Formatting a Mac with no optical drive (how to re-install your OS?)

mlamb64150 · Jan 31, 2013

Hi all,

Apologies if this seems like a dumb question but I don't seem to be able to find an answer on existing topics.

I have a 2009 MBP and have recently formatted it after 3.5 years of use as it was becoming a little bogged down and slow.

I recently bought an iMac 2012 and got to thinking about if I was to ever format this (for any particular reason) how would I go about installing Mountain Lion on it again as the system did not come with a recovery/installation disc.

Any ideas?

maflynn · Jan 31, 2013

Just go into the recovery partition on reboot to reinstall (I think its cmd-r on booting up). Mountain Lion uses a recovery partition that is hidden which can be used to boot up. There's also the internet recovery option as well, though I'm not really familiar with that.

justperry · Jan 31, 2013

^^ This, and to boot up in recovery there are two ways, one is to hold Command-R and the other is by holding the Option key.

oldgeezer · Jan 31, 2013

You can make a disk image on a usb thumb drive and install from that.

debuggr · Jan 31, 2013

maflynn said:
Just go into the recovery partition on reboot to reinstall (I think its cmd-r on booting up). Mountain Lion uses a recovery partition that is hidden which can be used to boot up.

I happen to be doing this right now! "About 46 minutes remaining"

mlamb64150 · Jan 31, 2013

Simple enough! Thanks all

KrasHr · Jan 31, 2013

justperry said:
^^ This, and to boot up in recovery there are two ways, one is to hold Command-R and the other is by holding the Option key.

Just a clarification.

Command+R will give you the recovery tool from the hard drive.
Option+Command+R will give you the the recovery tool from the internet.

justperry · Jan 31, 2013

KrasHr said:
Just a clarification.

Command+R will give you the recovery tool from the hard drive.
Option+Command+R will give you the the recovery tool from the internet.

Where did I say that, I said hold Option on startup, this will bring you to the boot screen where you can choose.

I am not aware of a Option+Command+R key sequence, never heard of it and if you google it, it won't find anything.

seanm9 · Jan 31, 2013

http://support.apple.com/kb/HT4718

everything one needs to know about os x recovery

KrasHr · Jan 31, 2013

justperry said:
Where did I say that, I said hold Option on startup, this will bring you to the boot screen where you can choose.

I am not aware of a Option+Command+R key sequence, never heard of it and if you google it, it won't find anything.

Reading comprehension and edit fail on my part, sorry.

Option+Command+R loads the recovery tools from the internet. You get a globe and a progress bar. Took about 10 minutes to load on an 8Mbit connection the other day, when my hard drive partition table was all screwed up.

justperry · Jan 31, 2013

KrasHr said:
Reading comprehension and edit fail on my part, sorry.

Option+Command+R loads the recovery tools from the internet. You get a globe and a progress bar. Took about 10 minutes to load on an 8Mbit connection the other day, when my hard drive partition table was all screwed up.

I am not saying I don't believe you but there is nothing on Apple's site about that short-cut.

Startup key combinations for Intel-based Macs

OS X keyboard shortcuts

KrasHr · Feb 1, 2013

justperry said:
I am not saying I don't believe you but there is nothing on Apple's site about that short-cut.

Startup key combinations for Intel-based Macs

OS X keyboard shortcuts

Short story. I had partition table issues, applecare person told me to use the option+command+r shortcut until I saw a spinning globe to try to rectify the issue via the Internet Recovery Tools.

seanm9 · Feb 1, 2013

justperry said:
I am not saying I don't believe you but there is nothing on Apple's site about that short-cut.

Startup key combinations for Intel-based Macs

OS X keyboard shortcuts

I was thinking you were correct until i saw this in the Fusion Drive FAQ on apple's support site
http://support.apple.com/kb/HT5446

Near the end is this little tidbit

Additional Information
Troubleshooting

The version of Disk Utility that comes with Fusion Drive is unique. Earlier versions of Disk Utility can't be used with a Fusion Drive.
If your system will not start because you see a flashing question mark or another alert:
Press the Power button and hold it down to power off your system.
Press the Power button again. After you hear the startup chime, press and hold Command-Option-R to start up to the Internet version of Mountain Lion Recovery.
A globe should appear with a "Starting Internet Recovery" message. It is now OK to release Command-Option-R.
A progress bar should appear and Internet Recovery should start and ask you to select a language.
Once you select a language, click Disk Utility in the window that appears and then click Continue.
If your Fusion Drive can be repaired with Disk Utility, you'll see a Disk icon with red lettering. Click the disk icon.

emphasis added

can't believe they buried that info so deep and dont have it listed in the startup key combinations you linked to...

justperry · Feb 1, 2013

seanm9 said:
I was thinking you were correct until i saw this in the Fusion Drive FAQ on apple's support site
http://support.apple.com/kb/HT5446

Near the end is this little tidbit

emphasis added

can't believe they buried that info so deep and dont have it listed in the startup key combinations you linked to...

That's why I said I don't believe you(Him-KrasHr).
Strange they don't have this on the shortcut page, well at least I know it is true now.

KrasHr said:
Short story. I had partition table issues, applecare person told me to use the option+command+r shortcut until I saw a spinning globe to try to rectify the issue via the Internet Recovery Tools.

So you were right, as above, odd Apple buries this shortcut somewhere else.

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Formatting a Mac with no optical drive (how to re-install your OS?)

mlamb64150

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maflynn

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justperry

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oldgeezer

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debuggr

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mlamb64150

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KrasHr

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seanm9

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