Hey, you got a new phone! Not just any phone, but one that compels otherwise sane people to wait outside in line for hours, days — sometimes weeks.

Whatever you did to get that new iPhone, it will be all for nothing if you don’t set it up correctly. Below is a guide to prepping your iPhone 6 or 6 Plus, for both first-time owners and i-device veterans.

1. It’s aliiive.

After you’ve gone through whatever detailed unpacking ritual you’re into, you’ll need to turn on the phone. In previous models, that would require you to press a button on the top right, but both iPhone 6 phones now sport that button on their upper-right sides. Hold it until the screen lights up and you see the Apple symbol.

View photos iPhone 6 sleep/power button More

(Apple)

2. The basics.

You’ll be greeted by iOS’s dry but helpful Setup Assistant. It’ll ask you to choose a language, connect to a WiFi network, and sign in to iCloud. If you do not already have an iCloud account, you’ll have to create one. Sorry, but there’s no convenient way around this.

Speaking of iCloud, Apple is upgrading to a new storage system it calls iCloud Drive. It’s supposedly going to be much better, but it’s not ready yet. If given a choice, I’d refrain from upgrading for now.

View photos iCloud Drive screenshot More

Why isn’t it working yet? Apple has engineered iCloud Drive to be compatible with only the most updated software on all your devices. That means iOS 8 on your mobile devices and OS X Yosemite on your Mac.

But Apple is behind on releasing Yosemite, and it likely won’t be out until mid-October. So if you upgrade to iCloud Drive, you won’t be able to access your cloud files on your desktop.

Long story short, select Not Now.

3. Give it life.



Previous iPhone, iPad, or iPod owners

If you’ve owned an iPhone and backed it up with an existing iCloud account in the past, you can import all your settings, contacts, apps, photos, and other content. Just be sure to back that data up via iTunes or iCloud before you make the transfer.

To sync via the Lightning cable, make sure you’ve downloaded the latest version of iTunes, and then select Restore from iTunes Backup. It should start syncing after you connect your phone.

To sync wirelessly, make sure you connect to WiFi during setup and choose Restore from iCloud Backup.

New iPhone users

If you’ve never used an iPhone before, select Set Up as New iPhone. If you’ve somehow managed to never use iTunes either, I’m very impressed. You can download it here, and throw all the song and movie files you want on your phone into the application.

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