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'Internet Recovery' Lets New Macs Install OS X from Blank Hard Drive

What about Bootcamp?

mmm Looking at what ships with the new AIR I see no mention of the USB recovery drive. Which begs the question for the new AIR as well as this new fangled Internet recovery. Where the heck are the bootcamp drivers? If I'm correct you have never been able to download the whole bootcamp driver stack only the updates and the stack is only available on the OS CD.

Or am I incorrect on this?
 
Ok, if you can install OSX Lion to a new blank hard drive, then where does the Recovery HD boot from?

I know the installer creates a hidden partition about 600MB to your drive which contains a dmg image that EFI boots from. Could it be that the new MBA's and Mac Minis might have this built in the firmware?

If not, then you still can't install Lion disk free on a brand new hard drive without having the Recovery partition built in first.
 
Kilamite said:
So instead of taking 30 mins to do a fresh install, it'll take 30 mins + up to 3 hours depending on your internet connection!

Apple should just have a utility to create your own USB key. I know it can be done quite easily, but Apple should have an official way.
Click to expand...

Actually with my antiquated and unreliable home Verizon DSL connection (~150K/sec if I'm lucky), it will take me 7.5+ hours :eek:

For sure, I will be making a DVD or USB stick.
 
theheadguy said:
This is very cool. The only potential issue I see is if someone is behind one or more firewalls and needs to configure proxy settings. What then?
Click to expand...

If that's the case then you probably have an IT department that doesn't want you doing your own installs. ;)
 
wordoflife said:
It seemed like Apple first forgot about this entirely, but I'm glad they figured something [elegant] out.
Click to expand...

They didn't forget. It was just one of their many secrets. Now all the whiners on the forum who lamented the loss of physical media look silly.
 
Now THAT my friend, is freaking awesome!

Now begs the question .... why the heck didn't apple announce these two things months ago???? USB Stick w/ Lion & Internet Boot Recovery ....

Are these things that evolved quickly due to people's complaints or were these things part of the entire plan? I'm sure these things didn't spring to life overnight ... maybe?

I wonder if/how it handles proxy servers and authentication ... You'd think that would be something that would be considered in all this, but the quicktime installer download software always struggled with installations behind a firewall / proxyserver.
 
saxon48 said:
Nice feature. But it'd be cool if some of the older models were included in this...
Click to expand...

This requires embedded firmware code. It would be quite involved to revisit all the old hardware and recode it to support this. Legacy hardware is in "maintain" state.. so if there is a bug or something they would update the firmware but no new development will happen on hardware that is in "maintain". It would distract from moving forward to always retrofit everything.
 
PlipPlop said:
They should make an easy eay to create tour own backup dvds. Like on a lot of PCs you just run a program and insert a dvd.
Click to expand...

Umm, not sure if you got the memo or not but CDs and DVDs are almost close to being obsolete in the modern world. I expect Apple computers to loose CD Drives in the next 6 years or so. Cloud is the future. or iCloud.
 
"a failed...drive"?? It includes hardware, then? Or is it soldering ability?

That seems like a slight overstatement.
 
ryanw said:
Now THAT my friend, is freaking awesome!

Now begs the question .... why the heck didn't apple announce these two things months ago???? USB Stick w/ Lion & Internet Boot Recovery ....

Are these things that evolved quickly due to people's complaints or were these things part of the entire plan? I'm sure these things didn't spring to life overnight ... maybe?

I wonder if/how it handles proxy servers and authentication ... You'd think that would be something that would be considered in all this, but the quicktime installer download software always struggled with installations behind a firewall / proxyserver.
Click to expand...

They were waiting for the patents to go through.
 
Why does everyone insist on blaming Apple for their slow Internet connections. I live in the middle of nowhere and it took 35 minutes to download Lion this morning. It was nowhere near the longest part of the upgrade process.

It is in no way unreasonable for Apple to expect their demographic to have access to a decent broadband connection in 2011.
 
this is a good feature

Internet Recovery makes me feel a bit better about the download only option for Lion.

Even though I am not in the market for a new Mac for the foreseeable future, if I still need a Mac down the road, Internet Recovery is, in theory, a very good feature.
 
Kilamite said:
Apple should just have a utility to create your own USB key. I know it can be done quite easily, but Apple should have an official way.
Click to expand...

Fwiw, apparently Apple will also be selling Lion on USB keys for $69. I know that's not the same as making your own (which you can also do if you know how), but at least the option is there.
 
Sure wish this was an option on my 45 day old MBP. Not that big of a deal, but still would be nice as I won't be replacing this notebook for another 3 years.
 
ipedro said:
Indeed it is funny. I've heard these kind of "Apple would never do that" arguments before so I just keep quiet until my prediction comes true. The one who laughs last laughs best ;)
Click to expand...

I said something very similar in a thread in June and was shot down within seconds. It seemed a reasonable progression that apple would have a firmware program that could call home and re-download the OS.
 
jeznav said:
Ok, if you can install OSX Lion to a new blank hard drive, then where does the Recovery HD boot from?

I know the installer creates a hidden partition about 600MB to your drive which contains a dmg image that EFI boots from. Could it be that the new MBA's and Mac Minis might have this built in the firmware?

If not, then you still can't install Lion disk free on a brand new hard drive without having the Recovery partition built in first.
Click to expand...

the BIOS/EFI will have a program to connect to apple's servers and download the file to the hard drive. it's not that big a deal
 
Wow. That is really innovative. Just doesn't work if you don't have a solid internet connection. But I'm glad Apple has come up with at least workable solutions for this whole no DVD thing.
 
Your projected estimated wait time for Lion installation is 11 hours. Enjoy your fishing. Oh wait then the iCloud kicks in and it will take you another couple of hours to actually sync everything down.

What ISP cap, don't worry about it. so its going to cost you another $20-$30 in overage fees. Its ok don't worry about it.

Good idea but I'll still use CCC on regular basis
 
i guess if apple did the PC thing with a recovery partition it would have confused all their customers as to why their 500GB hard drive only has 400GB free space
 
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