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Apple to Sell Lion on USB Thumb Drive Starting in August for $69

Ivan P said:
I think it's great they're going to offer a physical option - the part I cannot understand is how it apparently asks for a $40 markup? Sure I understand production and distribution costs, but they managed to ship Snow Leopard on a disc for only $29 a couple years ago, I wouldn't imagine a ~4GB thumb drive to cause that much of a price increase.
Click to expand...

Why is it $40 more? Because Apple doesn't want you to buy it on a thumb drive. They want everyone to look at the Mac Apple Store, so they see all the apps there and start buying them, which puts money into developers' pockets, so they write more software, which makes people buy more Macs.


dannnyh said:
I've not read anywhere that buying the USB Stick will enable you leap straight from Leopard to Lion. Hope there's more info to come on this because so far everything i've read suggests Snow Leopard is required to be able to install Lion and not just because of the App Store.
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The license allows to install Lion on any Macintosh that you control or own, and that has Snow Leopard installed.


whooleytoo said:
Forgive my ignorance on this but -

I have 10.6.6 installed, let's say I buy & download Lion. At some point my hard drive fails, and I need to re-install. Does it require 10.6 to be installed for me to reinstall Lion, or is it a case of I should have 10.6 installed, but it's not enforced?

If it's the former, I'd rather not have to keep a backup of Lion around, AND my Snow Leopard DVD.
Click to expand...

1. You should really, really, really have an external hard drive for Time Machine backups.
2. On that external hard drive, create a 15 GB partition. Download Lion. Copy the installer onto the partition (that's important because the installer deletes itself after installing, and you don't want to download it again). Then you install Lion on the 15 GB partition. Check that you can boot from it (hold the option key will rebooting).
3. Copy the installer back from the 15 GB partition, then install it on your computer.
 
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For $70 .. they should give you a copy of Lion stored in 16GB SSD, ready to be plugged into MacBook Air .. :D
 
justinfreid said:
Ok. You trust arn more than Steve Jobs, I think I get it: your Apple ID registration needn't be anymore accurate than the one for MacRumors.
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My MacRumors account is not pimped in keynotes to show how "good!" the service is, plus it is in active use. The MAS account would sit idle and dead but would still be pimped as if I was an active user. It is not a question of trust. I'm registered on Apple's developer portal and I have an App Store account for my iOS stuff, not to mention stuff I've bought online with Apple.

I have no intention of using the MAS, I shouldn't be counted as one of its users. Apple is just desperate for registered accounts because frankly, the MAS isn't doing as good as they hoped it would. If it had been, they would have pimped the heck out of it at WWDC.

Hence why I don't want to register on it. I can't believe this is so hard for some people and they need to lambast me over it. Do I force you to do stuff you don't want to ? No ? Then shush. I'm happy Apple is giving me the option to not use their turd of an online store. Now if only it were the same for Xcode... (please be on the USB thumb drive!)


iSayuSay said:
For $70 .. they should give you a copy of Lion stored in 16GB SSD, ready to be plugged into MacBook Air .. :D
Click to expand...

Hum... no. Having to unscrew a bunch of pentalob screws for which I don't have a driver just to insert a SSD with 10% of the capacity of mine to ... wait... how do you then install Lion to your other SSD that you just removed ?

Think people, think.
 
i just want to know what this usb is made of gold ?
and thats the american price think about englsih they always rip us off compared to americans fior instance we paid
£20.99 or $34.07 for lion.
while american paid £18.46 or $29.99

:mad:
 
akitajewski said:
compared to americans fior instance we paid
£20.99 or $34.07 for lion.
while american paid £18.46 or $29.99

:mad:
Click to expand...

You're mad because your country charges VAT ? You do realise that $29.99 doesn't include tax ?

No really, how many times does this have to be repeated on MacRumors before you brits get it : Your price includes VAT, US price doesn't.
 
Well looks like another month before i get to upgrade then.

I wanted a shiney apple install USB stick when i saw the air ones, now i get to own one of my very own lol

Im not bandwitdh limited, i just refuse to buy an OS that isnt on physical media.

Its a purely stubbornly habit driven reason for doing so, i dont trust download only solutions, and i dont trust home burned CDs/DVDs to still work 2 years down the line after being shoved in the bottom of a draw or cupboard and forgotten about.
 
KnightWRX said:
My MacRumors account is not pimped in keynotes to show how "good!" the service is, plus it is in active use. The MAS account would sit idle and dead but would still be pimped as if I was an active user. It is not a question of trust. I'm registered on Apple's developer portal and I have an App Store account for my iOS stuff, not to mention stuff I've bought online with Apple.

I have no intention of using the MAS, I shouldn't be counted as one of its users. Apple is just desperate for registered accounts because frankly, the MAS isn't doing as good as they hoped it would. If it had been, they would have pimped the heck out of it at WWDC.

Hence why I don't want to register on it. I can't believe this is so hard for some people and they need to lambast me over it. Do I force you to do stuff you don't want to ? No ? Then shush. I'm happy Apple is giving me the option to not use their turd of an online store. Now if only it were the same for Xcode... (please be on the USB thumb drive!)
Click to expand...

Just to conclude this discussion, can you point out the differences in MAS registration numbers vs. iOS App Store ones? Thanks.
 
radiogoober said:
Of course this is welcome news. In the other threads, people have been crying for months about some weird hypothetical case where they can't download Lion and need a physical copy. Now, I'm sure they'll find something new to complain about, ie the price, or that it's not on a DVD, or something else.

I'm glad to read this!
Click to expand...

You do realize that all State and Federal institutions can not order stuff off of an 'App Store,' right? It's also the same for most academic instituions as well. Budgeting rules set in place prevent that from being possible.

So until Apple releases physical media, and allows their Government and Education sales teams to start issuing purchase quotes, they will not see a dime in Lion sales for state/federal agencies, and will also get hardly a dime from academic institutions.
 
Why it's pricey

It's pricey for the same reason the floor mats for a Mazarati are pricey: it's a low volume item.

For those grumbling that a ~4 GB flash drive is cheaper than that: This likely is not a flash drive. It's a ROM drive. While it's possible that Apple buys them as flash drives, copies the image in and then "fuses" them to make them read-only, it would be far easier to manage and make for a much more reliable product for Apple to simply send the image off to a fab to make a mask ROM out of it.

Apple's not the first to do this, of course. Linux and the BSDs have had thumb drive image installation media for a while now, but Apple's represents the first consumer-grade OS to come this way. One advantage of this mechanism is that there's no reason that the ROM need be the only USB device inside of the dongle. They could just as easily add an HSM chip with licensing keys in lieu of printing license keys on paper. Look for Microsoft to do that RSN. Soon I imagine all expensive commercial software will come that way. The dongle will have the software on it as well as a license device. Nothing to install. Run it on whatever machine you like, but the dongle will insure you only get to run it on one machine at a time. Just like Nintendo cartridges.
 
Lion on all machines

Wondering if I buy a new Mac with Lion on it would I be able to upgrade other machines in my household that are hardware compatible, similar to if you buy Lion via the App Store you can upgrade all household machines. Just a curious thought.
 
not big enough to have separate USB key so server

No. Lion Server is only about a 15 MB download. Lion is about 3.5 GB download which is a different proposition for some. You can install Lion Server only after you have Lion client.
 
$40 markup = $5-8 for a 4GB thumb drive and the rest for the Apple designed shell with logo.
 
Does anyone know if the USB drive of OS X Lion have a clean install option available? Or is it the same product you get on the App Store? I would like to clean install Lion but am not so good at these types of endeavors. I've read the various "Clean install guides" on the web but when I get to "Step 5b" it gets a little confusing for me.
 
jeffreyk said:
Does anyone know if the USB drive of OS X Lion have a clean install option available? Or is it the same product you get on the App Store? I would like to clean install Lion but am not so good at these types of endeavors. I've read the various "Clean install guides" on the web but when I get to "Step 5b" it gets a little confusing for me.
Click to expand...

:shrug: I installed after restoring the InstallESD.dmg to an external firewire HDD. I booted from that HDD, then opened Disk Utility. I simply erased my internal HD & then installed Lion on it. Is that basically what you want?
 
Just wondering, are these USB sticks going to Resellers or is it Apple Store only?
Because our resellers are saying they're not getting anything in at all.

I would like lion, but with mac app store/itunes store not being available where I am, plus not having any apple stores, I can't and I don't really want to buy a return plane ticket to get a copy
 
Pretty cool product, but also quite expensive. Just like Apple; but at least you get what you pay for.
 
Does anyone know if the thumb drive is available at actual Apple store locations?
 
Bought my Lion usb stick today. I prefer to buy all my computer stuff at a certain local retailer called "tools at work". They are really nice and helpful, already know my name now and it's always a good experience buying something there while having a little tech chat. I chose the usb stick because I want to support small local shops like this in every possible way. Sure that one item will not make any difference, but I try to do all my shopping like this whenever possible and hope that others do so too or else there will only be some large corporations left sometime in the future.

I installed it on my mbp and everything went smooth as can be. Had to update some programs afterwards, but CS5 and Cinema 4D seems to work just fine. FontExplorerX also still works, so do all my fonts. I reverted the weird new scrolling back to normal and disabled resume, as I simply don't like these two. I like the new mail, mission control and the over all grey look, launchpad is rather useless to me but hey, no one's forcing me to use it. And that iTunes cover screensaver got one cool new feature! :)

I guess I'll wait with the update for 10.7.2 on my home Mac Pro though, who knows what little quirks might still show up. My work Mac Pro will come last in a couple of months after some really intense testing.
 
I ended up buying the Lion USB stick at an Apple store last week while in for another set of MBP problems.

It took a while for the Genius helping me to find it. Actually took a couple of them. Eventually, they gave it to me in the beige shipping envelope. Then they forgot about it and I had actually walked out the door when I realized that they'd forgot to charge me for it. When I went back in and said, "I don't think I paid for this" the Apple greeter was like, "What is that?"

I guess they're not selling a lot of USB sticks in store.
 
For $69, you better be able to do a clean install from it (without the SL disk).
 
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