Changing from old to new Mac Studio and Lightroom Classic + plug ins

[ymc226]

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I'm going from a M1 Mac Studio to a M3 Ultra Mac Studio in hopes of improving speed as working with files from 100MP cameras.  My LR catalog and photos are all on an external hard drive.  I also use DxO Viewpoint and the NIK collection plug-ins.  There are also some older version DxO and RNI film emulators that I hardly use.  Will Mac Migration assistant work to get everything over to the new Mac without additional work?  I have 2 monitors so can have both computers hooked up and working simultaneously and connected to the internet.  Should I have both Macs hooked up to the same external drive as well?

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[PhotoCruiser]

I strongly suggest you to not use the migration feature for setting up a new computer of any OS.
I did that twice and ended up with 1TB SSD 3/4 full with OS garbage and had to reset all again and install it from scratch.

What is suggest and consider the clean way is:

FIRST: Copy all your personal data to one or better two external storage devices for safety reasons and you need them later and check if you have your software serial numbers or similar to activate them nearby.

1. set up your new mac so that you can use it as you like; language, internet, etc, etc
2. think about what software you barely use and may not install in this moment, you can do that later if you need it
3. Download all software from Apple Store or manufacturer website and install it (you may need the serial numbers for that)
4. Once the software you are using is up and running then copy the data back from the external storage you saved it before

This is a clean install for your virgin computer where you don't want a heap of old, unused software relics from incomplete uninstalls, undeleted cache files, etc, etc

If you have tons of Apps like me and are in a hurry then firs install and activate only the software you use on a daily base and the software you use less then when you need it, that makes initial installation faster,

BTW, if i experience slow behaviour or a big increase in memory usage i do exactly the above, complete reset and a clean install and that works wonders and show that the "old" computer is actually not so slow and low on memory than expected.

Chris

Edited April 7 by PhotoCruiser