Switching to the Mac: The Missing Manual, Mountain Lion Edition

The Setup Assistant

What you see depends on whether you installed Mountain Lion onto an older OS X drive or an empty drive.

After Installing Over Snow Leopard or Lion

If you installed onto a drive that already had OS X stuff on it—accounts, files, settings, and so on—then after the Mac restarts, all you have to do is log in as usual. Enjoy the box that warns you about Mountain Lion’s upside-down scrolling habit (Full-Screen Apps, Mission Control). Click Start Using Mountain Lion, and start using Mountain Lion.

Note

It’s possible, at this point, that Mountain Lion will display a message warning you that it found some incompatible software on your Mac during the installation. You’ll discover that this outdated software has been summarily tossed into a folder called Incompatible Software in your startup disk’s main window.

After Installing onto a Blank Drive

If you installed Mountain Lion onto an empty drive, then the Setup Assistant is a little more involved.

Once again, you’re in for a click-through-the-screens experience, this time with the aim of setting up your Mac’s various options. After answering the questions on each screen, click Continue.

The number and sequence of information screens you encounter may vary, but here are some of the possibilities:

• Welcome. Click the name of the country you’re in.

• Select Your Keyboard. Different countries require different keyboard layouts. For example, if you choose the Canadian layout, pressing the ] key on a U.S. keyboard produces the ç symbol. ...