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First Post - Equipment Migration Process Question

  • March 23, 2017
  • 6 replies
  • 37 views
JoshRouthier
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Good Afternoon all (EDT here). First post on Jamf Nation, though I’ve been finding so much useful information here, thank you all!

We are strongly considering Jamf Pro to replace our Profile Manager system (I know, I know), but I was more curious about a procedural aspect that could/would be affected by Jamf or any MDM solution really. What do other organizations do when swapping out old equipment for new equipment?

  • Do you just hand the users a new computer, have it configured with Jamf/Casper, and then let the user deal with migrating their local data?
  • Do you handhold the whole process and just have them drop off their old equipment, move everything over, and then hand them back the new equipment with everything looking exactly the same to the user?
  • Is migrating to new equipment and its ramifications just something your users just have to deal with?

For some context, we’re a smaller boarding school, and we go the whole handholding route. I’m curious if this is common amongst other institutions or we are in the uncommon.

Thank you for your time, and the great information you all provide.

    6 replies

    S
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    • Sandy
    • Esteemed Contributor
    • March 24, 2017

    Hi Josh and Welcome!
    We prepped our new teacher computers: asset tagged, then used a no wipe pre-stage to name (includes Asset Tag #) and policies to add apps, enroll in JSS, bind to AD. We then used Migration Assistant one member at a time to migrate their Mobile account from their old Air to their new Air, using Thunderbolt. This worked extremely well on 99% of our migrations. Problems we saw were probably problems that were migrated over from the old computer.

    This was before Sierra though, and we have seen some problems now with Migration Assistant and Sierra (permissions on the Home directory on the new computer). Our project is completed and so now we'll have time to look into this. Others I know use RSYNC or other methods to copy things over, or just have users responsible back up to iCloud, Google Drive, Time Machine, SAN etc.

    We so far are not using DEP on computers, but we have 4500 iPads in DEP.

    V
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    • Volker
    • New Contributor
    • March 24, 2017

    Hi, Josh. We lease our client boxes, so we do hundreds and hundreds of swaps annually.

    We image machines monolithically with Deploy Studio (but are moving away from that method) and Jamf handles what imaging doesn't.

    Class/Lab machines' data is "disposable," i.e. we don't retain it when the equipment's decommissioned.

    For staff or similar 1/1 machines, we move the users' homes onto the new, imaged hardware. Only very very rarely are there problems with that. Total time to switch out a machine is the time it takes to transfer the home directory, and the end user rarely notices any changes.

    FWIW, users migrating their own data usually doesn't go all that well and is worth the couple of minutes' worth of technical staff's time to handle properly.

    JoshRouthier
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    • JoshRouthier
    • Author
    • Valued Contributor
    • March 28, 2017

    Thank you for your responses!

    JoshRouthier
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    • JoshRouthier
    • Author
    • Valued Contributor
    • March 28, 2017

    ~Safari being stupid~

    JoshRouthier
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    • JoshRouthier
    • Author
    • Valued Contributor
    • March 28, 2017

    ~Safari being stupid again...~

    J
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    • jared_f
    • Valued Contributor
    • March 28, 2017

    Hi!

    When I deploy laptops and have to transfer over data, I use CrashPlan (it cost nothing) and backup to either our backup server or an external hard drive and have the user go through setup and create a local admin account. CrashPlan only brings over the users files and no software (which can be re downloaded with something like Self Service). We also configure them to out MDM Server.

    I find that not imaging or binding to AD has helped us and resulted in less failures. I let my users choose what they want on their machines using the Self Service model (except for very necessary things). I also use very little restrictions, but this is obviously at your discretion and what you think is best for your users.

    Jared

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