Reformat HDD on early 2011 MBP w Mountain Lion

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I feel my hard drive needs a fresh start. When I purchased my MBP in Spring 2011, I simply restored from my 2008 white macbook. Ever since then, my MBP has felt sluggish, and I'm pretty sure this is the reason why. So, I want to do a fresh install of Mountain Lion.

I'm thinking I do not want to restore the entire system as this will defeat the purpose of reformatting the hard drive. My plan is to 1. create a backup folder on my desktop and put all the folders/files I want to have on my MBP after reformat there. Then, after I have that folder setup, let time capsule do its thing. Then, I'll reformat the drive, install Mountain Lion afresh and then go into time machine and restore that backup folder individually.

Is this the way you would do it? If not, please advise. When I was a Windows user, I reformatted every six months. I've never done it on a mac, so want to make sure i'm making the best out of the technology I have...

Thanks! :)
 

chscag

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Re-formatting is almost never necessary on a Mac. There is no registry, no buildup of junk files, or unnecessary scattering of programs and program files.

But, if you wish to re-format anyway I would:

First backup everything via Time Machine to an external drive not a desktop folder. Boot to the recovery partition, erase the drive, reformat, re-install Mountain Lion, and then restore your Time Machine backup.

Instead of doing the above, I suggest downloading OnyX which is a recommended safe maintenance and cleanup tool for OS X and use it in auto mode. See if that speeds things up before taking the format step. (OnyX is free.)
 
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I don't think you fully read my post. I am using time capsule which IS an external hard drive. I am aware of how to backup ... i was just asking to make sure there wasn't an easier way to do it than I was thinking. I didn't get any responses so I just did it...format and install went extremely well as did restoring the files i wanted on the MBP...the results were exactly as I expected. Very smooth and fast now -- for first time ever. I think when i just went from old MB to new MBP, something was corrupt. So, anyhow, this worked extremely well. thanks anyway.
Tommy


Re-formatting is almost never necessary on a Mac. There is no registry, no buildup of junk files, or unnecessary scattering of programs and program files.

But, if you wish to re-format anyway I would:

First backup everything via Time Machine to an external drive not a desktop folder. Boot to the recovery partition, erase the drive, reformat, re-install Mountain Lion, and then restore your Time Machine backup.

Instead of doing the above, I suggest downloading OnyX which is a recommended safe maintenance and cleanup tool for OS X and use it in auto mode. See if that speeds things up before taking the format step. (OnyX is free.)
 

chscag

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I did fully read your question and knew you had a TC.

My plan is to 1. create a backup folder on my desktop and put all the folders/files I want to have on my MBP after reformat there.

This is what I was referring to. But anyway, glad you got things going - seems like you wasted a question if you were going to follow your own advice anyway.
 

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