How do I do a CLEAN install of Lion?

I've just installed Lion and it runs more like Mouse. Everything has slowed right down. I've repaired permissions, and that's no better. Adobe Bridge is an absolute nightmare. I've reset it's preferences and that's not helped. It keeps asking me to restart, but restarting doesn't help either. Reading the advice in Apple communities suggest I do a clean install rather than to install over Snow Leopard.
How do I do this please? I have everything backed up to Time Machine. I'm usuing an iMac with 3.06 Ghz Core 2 Duo processor with 4 GB 1067 MHz DDR3 memory, and a 1TB hard drive. Should be fast enough to cope, but feels like an old Performa now.
Wish I was back to good old Snow Leopard!
Can anybody help? I don't want to screw things up and make it worse.
Thank you,
Bruce 

clean installs can be done from the Lion download you get from the app store - BUT only before you install it.
i know they are now doing some new options for installs with the latest machinery with boot paritions etc, but the best bet for you is probably to re-download the lion installer from th app store, and then google this phrase
"how to make a bootable Lion install disc or drive"
and go to the mac world page telling you how to make a bootable image to burn to dvd and then do a clean install.
upgrading OS always does weird stuff, you're usually better off doing it clean - and even the migration assistant seems to be a waste of time, as you still need to re-enter all yoru serial numbser for apps etc.
best bet is to start a clean install on to a new partition or hard drive (can be external FW drive) then you start to run off the 'new' system, and keep the old one for a week or two to go grab all your favourite file and fixes for stuff. then Once you have your new OS running nicely you can ditch the old one, and clone your system over to the 'proper' internal drive.
see super duper app for cloning boot disks if youre interested.

Similar Messages

  • How do I do a clean install from Lion download

    how do I do a clean install from Lion download ?
    My old tower will only stretch to Lion which I have had to download and installed it following the instructions.
    My local Applestore genius has told me to do a clean install but I don't have or can't find a copy of the Lion osX to use.
    Applegadge

    Welcome to the Apple Support Communities
    If you are already using OS X Lion, use OS X Recovery to reinstall OS X and erase the disk. See > http://support.apple.com/kb/HT4718
    Follow these steps:
    1. Make a backup of the data you don't want to lose after erasing the hard disk.
    2. Start your computer holding Command and R keys to start in OS X Recovery, and open Disk Utility.
    3. Choose "Macintosh HD" or the OS X partition in the sidebar, go to the Erase tab and erase the disk.
    4. Close Disk Utility and reinstall OS X

  • How do I perform a clean install of Lion Server?

    There seem to be many sites documenting how to pull out the ESD image and burn a bootable copy of Lion.
    What I'd like to know is how do I perform a clean installation of Lion Server?
    Is it possible to just install Lion and then open the App Store and install from Purchase without being charged again?

    Okay....so Apple does have a guide related to Mass deployment which includes a rough way to do a clean OS X Server clean install. You need to use a NetBoot Lion Server as a boot, but it works.
    http://support.apple.com/kb/HT4746
    Use these steps to create a NetRestore image of an un-configured Lion Server:
    Install OS X Lion, and then Lion Server. This server will be used to create the NetRestore image.
    On the server, install the app named "Install Mac OS X Lion" from the Mac App Store (a network connection is required for this process).
    Install the Server Admin Tools from http://support.apple.com/downloads/ on the server.
    Open the "Install Mac OS X Lion" application, and install to an empty volume. This volume can be a spare partition or external hard drive. Be sure to click the Customize button and to select the Lion Server software.
    Once installation is complete, the server will restart from the newly installed volume.  Instead of completing the setup assistant, press Command-Q to quit the assistant.
    Select the option to shut the server down.
    Restart the server and hold the Option key.
    When the Startup Manager appears, select the volume which you've already configured Lion Server on.
    Open System Image Utility and create a NetRestore image from the newly installed (and still un-configured) volume. If you'd prefer to image the volume after it has already been configured, you can proceed with the setup assistant before booting back to the original installation created in step 1.

  • How can I do a "clean" install of Lion

    I have installed Lion over several successively upgraded versions of OS X and I'm now finding my system very wonky, with more and more small glitches and the occasional freeze. I'd like to simply start over and install it clean but, having bought the App Store rather than thumb drive version, how can I do this?
    Edward

    You can do this very easily.  You can reboot in recovery mode by holding down command-R at startup, where you can erase the hard drive and reinstall the system from scratch.  However, you'll have to re-download it that way.  A better alternative is to re-download the installer from the App Store and then use it to make a bootable Lion install disk.  (I put it on an 8 GB flash drive, myself.)
    However, note that there are probably some easier solutions.  Take a look at some of the suggestions in the second half of Understanding upgrade nightmares*.
    * Disclaimer: links to my pages may give me compensation, and should not be taken as endorsement of my services by Apple.

  • How to do a clean install of Lion download from App store

    How do you do a clean install of Lion downloaded from the App store.  I downloaded and it installed but never was there a time of the installation it gave me an option to do a clean install.  Thanks for any help.

    Install or Reinstall Lion from Scratch
    If possible backup your files to an external drive or second internal drive.
    Boot to the Recovery HD:
    Restart the computer and after the chime press and hold down the COMMAND and R keys until the menu screen appears. Alternatively, restart the computer and after the chime press and hold down the OPTION key until the boot manager screen appears. Select the Recovery HD and click on the downward pointing arrow button.
    Erase the hard drive:
    Select Disk Utility from the main menu and click on the Continue button.
    After DU loads select your hard drive (this is the entry with the mfgr.'s ID and size) from the left side list. Note the SMART status of the drive in DU's status area.  If it does not say "Verified" then the drive is failing or has failed and will need replacing.  SMART info will not be reported  on external drives. Otherwise, click on the Erase tab in the DU main window.
    Set the format type to Mac OS Extended (Journaled.) Click on the Erase button and wait until the process has completed.
    Quit DU and return to the main menu.
    Reinstall Lion: Select Reinstall Lion and click on the Install button.
    Note: You can also re-download the Lion installer by opening the App Store application. Hold down the OPTION key and click on the Purchases icon in the toolbar. You should now see an active Install button to the right of your Lion purchase entry. There are situations in which this will not work. For example, if you are already booted into the Lion you originally purchased with your Apple ID or if an instance of the Lion installer is located anywhere on your computer.

  • How do you do a  Clean install lion

    How do you do a clean install of lion? My iMac is 8 yr old and has gotten sluggish. At one point it was suggested that I might want to do a clean install but no one ever told me how to do that since we don't have a disk!

    Assuming you already have Lion installed, boot into Recovery Mode (Command-R). From there you can reinstall Lion. Note, however, that a clean install means you first erase the drive you want to do the clean install on, and unless you have a complete backup of everything that's currently on it, you'll lose it all; the clean install will leave you with a fresh operating system but nothing else. To get it all back, make that external clone, then when the clean install is finished on the internal, Setup Assitant will run and you can point it at the external clone to get all your stuff back.

  • How many times can you clean install leopard on the same computer?

    How many times can you clean install leopard on the same computer? Will the leopard dvd run out of installations and not let you install anymore?

    Hi colman Prez;
    Now that the funny comments have been made, I have a serious question and that why are you worry about reinstalling Leopard with an Erase & Install which is what I take that you mean when you say clean install. In actually fact there is no such thing in OS X as a clean install.
    I am curious because in all the years I have used OS X, I have yet to do an Erase & Install yet.
    I know with Windows that they suggest reformatting and reinstalling at the drop of a hat but that isn't true with OS X.
    Allan

  • How to do a Clean Install of Lion

    Hope this will help someone.
    I recently did a clean install of Lion on my Mac Pro (after doing an earlier Lion upgrade) and the performance difference is absolutely amazing. Before my Mac Pro was laggy and there all kinds of little glitchy bugs (I'm sorry I can't explain it better than that) with a lot of my applications. Since I use that machine to also administer the network, that just wasn't acceptable.
    I'm convinced, after this experience, that a clean install of Lion is the best thing for me, so, this morning I decided to do the same thing to my MacBook Air (IMHO the best laptop ever invented).
    Here's what I have done.
    1.  Download and install Carbon Copy Cloner to the laptop.
    2.  Clone the laptop hard drive to an external hard drive. I have a Seagate 500GB USB drive which had a 500GB partition with Lion already installed on it. There are instructions all over the web on how to install Lion to an external drive. I used disk utility to add a partition, effectively splitting the partition in two with Lion still installed on one of the partitions and the other partition "clean".
    3.  Donate to Mike Bombich's site. Carbon Copy Cloner is a remarkable program - I've paid a heck of a lot of money over the years for similar programs and they didn't work 1/2 as good.
    4.  Go into System Preferences, select the "Startup Disk" applet and select your Lion install on the external hard disk drive as the startup disk. I SUSPECT you could also set the cloned laptop partition as your startup disk, but since the Lion install was already on my external drive, I used that.
    5.  Reboot the laptop
    6.  Hold down Command + "R" during the startup process to boot to the recovery partition of the Lion install on the external disk.
    7.  When the menu pops up, select Disk Utility
    8.  Repartition your laptop hard disk drive. This will also erase everything on the laptop. You can not repartition your hard drive unless you are booting from an external install of Lion. The recovery partition is hidden so repartitioning the drive will fail if you try to do a clean install from your laptop.
    9.  When the partitioning is finished, quit Disk Utility and return to the previous menu.
    10.  Select "Reinstall Lion" and select your laptop hard disk drive as the target.
    11.  You'll have to authenticate to Apple with your Apple ID, so there should be no problem with downloading and reinstalling Lion.
    12.  Wait for the download and install to finish. The download will take longer than the install.
    13.  During the setup, use the Transfer Assistant to transfer the cloned drive items to the new Lion install.
    When the TA and install is finished, you should be back to where you started with everything intact.
    Good luck!

    Hope this will help someone.
    I recently did a clean install of Lion on my Mac Pro (after doing an earlier Lion upgrade) and the performance difference is absolutely amazing. Before my Mac Pro was laggy and there all kinds of little glitchy bugs (I'm sorry I can't explain it better than that) with a lot of my applications. Since I use that machine to also administer the network, that just wasn't acceptable.
    I'm convinced, after this experience, that a clean install of Lion is the best thing for me, so, this morning I decided to do the same thing to my MacBook Air (IMHO the best laptop ever invented).
    Here's what I have done.
    1.  Download and install Carbon Copy Cloner to the laptop.
    2.  Clone the laptop hard drive to an external hard drive. I have a Seagate 500GB USB drive which had a 500GB partition with Lion already installed on it. There are instructions all over the web on how to install Lion to an external drive. I used disk utility to add a partition, effectively splitting the partition in two with Lion still installed on one of the partitions and the other partition "clean".
    3.  Donate to Mike Bombich's site. Carbon Copy Cloner is a remarkable program - I've paid a heck of a lot of money over the years for similar programs and they didn't work 1/2 as good.
    4.  Go into System Preferences, select the "Startup Disk" applet and select your Lion install on the external hard disk drive as the startup disk. I SUSPECT you could also set the cloned laptop partition as your startup disk, but since the Lion install was already on my external drive, I used that.
    5.  Reboot the laptop
    6.  Hold down Command + "R" during the startup process to boot to the recovery partition of the Lion install on the external disk.
    7.  When the menu pops up, select Disk Utility
    8.  Repartition your laptop hard disk drive. This will also erase everything on the laptop. You can not repartition your hard drive unless you are booting from an external install of Lion. The recovery partition is hidden so repartitioning the drive will fail if you try to do a clean install from your laptop.
    9.  When the partitioning is finished, quit Disk Utility and return to the previous menu.
    10.  Select "Reinstall Lion" and select your laptop hard disk drive as the target.
    11.  You'll have to authenticate to Apple with your Apple ID, so there should be no problem with downloading and reinstalling Lion.
    12.  Wait for the download and install to finish. The download will take longer than the install.
    13.  During the setup, use the Transfer Assistant to transfer the cloned drive items to the new Lion install.
    When the TA and install is finished, you should be back to where you started with everything intact.
    Good luck!

  • I need to do a clean install with Lion. How do I do this. I can't find any doc. to tell me the procedure.

    I need to do a clean install with Lion. How do I do this. I can't find any doc. to tell me the procedure.

    Follow the instructions at the link I posted 
    have a lot of old stuff transferred from Mac to Mac to Mac that is slowing down everything
    If that included Power PC apps, read here >  Lion upgrade questions and answers:  Apple Support Communities

  • How to Create a Bootable Flash Drive to do a clean install of Lion.  I have tried to use the InstallESD.dmg but it still will not do a clean install so that I do not have to do a reinstall from the Recovery (That just re downloads and takes over 6 hours)?

    How to Create a Bootable Flash Drive to do a clean install of Lion.  I have tried to use the InstallESD.dmg but it still will not do a clean install so that I do not have to do a reinstall from the Recovery (That just re downloads and takes over 6 hours)?
    The system I'm have is a Mac-mini that had SL on it and no SuperDrive.  I have also call Apple Support and they have really have not been to much help over 1st did my up grade to Lion and Installed the Lion Server.... it lost my SSL that I paid for and kill almost on of my server setting, plus kill all my web servers (using apache vhosts), and not to say the LDAP will even let remote users login to your laptops.
    PS: There is no way that I'm going to buy a Install USB from Apple... They have over billed me over $300.00 because the Apps Store still has bugs (Glad I did not write that App/Service)
    If there is anyone that can give in the information to create a USB install stick, I would be very thinkful.

    Here you are bro, courtesy of "softpedia.com"....brilliant site!!!
    If you ever had problems with your Mac OS X installation you know that the first thing you should do is to check the startup volume using Disk Utility.
    After the check has ended and, if the errors exceed a certain level of seriousness, the Disk Utility application will require you to restart your Mac and use its Mac OS X Install disc counterpart.
    Other users may have to reinstall OS X altogether, but will find, or already know, that their SuperDrive (a CD/DVD reader and write combo drive) is not functioning properly and it will not be able to read the Install disc.
    Although this might happen to Mac OS X Leopard users due to faultyhardware, the vast majority of problematic SuperDrives will be encountered inside Snow Leopard running Macs.
    This is due to the updated SuperDrive firmware included in either the Install disc or the software updates one has to install to reach the latest version of OS X, namely 10.6.6.
    This can be fixed by flashing the SuperDrive’s stock firmware using free command line tools that one can find for free online (I will write about this process also, but at a later time because this article only focuses on allowing you to create your own alternative USB boot disc).
    If you are reading this last bit of information with skepticism, than you should know that it happened to me too. Despite all my tries to make it work properly, the SuperDrive kept on munching any inserted DVDs and just popped them out in about twenty seconds.
    The workaround to this issue was to create my own Leopard bootable USB memory stick. I am not suggesting a Snow Leopard bootable stick mainly because there are lots of users that have decided to buy the cheaper, Upgrade version, which I have not tested and, therefore, I’m not sure if it will work properly once written to a USB disk.
    And now, here are the exact steps you should follow in order to obtain a fully bootable Leopard (or Lion) Install disc.
    Step 1 (If you already have the Leopard install disc DMG file you can skip to Step 2)
    Launch Disk Utility (you can find it inside /Applications/Utilities). Here select the Leopard Install disc in the list of drives on the left and click on the New Image menu entry at the top of the window. A save message will appear where you will have to select the Desktop as a destination.
    Step 2
    After Disk Utility has finished creating the Leopard DMG, insert your USB stick and erase all data and reformat the disk. To do this select the USB in the list of drives on the left and, after clicking on the Erase tab on the right side of the window, choose the Mac OS Extended (Journaled) format and click the Erase button beneath.
    Step 3
    After the USB has been reformatted, download the SuperDuper app from HERE and launch it. Once SuperDuper starts, you will only have to select the DMG in the Copy drop-down menu, your USB memory stick on the right and hit the “Copy Now” button.
    One can also use Disk Utility for this task but creating a bootable USB stick failed 2 out 4 times when copying the DMG to the stick (with the exact same settings each time). Creating the bootable stick using SuperDuper proved to be the perfect way to do it because it worked each of the 4 times I tested it.
    The steps above can also be used to create a bootable Mac OS X Lion USB by using the InstallESD.dmg image you can find inside the Lion installer (named “Install Mac OS X Lion.app”) downloaded from the Mac App Store in the /Applications folder.
    To locate the InstallESD.dmg right click the Lion installer, select the “Show Package Contents” entry, go inside the “Contents” folder, and from there into the “SharedSupport” folder. Inside this folder you can find the InstallESD.dmg you can use to create your own bootable Mac OS X Lion USB stick. To do so, go to the third step described above and use the InstallESD.dmg as the DMG to be copied to your USB disc.
    That’s it! Once the process ends you will have a fully bootable Leopard (or Lion) USB disk that you can use as an alternative to the Apple’s DVD Install disc that comes bundled with all Macs.
    To use your newly created bootable disk you will have to restart the Mac, press and hold the OPTION key until the StartupManager appears. Here, select the Mac OS X Install disk using your keyboard arrows and press return to start from the selected drive.

  • How can I do a clean install of Mountain Lion?

    I have an older MacBook Pro that I'm selling. I upgraded to Mounbtain Lion, but there was not an option to do a clean install (wiping everything clean and starting fresh). I want to do this to make sure all of my data is removed before I sell it. How can I do a clean install of Mountain Lion in order to accomplish this? In the past, from DVDs, it was easy. Thanks!

    Budrew wrote:
    Sure, but I would imagine that it will be common for people to sell their Macs with upgraded OSs.
    That was only OK when you bought the Upgrade DVD and included both the original system discs and the disc you used to upgrade the OS.
    Since Apple has now gone to the Download only model of OS X you now always need to install the Original OS or an Upgraded version that you have the DVD disc for.
    If a Mac came with Leopard and you upgraded to Snow Leopard and then to Lion or Mt Lion you must remove Lion or Mt Lion and reinstall either Leopard or Snow Leopard and include all the discs for that system, Originals and the Upgrde Snow Leopard DVD.
    If your system came Snow Leopard and you installed Lion or Mt Lion thenn again you remoeve Lion or Mt Lion and reinstall Snow Leopard and include the original discs that came with the system
    If your system came with Lion and you upgraded to Mt Lion then you remove Mt Lion and reinstall Lion.
    The reason for all of that is because with the Download only OS all upgrades are TIED to YOUR Apple ID, not to the computer. So the new owner can not reinstall Lion or Mt Lion, whichever you upgraded to, without using your Apple ID.

  • How can I do a clean install after doing an update using a volume purchase license?

    My question is this:  We purchased 20 licenses of Lion through the Volume Purchase program.  2 of the users installed it first doing an upgrade - now they have decided they want to do a clean install.  How can they do a clean install - I can't give them the installer cd we created because I have been informed by Apple Sales that it will use another license from our quantity of 20 - but they offered no other solution.
    We would rather not waste another license just to do a clean install.
    Thanks!

    Install or Reinstall Lion from Scratch
    If possible backup your files to an external drive or second internal drive.
    Boot to the Recovery HD:
    Restart the computer and after the chime press and hold down the COMMAND and R keys until the menu screen appears. Alternatively, restart the computer and after the chime press and hold down the OPTION key until the boot manager screen appears. Select the Recovery HD and click on the downward pointing arrow button.
    Erase the hard drive:
    Select Disk Utility from the main menu and click on the Continue button.
    After DU loads select your hard drive (this is the entry with the mfgr.'s ID and size) from the left side list. Note the SMART status of the drive in DU's status area.  If it does not say "Verified" then the drive is failing or has failed and will need replacing.  SMART info will not be reported  on external drives. Otherwise, click on the Erase tab in the DU main window.
    Set the format type to Mac OS Extended (Journaled.) Click on the Erase button and wait until the process has completed.
    Quit DU and return to the main menu.
    Reinstall Lion: Select Reinstall Lion and click on the Install button.
    Note: You can also re-download the Lion installer by opening the App Store application. Hold down the OPTION key and click on the Purchases icon in the toolbar. You should now see an active Install button to the right of your Lion purchase entry. There are situations in which this will not work. For example, if you are already booted into the Lion you originally purchased with your Apple ID or if an instance of the Lion installer is located anywhere on your computer.
    This method relies on the Internet Recovery system. This is the standard procedure when you don't have an installer or Lion came pre-installed.

  • Can I do a clean install of Lion, onto my Mac Book Pro4,1, that is currently running 10.5.8? I have seen U-tube videos on how to do a clean install to Snow Leopard, and another from SL to Lion, but can zero out my HD, and do a clean install to Lion?

    Can I do a clean install of Lion, onto my Mac Book Pro4,1, that is currently running 10.5.8? I have seen U-tube videos on how to do a clean install to Snow Leopard, and another from SL to Lion, but can zero out my HD, and do a clean install to Lion?

    See this article.

  • How do I do a clean install of Mountain Lion?

    I already have Mac OS X Mountain Lion on my MacBook Pro A1126, but how can I do a clean install on it? Do I have to buy a installation disc or from Mac App Store?
    Thanks in advance!

    I differentiate between a 'clean' installation and a 'fresh' installation by this meaning: a 'clean' installation means that you're going to erase the boot drive and 'cleanly' install everything, including OS X anew, whereas, for me, a 'fresh' installation means only that you're NOT going to erase the entire drive, but only install a 'fresh' version of OS X.
    So which do you wish to do?
    Either way, you should just be able to boot into your Recovery partition (hold down the command and R keys whilst booting) and then either install a 'fresh' version of OS X, or erase the contents of the drive, using Disk Utility, and do a 'clean' install of OS X.
    Mountain Lion does not come on a disc - you should have purchased it via the App Store and you may need your Apple ID to install again from the Recovery partition.
    Does that help?

  • How do I do a Clean install of Tiger and Classic?

    My G4 came with Jaguar. OS 9 was part of the complete installation, that you could install or choose not to install. My computer has been having a lot of issues lately and I think that a clean install would be a good idea, especially, since I used an upgrade to install Panther and then installed Tiger on top of Panther. I want to install classic and Tiger. How do I do this properly? Thanks

    I plan to back up my personal files and any
    downloaded software I have.
    Amazing that. You've told us that numerous times, but
    you've failed to provide us with information on
    HOW you're going to do this. That is, please
    explain WHAT you're using for the backup and
    WHERE you're planning on using to store the
    backup.
    All Power Macs come with the capability of burning CD's today. Mine can also burn DVD's, so backing up MY files is NOT a problem. I just can't clone my whole drive. Now, I'm not sure how this is pertinent in answering my question about how to properly do a clean install of Tiger and be able to install Classic. My son however, just told me he thinks that all I need to do is to clean-install Tiger. Then, insert the installation CD with classic on it that came with my computer. Find the invisible file, which is a disk image and drag the contents of the disk image to my computer. If anyone can tell me if this is correct, I would appreciate it.

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