How to do a fresh install of OSX

I just bought a new Macbook Air for my wife.
It didn't come with any re-install / system software.
If I need to reinstall the OS for some reason (which I do have to do from time to time on my other computers), how do I do this on an Air?
I have Mountain Lion, Leopard, and Snow Leopard installed as a boot device on a Thumb drive.
Could this work on an Air?
Thanks

Your Mountain Lion, etc. flash drives will not work if the Mac came with a newer OS like Mavericks.
The way Apple provides to reinstall OS X is to hold down the Command and R keys during bootup, which will take you to the Recovery partition.

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Mavericks is already installed. If you ever need to install again, see below.
OS X Mavericks: Reinstall OS X

Where do I continue; I have a '07 Macbook Pro, and would truly appreciate your help as I freshly install my osx beginning with my original 10.4

Please...
Where do I continue; I have a '07 Macbook Pro, and would truly appreciate your help as I have freshly installed my osx beginning with my original 10.4
Thank you
PS
I should mention; for reasons unknown to me, I no longer have use of my disk drive since reinstalling 10.4.

You can use software update to install the latest version of Tiger. If you connect an external DVD drive you can install an upgrade to Snow Leopard. The disk is available at the Apple online store:
http://store.apple.com/us/product/MC573Z/A/mac-os-x-106-snow-leopard
Further upgrades are dependent upon the EXACT model of your MBP.
Ciao.

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So pretty much all I need to do is just insert the cds and follow the directions?
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hi all.
i am about 2 years into my move back to mac with a small professional office and i am considering a fresh install of Lion from Snow Leopard on the Mac Pro (1st generation) and a 2009/10 MacBookPro. I believe the Mac Pro shipped with Leopard and the MacBookPro shipped with Snow Leopard but not sure if i am off by an OS release on that.
in any event, it has been a /ton/ of effort in customizing this setup and it includes an install of Mac Drive, Parallels and other software and software settings. I have also edited the registry on windows in a couple of instances and i have run a couple of Terminal customizations on the mac side.
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If I understand correctly, you are still running SL. As I said, I'm not familiar with this when using any Windows install. If it were strictly Apple, then it wouldn't be a problem. But still if you want to do a full clean install, that would require reinstalling all applications manually. Otherwise, you would still be migrating the same files your already have.
Installing Lion over SL will give you a new OS. Unless you have hard drive issues, this should be all that's needed.
What I would do is check for any PPC applications. If you have any, then uninstall them. Check each application for complete removal instructions.
You might also use an application such as ONYX to caches, etc. Repair permissions. Just to get the system as clean as possible.
Once done, you would want to make a current backup. Maybe even a second just in case. You can always do a restore if nessary.
You could clone your system to an external drive using either SuperDuper or CarbonCopy Cloner. The advantage is that it's bootable. You could then install Lion on either the internal or external drive and make sure it works OK.

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Is there a way to do a fresh install of Mavericks on my MBP? I did the download and upgrade but it seems low probably because this is the 3rd or 4th upgrade. Is there a way to install Mavericks and create a "clean" impage. i can then restore the apps I need from my Time machine drive.

Please don't make duplicate posts. An answer has been posted on your previous post.

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I have a mid-2010 MacBook Pro 7,1 and am replacing the HD. I want to do a fresh install of Snow Leopard but don't have the disks that came with my computer. Is the retail version of Snow Leopard what I need or are the original install disks that came with the computer different?
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You can get replacement System Install & Restore CD/DVDs from Apple's Customer Support - in the US, (800) 767-2775 - for a nominal S&H fee. You'll need to have the model and/or serial number of your Mac available.
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Hey everyone,
The following are my computer specs:
MacBook Pro
15-inch, Early 2008
Hardware
Overview
Processor
2.6 GHz Intel Core 2 Duo
Memory
4 GB 667 MHz DDR2 SDRAM
L2 Cache
6 MB
Graphics
NVIDIA GeForce 8600M GT 512 MB
Software
Mac OS X Lion 10.7.4 (11E53)
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mid 2009 - I bought a Snow Leopard disk from the Apple Store and upgraded the OS directly over Leopard, with all my data still there.
mid 2011 - I purchased the Lion download online from the Mac App Store and upgraded the OS again, directly over Snow Leopard, with all my data still there.
mid 2012 - Now I want to upgrade to Mountain Lion. I have already purchased the Mountain Lion download online from the Mac App Store and downloaded it to my computer. Have also copied (i guess) all my files, bookmarks, iTunes library on to an external HD.
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I also don't see Apple offering the Lion download on the App Store anymore..so, can anyone please help me out with how I can do this?
Another thing I want to mention is - I had my display replaced at the Apple Store late 2011 because of that defect which apparenly affected many MacBook Pros from that period.
So was wondering if there might be any hardware issues if I downgraded all the way down to Leopard? Because at the time of the replacement, the laptop was running Lion.
Any help is great, thanks!

1) You don't see Apple offering Lion for download from the app store anymore because you already downloaded it to your computer. Hold down the option key then click on purchases and it should appear. I don't know why they hide it after you bought it?
Ref: http://osxdaily.com/2011/08/02/re-download-mac-os-x-lion-from-app-store/
2) Don't install Lion right after you download it from the app store! Make a copy and put it in a different directory first! I use this tutorial to make a bootable usb and a dvd for backup just in case. This will give you the "clean" install you are looking for.
Ref: http://www.macworld.com/article/1165337/create_a_bootable_lion_install_drive_for _newer_macs.html

Tell me how to see the Freshly installed objects

Hi,
After fresh installation what are the settings, I try to saw the objects in so many ways but i did not found.
Pls provide solution ASAP.
Best Regards,
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Hi Yaram
What type of Object have u installed is it IO or Any other.
For Info Objects, Go to RSD1 tcode. or go to Se11>table RSDIOBJ there u can find the versions of Info Object.
Same thing for DS,, goto Table ROOSOURCE.
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Thanks

What is the default file that's in the downloads folder on a fresh install of OSX?

I deleted the .pdf file that's in the Downloads folder when you first install OSX.
Is there anyway to get this file back?

The file is the "About Downloads" pdf file, that's preset in the Downloads folder when you first install the OS.
Can this be replaced if you accidentally delete it?

Time Machine - Restoring Files only to a fresh install of OSX

Hi folks,
had my 17' MBP for about a year now and love it, although in the last couple of month it's become frightening slow, jerk video playback and what not.
So I'd like to Format the Mac and re-install Snow Leopard to get full performance back, I have a Time Machine but don't want to do a system restore as I won't get any benefits of renewed performance etc, I'd just like it to restore my non-system files and possibly iTunes to avoid any iPhone/iPod/iPad syncing issues.
Is there any way of restoring just files only without having to manually pick them out of the Time Machine once I've formatted/re-installed Snow Leopard?
Thanks!

mlamb64150 wrote:
can you use that technique for iTunes as well?
no. you would restore iTunes using the finder.
you should restore the entire iTunes folder (not just the iTunes music folder).
JGG

How to do a FRESH install on NEW drive

I had my iMac's internal HD upgraded to 1TB today. The drive is a blank canvas so far. I've installed multiple OS Xs on Macs with factory drives, but never a retail drive. Do I do it the same way? i.e. pop in the disc and go to work?
I plan on reserving 15GB for Windows XP (gotta play Magic Online somehow)

Nick Rooney wrote:
I had my iMac's internal HD upgraded to 1TB today. The drive is a blank canvas so far. I've installed multiple OS Xs on Macs with factory drives, but never a retail drive. Do I do it the same way? i.e. pop in the disc and go to work?
I plan on reserving 15GB for Windows XP (gotta play Magic Online somehow)
Piece of cake
Just insert the DVD and go through the normal process.
When the system reboots, you should be given a selection of drives on which to install Leopard.
Just be sure to select the proper one - the empty one and wait.

Firefox will not open after fresh install in OSX Lion. "Firefox profile missing."

After recently upgrading OS X Snow leopard to OS X 10.7 Lion I downloaded and ran the Firefox installer package, only to find that Firefox could not open. The error message says "Profile missing – Your Firefox profile cannot be loaded. It may be missing or inaccessible"
I checked Firefox forums and found a script that when run in Terminal allows access to the (upper) Library folder; but this still does not solve the issue.
Obviously, with Lion Apple has deliberately placed a stumbling block in the way of would-be Firefox users.

Thank you. I solved the dilemma, which was one of my own making although I take no blame for it. You see, a while back I grew tired of going through the semantics of manually deleting Caches and Cookies and simply locked those folders (in Users/my name/Library) so that nothing could be added or removed from them without login credentials.
. . . There's where the fly got into the ointment. The Caches folder must be unlocked in order to run Firefox because it uses Caches to store files. Folder unlocked – problem solved.
It seems that OS X Lion has more warts than its predecessors (initially, at least), in that where Apple once gave the user full egress to all venues, it has developed a hard-nosed, up-in-your-face micro-managerial stance with Lion – such as making the System/Library invisible. This, of course, under the tacit label of "offering the user greater security" . . . against himself.
If you fully embrace that logic I've got some s. Florida realty I can dump I mean sell you on the cheap, lol.
I appreciate your kind help.
Thanks.
mike4444

Restore everything but OSX for fresh install

I am looking to do a fresh install of OSX to Leopard from Tiger. Is there any way I can restore everything from the Time Capsule EXCEPT the operating system - so that I can keep the fresh 10.5.8 install, but have all the rest of my programs/files back?
Thanks.

sfnorton wrote:
I guess I was using the old account - because at times, it came up as her generic user/password. I did add a new user (sorta like you suggest) and thought I deleted hers (I sign in as my new user each day) - but still, at times, that generic use/password comes up. For example - in Qmaster, when setting up a cluster, the generic name came up.
I don't use that app, so don't know why it's doing that.
But if you're using a different account from the old one for most everything, you may be able to delete that old account with far less trouble than erasing and trying to restore things, especially apps.
What's in that old account? Specifically, are any apps there?
So you are saying that it will ruin my TM back up if I somehow manage to get rid of her presence all together?
No. I was afraid you had data, etc., in the old account, and were trying to delete it, then restore backups from that account into yours. That's tricky, at best.
I did the TM backup
the TM backup? You are letting TM do it's normal hourly backups, aren't you?
after changing to my new user/password. Does that help? I have all the apps and passcodes etc. So worst case is I start all over again. Ugh!
No, I see no reason for that. Unless you're having other problems, I'd recommend making sure there's nothing you need in the old account. Delete anything large & obvious. If there are any apps or data there that you need, move (or reinstall) them to the main Applications folder.
If everything still seems to work, then delete the user, but archive the home folder.

How to do a fresh install of OSX

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