mechanical and ergonomic disasters.

My Sympathies to the Mac Techs

[EndlessNameless]

It is already difficult enough to migrate data fully. From my experience back-in-the-day, a customer usually couldn't tell you exactly what he wanted or where anything was saved.

And now they will have the fad-chasing, premium-paying customer base feeling entitled to it. May God have mercy on their souls.