USB VS Internet Install

[trackbikes]

I was planning to do a clean install of High Sierra on my imac over the weekend, so started checking for instructions. Every guide I read says get a usb and format it...

I was under the impression that for the past few years we could do an internet based install.

Am I wrong or are sites just regurgitating old information as they are too lazy to update the guides

 

[h9826790]

I really don't know why people love the make simple things complicated. ALL my OS upgrade are "OTA" (since OSX available from Appstore). It work perfectly.

On the other hand, I also see quite a few guys spend days on just try to create / boot from the USB drive. And format the hard drive, installation stuck. Or unable to recover user data etc.

In general, it's better not to "fix" something that is working fine. If the Mac is working, why format it?

 

[Fishrrman]

I've come to prefer making a USB flashdrive and using that.
See this post I put up a few minutes ago:
https://forums.macrumors.com/thread...store-or-clean-install.2065979/#post-25123730

 

[EugW]

Not a direct comparison but I upgraded two machines at the same time from High Sierra GM to High Sierra, by installing the OS over the existing OS, keeping the data.

Machine 1 was a brand new 2017 Core m3 MacBook with APFS, PCIe SSD, 16 GB RAM. Install was done from the High Sierra installer application that was on the boot drive. Install kept APFS.

Machine 2 was an ancient and unsupported 2009 Core 2 Duo 2.26 GHz Core 2 Duo with HFS+, SATA II SSD, 8 GB RAM. Install was done over USB 2 with a USB drive using the patched HS installer. Install kept HFS+.

The install process was much faster on machine 2, despite the fact it had way, way lower specs.