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USB Lion

ghsDUDE

ghsDUDE

macrumors 68030
Original poster
May 25, 2010
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So I put in my 8GB USB Drive (Thumbstick) and it erased everything on it and changed the name to "Recovery Disk." It put Recovery Disk Assistant on it.

If I ever need to re-install Lion on my iMac or Air I just put in the USB and upload it to the system from there?

It only takes up 1.7MB...this seems kinda small to have Lion on it?

PS - Can I change the name of "Recovery Disk?" If I want to add other stuff to my USB again can I also do that too? Or should I just leave Lion on it?

Edit - Can someone please explain an EASY way to add Lion to a USB AND still allow me to add files to my USB?
 
Last edited:
M

mrapplegate

macrumors 68030
Feb 26, 2011
2,818
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Cincinnati, OH
johndoejohndoes said:
So I put in my 8GB USB Drive (Thumbstick) and it erased everything on it and changed the name to "Recovery Disk." It put Recovery Disk Assistant on it.

If I ever need to re-install Lion on my iMac or Air I just put in the USB and upload it to the system from there?

It only takes up 1.7MB...this seems kinda small to have Lion on it?

PS - Can I change the name of "Recovery Disk?" If I want to add other stuff to my USB again can I also do that too? Or should I just leave Lion on it?
Click to expand...

The Disk assistant is not a lion install. It is just access to what the recovery partition can do.
You can make a separate partition as well. Directions are here.

The Lion Recovery Disk Assistant lets you create Lion Recovery on an external drive that has all of the same capabilities as the built-in Lion Recovery: reinstall Lion, repair the disk using Disk Utility, restore from a Time Machine backup, or browse the web with Safari. This drive can be used in the event you cannot start your computer with the built-in Recovery HD, or you have replaced the hard drive with a new one that does not have Mac OS X installed.
Click to expand...
 
ghsDUDE

ghsDUDE

macrumors 68030
Original poster
May 25, 2010
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mrapplegate said:
The Disk assistant is not a lion install. It is just access to what the recovery partition can do.
You can make a separate partition as well. Directions are here.
Click to expand...

Ok...I'm going to Partition 1GB on my USB for this. I'll only use it on my iMac since the new Air comes with this recovery...correct?

And how do I delete everything on my USB to re-do all of this? My USB won't work on my PC or anything else since I did this?
 
M

mrapplegate

macrumors 68030
Feb 26, 2011
2,818
8
Cincinnati, OH
johndoejohndoes said:
Ok...I'm going to Partition 1GB on my USB for this. I'll only use it on my iMac since the new Air comes with this recovery...correct?

And how do I delete everything on my USB to re-do all of this? My USB won't work on my PC or anything else since I did this?
Click to expand...

Every Lion install comes with the recovery partition.
You can use Disk Utility to erase the USB drive and make a 1GB partition. The Lion partition disk assistant creates can only be used on Macs. The two notes below explain how you can use the USB drive.

If the computer shipped with Lion, the external recovery drive can only be used with the system that created it.
If the system was upgraded from Mac OS X v10.6 Snow Leopard to Lion, the external recovery drive can be used with other systems that were upgraded from Snow Leopard to Lion.
Click to expand...
 
ghsDUDE

ghsDUDE

macrumors 68030
Original poster
May 25, 2010
2,921
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mrapplegate said:
Every Lion install comes with the recovery partition.
You can use Disk Utility to erase the USB drive and make a 1GB partition. The Lion partition disk assistant creates can only be used on Macs. The two notes below explain how you can use the USB drive.
Click to expand...

So do I really even need this?
 
ghsDUDE

ghsDUDE

macrumors 68030
Original poster
May 25, 2010
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mrapplegate said:
I don't know if you need it. If you want a bootable Lion disk, with recovery tools ,then this is for you. It can't hurt to have around for troubleshooting. I'll make one myself.
Click to expand...

Can I put this on a blank disc?
Because when I go to Partition the USB Drive it wants me to make it GUID...and that won't work on Windows.

Basically I want my USB Drive to work like it used to...and make a copy of this on a CD or Thumb Drive...whatever is easier.

Right now I went to disc Utility and erased what was on this 8GB USB Drive and
wrote all zeros" on it to do so.

I feel so lost :(

I tried doing this...

But I can't locate any of this stuff.
 
M

mrapplegate

macrumors 68030
Feb 26, 2011
2,818
8
Cincinnati, OH
johndoejohndoes said:
Can I put this on a blank disc?
Because when I go to Partition the USB Drive it wants me to make it GUID...and that won't work on Windows.

Basically I want my USB Drive to work like it used to...and make a copy of this on a CD or Thumb Drive...whatever is easier.

Right now I went to disc Utility and erased what was on this 8GB USB Drive and
wrote all zeros" on it to do so.

I feel so lost :(

I tried doing this...

But I can't locate any of this stuff.
Click to expand...

The method you linked to was an unsupported way to make a bootable disk before Apple released todays application. Follow the directions and you should be good to go.
That is correct the USB drive won't work on windows, but it is possible to use a USB drive with more than one partition on a Mac. This is a recovery aid and is not meant to co-exist on a PC.
 
jamezr

jamezr

macrumors P6
Aug 7, 2011
15,833
18,376
US
johndoejohndoes said:
Can I put this on a blank disc?
Because when I go to Partition the USB Drive it wants me to make it GUID...and that won't work on Windows.

Basically I want my USB Drive to work like it used to...and make a copy of this on a CD or Thumb Drive...whatever is easier.

Right now I went to disc Utility and erased what was on this 8GB USB Drive and
wrote all zeros" on it to do so.

I feel so lost :(

I tried doing this...

But I can't locate any of this stuff.
Click to expand...
Try this method and you can create the USB boot or DVD
http://blog.gete.net/lion-diskmaker-us/
 
ghsDUDE

ghsDUDE

macrumors 68030
Original poster
May 25, 2010
2,921
740
Ok I used what you guys gave me and that's awesome. It's legal stuff to, right?

AND - Ever since I re-did my USB it used to be the :)F) drive on my PC and now it's a :)G) drive...is this okay?
 
G

GadgetGeek407

macrumors 6502a
Mar 26, 2009
994
61
florida
Interesting link. I too only kept the DMG file as the link said but even than off my usb it does everything, has disk utility and all, so what advantage do I have using the other way where I have to do the whole lion install the way that link explained?

Also what is the point of having the recovery disk assistant if i have the dmg on a thumb drive?
 
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