iOS 6 upgrade from 4.2.10...HELP!

[solomonster]

Here is my quandry. I have a 32GB Verizon iPhone 4 still running iOS 4.2.10 because I was too afraid to upgrade to iOS 5 for fear of losing my media. As such, I have not been able to set up iCloud because it requires you to have iOS 5 and above for that. I will likely be getting an iPhone 5, but am worried that without first backing my contacts/media/apps up in the cloud, I may be in for a rude awakening with the new phone.

My question is this: what is the best way for me to upgrade to iOS 6 (I know nothing of the different methods...clean install, etc.) without losing everything? Again, I can't back up to the cloud, but before the cloud, I'm sure people didn't just lose all of their media when they upgraded. Everytime I plug my phone in to iTunes to sync on my laptop, it does a backup, so is that sufficient? Am I screwed? Any help is appreciated.

Thanks!

 

[Thomasjtsi]

The backup is exactly what you need. Connect to iTunes & allow it to create a backup, then hit Restore. The update w/ take you to iOS 6... once the update is complete iTunes will prompt you on which you'd like to restore to... as a "New Device" or "From a Backup." Choose your most recent backup and voila.