Revert from Mavericks to Lion (snow leopard original OS)

[prp134]

Hello guys,

I know this seems to be a popular question and I've read if not all the posts about reverting back but I'm still confused. I want to get rid of Mavericks (hate it, its weird, it drains my battery so on) My Macbook originally came with snow leopard. But would like to downgrade to Lion.

Maybe Im not understanding correctly but if I want to get rid of Mavericks I need to get my original 10.6.3 disk and reboot with that and then upgrade to lion?

Why can I just do a clean install of lion? like I said, I don't want snow leopard back, I just want to go back to lion.

 

[Macman45]

You will need the original grey install disks that came with your Mac, and a bootable USB copy of the Lion installer...More details here

https://www.macrumors.com/2012/07/25/create-a-bootable-mountain-lion-usb-key-installer/

The article refers to ML, but the process is the same for Lion.

 

[Eithanius]

You will need the original grey install disks that came with your Mac, and a bootable USB copy of the Lion installer...More details here

https://www.macrumors.com/2012/07/25/create-a-bootable-mountain-lion-usb-key-installer/

The article refers to ML, but the process is the same for Lion.

Why does one need to have the original disc when the bootable USB copy of Lion alone can do the job without it...?

 

[Macman45]

Why does one need to have the original disc when the bootable USB copy of Lion alone can do the job without it...?

My Bad, was thinking about SL...As long as the OP erases the HDD and uses the instructions in the link I provided should be good to go.

 

[monkeybagel]

What model machine do you have?

Many machines that came with 10.6 originally had an EFI update released that provided the Internet Recovery functionality.

If you boot to the recovery partition now, it will attempt to restore 10.9 if you do a fresh installation.

I would recommend to see if it will boot from Apple's servers and see if it offers 10.7.

To do this, turn the computer off, turn it on, and press Command+Option+R when the startup bong sounds and hold them. If it attempts to boot from the Internet it will show a spinning globe and a progress bar.

It may need to ask you your WiFi network name and password. If this is successful, it should be clear what OS it intends to install when it boots.