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How to reformat and uninstall Lion OS X completely
- Thread starter okizen
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Create a bootable Lion Installer:
Then do a Clean Install (guide can be used for Mac OS X 10.7 Lion too):
Or if your Mac has a Lion recovery partition, boot from that and make a clean install:
Then do a Clean Install (guide can be used for Mac OS X 10.7 Lion too):
To create a Clean Install (formerly known as Erase & Install) of Mac OS X 10.6 Snow Leopard (the 29 USD Upgrade DVD is a fully working retail version of Mac OS X and does not need a prior installation of Mac OS X on the Mac), follow one of the following guides:
- Short version: Clean Install of OS X 10.6 Snow Leopard
- Long version: Mac OS X v10.6 Snow Leopard: How to Erase and Install
Or if your Mac has a Lion recovery partition, boot from that and make a clean install:
either create a copy of the Lion install on a USB thumb drive (search create Lion install USB Stick in google, loads of walk throughs there) or use the internet recovery process (see link)
http://support.apple.com/kb/HT4718
Both options will give you the ability to use disk utility to remove the original Lion partition and create a fresh install
TBG
if you purchased lion from the mac app store i would do this
make bootable copy of lion
of course if it came preinstalled it won't be on your purchased tab in mac app store so you won't be able to make a bootable copy
so the above advice will work, both processes required you to re-download lion but with the bootable copy you will have it already for the time after this you might have to re-install
I've been trying all methods. Sometimes after booting, a question mark flashes on the screen or a network connection request comes up and when I put the info required, it justs buzzes and asks me to input again. This is booting with and without the dvd. Other times the disk utility comes up and no matter what I do I seem to be stuck without getting to boot/reinstall Lion.
Thanx for your help guys. I took my machine to the Apple Authorised Dealer and apparently I only had a WEP key for internet security so I couldn't download the Lion Recovery. Anyway he reinstalled the OS. And as soon I got home I immediately made a Time Machine backup if ever this situation arose again.