Thread: Mac OSX Lion recovery partition tip

If for some reason you don't have a recovery partition on your OSX Lion install, here is a good and non-destructive way to get it there. Just re-install OSX Lion over your existing Lion installation. About a 45 minute job depending on your 'net speed.

I had read all over the place about this as I had to get an HD replaced in my iMac. I had a good cloned backup, but that doesn't include the recovery partition.

Most of what I read was that it wasn't all that important unless you wanted to have the 'find my mac', use File Vault or need a bootable utility disk. And that seems to be true, but I'm a bit anal about these things. Nearly everything I read talked about doing it destructively (ie; virgin install w/time machine restore) or doing it on an external drive (that just gets you the utilities). But one person on the Apple support forums said he just did a Lion on Lion install and all was good. That rang a bell, so I did it. Worked flawlessly!

I so wish that they would just provide a dang DVD.

Me too!

But I will say that when I downloaded the new installer, it was up to date which isn't the case with the DVDs. They never refreshed them.

That's why they have the option for recovery over the Internet.

You can create a Lion installer on DVD or usb stick. I just did it the other day. Needed to re-install Lion after a HDD replacement. Clean install created the recovery partition. From there migration assistant and was back to where I was prior to my HDD failure in less than 3 hrs.

How to make a bootable Lion install disc or drive

I knew I could do that, and in fact, thought about it. But I could restore the cloned backup I had that was up to date while I was watching some TV. After the reboot, it took about 45 minutes to do a Lion over Lion install via the internet. Quite easy and very time efficient, imo.

Did the cloned backup have your recovery partition? My guess is no since it's hidden? I know Timemachine doesn't back it up, which is why I went with the clean install route. Either way, much better than I remember doing a windows recover many yrs ago.

No, the cloned backup doesn't do the recovery partition. That's the issue when you replace a drive. And you are right, it is much easier and less time consuming than doing a Windows recovery.

The Lion on Lion installation method I used isn't what Apple recommended, and their recommendations were either destructive or just put the recovery partition on an external drive. And that latter one doesn't really help all that much. I was frankly surprised that Apple didn't recommend the Lion on Lion installation since it is so dead simple and works so well.