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Apple Computing Products:
macOS - Desktop Hardware
Can I make a second mac into a true clone of my present one?
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<blockquote data-quote="MacInWin" data-source="post: 1947348" data-attributes="member: 396914"><p>I believe the "identity" is embedded in firmware in the form of a digital id. And cloning does not copy that code, nor does running a virtual machine. So, if the activation is tied to that unique identifier, then there is no real way to do what you ask. </p><p></p><p>Now, if the vendor doesn't read the actual machine ID, but depends on some file that it puts in place, cloning and/or a virtual machine might work. </p><p></p><p>I've had it work both ways (blocked and allowed), depending on the developer.</p><p></p><p>As advice, it's time to start thinking and preparing for when those old machines die. You can only stretch them so far before they do fail and when they do, you may get zero notice. If these things are really important to you, then you need to have a contingency plan for how to recover from a total failure. What you don't want to discover is that there is NO bridge between those old programs and files and anything you can find today. I tried to help a shop owner who was in that exact circumstance a few years ago. She had an inventory progrm that ran under Windows 95 (!) that she had never updated or upgraded. Then her PC died and she ended up with no way to migrate the old files into the newer version (six generations) of the same inventory program. Even the developer said that he had gotten rid of the "old" conversion software that she would have used to migrate from one generation to the next. He never expected anybody to be using version 1.0 at the time I contacted him. Her only option was to install the new version of the inventory and re-inventory her entire shop, or find an old PC that still had Win95 on it (She had long ago lost the install disks, so we had no way to reinstall anything at all.) She limped along on paper for a few months and then went out of business totally. Sad to see. </p><p></p><p>Don't get caught, make a plan and start the migration now, before it all dies.</p></blockquote><p></p>
[QUOTE="MacInWin, post: 1947348, member: 396914"] I believe the "identity" is embedded in firmware in the form of a digital id. And cloning does not copy that code, nor does running a virtual machine. So, if the activation is tied to that unique identifier, then there is no real way to do what you ask. Now, if the vendor doesn't read the actual machine ID, but depends on some file that it puts in place, cloning and/or a virtual machine might work. I've had it work both ways (blocked and allowed), depending on the developer. As advice, it's time to start thinking and preparing for when those old machines die. You can only stretch them so far before they do fail and when they do, you may get zero notice. If these things are really important to you, then you need to have a contingency plan for how to recover from a total failure. What you don't want to discover is that there is NO bridge between those old programs and files and anything you can find today. I tried to help a shop owner who was in that exact circumstance a few years ago. She had an inventory progrm that ran under Windows 95 (!) that she had never updated or upgraded. Then her PC died and she ended up with no way to migrate the old files into the newer version (six generations) of the same inventory program. Even the developer said that he had gotten rid of the "old" conversion software that she would have used to migrate from one generation to the next. He never expected anybody to be using version 1.0 at the time I contacted him. Her only option was to install the new version of the inventory and re-inventory her entire shop, or find an old PC that still had Win95 on it (She had long ago lost the install disks, so we had no way to reinstall anything at all.) She limped along on paper for a few months and then went out of business totally. Sad to see. Don't get caught, make a plan and start the migration now, before it all dies. [/QUOTE]
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Apple Computing Products:
macOS - Desktop Hardware
Can I make a second mac into a true clone of my present one?
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