Transferring data from Macbook Air 2013 to Macbook Pro 2020 M1

To make a direct Thunderbolt connection, you would need a $50 Apple Thunderbolt 3-to-2 adapter and a $30+ Thunderbolt 1/2 cable.

Instead of spending that money on specialized hardware that you would only use once, I would suggest that you backup the 2013 MacBook Air onto a USB drive – like a portable hard drive or portable SSD. You can

• Use Time Machine
• Make a bootable clone backup with Carbon Copy Cloner
• Make a bootable clone backup with SuperDuper!

whichever is most convenient for you. (If you have been making backups, you may already have a backup drive which just needs one final incremental backup to be brought up to date.)

Then transfer the backup drive to the 2020 MacBook Pro. You'll need to adapt for USB-C vs. USB-A, but that is easy enough, e.g., with the aid of an Apple USB-C to USB adapter, or a replacement cable for your backup drive that has a USB-C plug on the computer end, or whatever.

If you are resetting the 2020 MacBook Pro from scratch and are using Migration Assistant to import data from an old computer, you then just tell Migration Assistant to get the data from the Time Machine backup or the bootable clone backup (startup disk) rather than over a cable or over Wi-Fi.

Pregunta1 wrote:

So do I just do a backup on my seagate and ask the Macbook Pro to backup from it?

You just do a backup on an external drive, transfer the external drive to the new Mac, and tell Migration Assistant to migrate from it. Migration Assistant expects to see a Time Machine backup or a startup disk, but it won't copy the old version of macOS from the old machine to the new one. It will pick out and transfer your data.

After you are satisfied that the migration has succeeded, then you could think about reformatting the drive, and using it to back up the newer Mac.

And I don't need any Thunderbolts?

Not for this. Migration Assistant just needs some way to get the data. That can be over Wi-Fi (not very reliable), over a cable, from a Time Machine backup, or from a bootable clone backup ("startup disk"). You don't need to provide it with ALL of these sources – just with one of them.

Transfer to a new Mac with Migration Assistant - Apple Support

If you are using Migration Assistant on the new Mac, you'll be asked to select a source for the migration. Connect the external drive and select it as the source.

Transfer to a new Mac with Migration Assistant - Apple Support

You'll need the proper cable/adapter to connect the external drive to the new Mac. That Mac has Thunderbolt 3 / USB 4 ports, the connector you need is USB-C, so you may need a USB-A-to-C adapter if your drive has USB-C. Personally, I have a bunch of little dongles from nonda (Amazon link) that I use to connect old peripherals when needed.

Second the recommendation to set up the M1 Mac using a backup of the old Mac, assuming you're starting the M1 from scratch and not just looking to move data. If you want to move small amounts of data, even AirDrop can handle that.

If you're going the external drive route, get one that's ≥2x the size of the internal storage of the M1 Mac, then once the transfer is completed you can reformat that drive and use it as a Time Machine backup for that Mac going forward. There are only two types of drives – those that have failed and those that will fail. Always have a backup, preferably more than one (the 3-2-1 strategy is recommended, three copies of your data, two of which are backups and one of which is kept offsite).