Lion restore partition question

Hi
So here is my issue/challenge and my proposed solution, the question is, will it work?
I have a nice new Retina display MacBook Pro on order and when it arrives I will be selling my MacBook Air.
I need/want to securely erase the SSD and here is my proposed solution:-
Enable FileVault on the Air.
On another computer, go to iCloud and do a remote wipe.
This I beleive just removes the encryption key making all my data inaccesable.
Next I am HOPING I can reboot the Air with the Command R held down and boot into the Lion Restore partition and from there, reformat the Air main partition and re-install Lion.
I then have a clean computer I can sellwith confidence.
Question 1. Will all the above work?
Question 2. Is there any easier way to acomplish all this?
Cheers.
Robin

The problem with your approach is that a person could still boot
into target disk mode extract what is on the disk and attempt
to recover the data. It can also create issues for the purchaser.
In the case of SSD drives, the seven pass erase is major overkill.
The reason for that level of erase is that on traditional hard drives
the data is a magnetized area on the disk. A first pass erase
could still leave enough residual magnetism that, using special equipment,
can still recover something of an image.
With an SSD, it is purely digital. A storage cell can only be a zero or
a one. It cannot be anywhere in between. So, an erase method that
writes a single value to all cells is sufficient.
So, I suggest take the time do the Secure Erase of the entire drive
from a USB stick Recovery HD and reinstall.
If you still think that this is not good enough, go to OWC and
get a replacement drive and destroy the current one.

Similar Messages

Reformat, restore, partition question

Trying to set-up Boot Camp using the assistant and haven't quite found the answers I need by searching this forum. I get an error message that there are files on my hard drive that cannot be moved and the partition process cannot continue. If I understand correctly, I need to reformat the hard drive using Disk Utility and then Restore (I have backed up to an external using TM.)
So my questions:
1) Do I reformat the drive by running Disk Utility from the hard drive, or from the OS X installer disk?
2) When restoring using TM, do all the files, extensions, apps, etc get restored to the same place on the hard drive (eg, back to square one)?
3) Have people had better success by running the Boot Camp Assistant prior to restoring from the external drive?
Have tried running disk utility and selecting Repair Disk, but the utility reports that there is nothing to repair - all is well.
I'm a bit nervous about wiping my drive...
Details: MacBook, with 40GB available on a 160GB drive. Have run software updates. Standing by to install Win XP Pro SP2 once BCA partitions the space.
Thanks in advance for any suggestions.

I'd also be nervous about wiping the drive.
I'd also be nervous with 40GB free on a 160GB drive that hasn't yet been partitioned for Boot Camp. In order for Leopard to work reasonably well, you want to have about 10% of your hard drive free. So I think this means making at most a 20GB Windows partition, and then trying to keep as much as possible of the remaining 20GB unused. Be warned that there are reports that Mac OS will randomly(?) delete data files if it starts running out of disk space.
To answer your questions:
1. From the installer disk. OS X won't let you reformat the drive from which you booted. When you do this, check in Disk Utility (select the hard drive, not just the Macintosh HD Volume, and then look in the lower-right corner) that your hard drive's partition scheme is GUID. If not, click the partition tab, click "options...", select the GUID partition scheme, and then "apply". *Note that this will effectively delete everything on the hard drive* but that's your intention anyway...
2. I seriously doubt that the physical location of the data on your hard drive is stored in the Time Machine backup, but just the data itself. Therefore the file structure will stay the same, but its physical location on the drive will change. That is, reformatting and then restoring should be roughly equivalent to defragmenting your hard drive, which is your intention.
3. Is an excellent idea. I try to advocate repartitioning using Boot Camp Assistant as one of the first things done with the computer, even if installing Windows is a task being left for much later, just to avoid the problem you are having. Since you don't have much margin for error (only 25% of your hard drive free) it is probably sensible to run Boot Camp assistant before doing the Time Machine restore. If not, then make it the very first thing you do after doing the Time Machine restore.

Lion Bootcamp partition compatible with SL?

I have Lion installed (clean install) and am unhappy with the performance to say the least. In my experience SL was more stable with my video apps.
Anyhow, I've created a bootcamp partition via Lion to install Windows 7 (what a PITA). I want to format the Lion partition and reinstall SL.
My question is:
Are there any issues with using SL with my bootcamp partition that was created with Lion's newer version of bootcamp?

Same difference as I believe a reinstall erases first then installs. To be sure though Start from the SL dvd and go to utilities and erase the Mac partition then install. As BootCamp is a separate partition it should be untoched.
You will undoubtedly have the Lion restore partition left but it is invisible to Disk utility. Here is the procedure I followed to get rid of this partition since I have the Lion USB install thumb drive and do not need it.
1) Make the Recovery visible in Disk Utility by using a program like Secrets:http://www.macupdate.com/app/mac/27025/secrets or MacPilot:http://www.koingosw.com/products/macpilot.php (15 day free trial).
2) Highlite the Recovery partition and Control click it and select Mount the partition.
3) With the Recovery partition highlited, erase the partition, you'll get an error message, ignore it.
4) Now highlite the top identity of the hard drive and select the partition tab.
5) Highlite the Recovery partition and press the minus sign.
6) Click and hold on the bottom edge of the partition above and drag it to the bottom, if it doesn't go there automatically, the press apply.

How do I install just the Lion installer via the lion recovery partition.

I am trying to bootcamp windows 7 on my new macbook pro (early 2011), the installation was successfull but i am missing drivers on the windows side and cannot access the internet until i install them. I installed all the bootcamp updates and put them on a usb to transfer to windows partition but windows kept telling me i need an earlier version of bootcamp which is not available from the update support downloads section of the apple website.
After some research i realized i needed the mac boot disc for lion, which doesnt exist so i need to create my own. I was told i could install lion from the lion recovery partition.
here is my question....If i install lion onto my mac partition that currently has lion, can i stop the download after the initial 4 gb installer and not go through with the full re-installation of lion? so that i can then take the installesd.dmg (i think thats right) file and put it on a dvd to install from the windows partition and finally get the drivers i need to get it running.
Comment: based on what i have read on how you used to bootcamp a mac, apple has made it very difficult, unneccesarily difficult it seems.

Before you do anything else, I suggest a thorough read of this:
http://manuals.info.apple.com/en_US/boot_camp_install-setup_10.7.pdf

How do I prevent the Lion boot partition from being reformatted when using boot camp?

Under Windows 7, Computer Mgt, I shrink the C drive to create another drive. When I right click on the unused drive to format it, 200MB Lion boot is formatted and assigned a drive letter F. But I did not tell Windows 7 Computer Management to do that. I clicked on the unused 170GB space to create it as F, I did not click on the 200MB Lion boot partition at the front of the list.
Now I have to take the computer back to the Apple store to reinstall Lion for me.
I tried this twice and it happened twice. So now I need to go back to the Apple store a second time for help on the same problem.
Would the 200MB Lion boot disk at the front be safe from reformatting if I first made it drive letter F, and then made the new drive letter H at the right side of the drive list in Computer Management? Also, there is an unlettered drive between the Lion drive E and the Windows 7 drive C. Should I make that G prior to formatting drive H?
By the way, I did this on another MacBook pro that was using Snow Leopard, following the same procedure, and had no problems. So could a different version of Boot Camp be the issue?

I just found an older question similar to this one that you also replied to. It was from 2012 and never solved. The only things I am using in my set up is a male quarter inch cable from my guitar to my interface, a USB cable from my interface to my computer, and headphones from my interface to my ears of course. Just like in the other question I found I have everything in the Audio MIDI Setup of the computer set to use the interface as input and output and I also have everything in garage band setup to use the interface as audio input and output. Any new track is recording the metronome and any old track that is being played in the headphones. No external speakers are being used for monitoring and no microphones are being used.

Q : How to restore from USB if restore partition is removed?

Hi, have made a backup of my Windows 7 cumputer envy 14 spectre to a usb drive with hp recovery manager. After i deleted the restore partition on the drive, and installed Windows 8. Now having sleep/power issues on Windows 8, have to go back to Windoes 7 to test before sending it in for repairs.
Bus even though i have made a USB backup, I cannot boot from the USB drive, and the ect/f11 option on boot, does nothing, windows still just boots.
Now how can i restore from a USB without having access to the F11 restore option on the drive, how to install the System Recovery again?
This question was solved.
View Solution.

Hi,
A backup is not a clone. You would need to have cloned the partition to a bootable USB for it to work.
The HP Backup & Recovery Manager does not copy the recovery partition even if you back up the entire hard drive.
Here is a user reference manual for the HP recovery manager.
Unless you made recovery media in DVD or USB form the only source for it that is available for you is to purchase a set of recovery disks.
I wish I had better news to give you on this.
Best regards.
****Please click on Accept As Solution if a suggestion solves your problem. It helps others facing the same problem to find a solution easily****
2015 Microsoft MVP - Windows Experience Consumer

Lion Recovery partition on 2011 MacBook Airs

I did a post for my blog yesterday concerning the use of the Lion recovery partition in solving the problem of turning on Find My Mac. I've had a very positive response from readers, most reporting success. But one has raised a question I cannot answer.
Here is the original article
http://www.macfilos.com/home/2011/10/16/icloud-cannot-turn-on-find-my-mac-recove ry-system-update-req.html
My reader maintains that the Lion recovery partition is not active on her 2011 MacBook Air. She has the latest OS X build and has also installed the Lion Recovery update. I can't really believe this, but I only have a 2010 Air to play with. Can someone confirm or deny?
The problem I (and many others) had was that the recovery update was not being recognised, the reason being a corrupt volume. After repairing the volume using the recovery partition it was then possible to reinstall the recovery update and subsequently turn on Find My Mac. It could be that my reader has a more intransigent version with the same cause that needs additional work.
Michael

If she enters in Terminal
diskutil list
if there is a Recovery Partition, she'll see:
Apple_Boot Recovery HD 650.0 MB disk0s3
as the last partition.
See also: https://discussions.apple.com/message/16417843#16417843
Tony

Macbook Pro Won't Do Lion Restore From USB

Hi Users,
I am exhausted. Graduate school is starting again. I have been to way too many forums and I am about to throw this piece of junk called a MacBook Pro in the trash and call it a lost. I will tell you why I am so frustrated:
1. Wanted to reload Mac OSX + bootcamp to install W7. Did a bunch of things on another forum that just made things worse.
2. Now my mac is so jacked up I am trying to do a OSX restore on my USB.
Problem Description:
My macbook lion will not restore from the app store. I put the USB in the computer. I get to the restore Lion window and then it tells me that it will take 99
hours to reload. I do not believe it is even contacting the store. I don't want a bunch of nonsense about how my wifi isn't working or something like that.
I would like to know how to get into the terminal and just freaking reset everything so that even the lion restore on my USB would freaking work.
I am going to take this piece of crap into the store tomorrow, but I have to say, as a computer science major. This is a piece of ####. I can't believe I even
used to be a mac fan boy. This diskless stuff was a great idea, but makes doing major restores a pain. Also, I tried doing a disk DVD restore and even that is jacked up. Sigh...
Frustrated Geek. Thanks for your patience all. I am frustrated at the machine, but not you all.

Can you give some specifics about your situation.
Which MacBook Pro do you have? Did it ship with Lion or is it a pre-Lion model? Do you have the Lion installer on a USB key? Do you have a backup of your MacBook Pro data in case you need to reformat your drive? Do you have a fast internet connection?
What have you attempted so far to restore your OSX Lion partition?
Have you started up from the Recovery Partition? If so, did you have any success downloading Lion from the App store?
Users here are generally helpful if you can provide a little more information.

HT201316 Mt Lion & Bootcamp Partition

Mt Lion failed to install indicating "no-recovery" which appears due to having a Bootcamp Partition on my iMac. If I remove the Bootcamp Partition, will Mt Lion install? If so, can I then re-install the Bootcamp Partition?

Here is what was required with Lion. I cannot guarantee it will help with Mountain Lion since you may have the error stating it could not install because it failed to find a Recovery HD partition.
What to do if the installer warns that no Recovery HD can be created
Some disk partition configurations may result in the OS X Lion installer reporting that it could not create a Recovery HD. In these situations, even if you are permitted to continue the install, you should quit the install and create an external, bootable OS X Lion hard drive with a Recovery HD, first. You will be able to return to the upgrade to OS X Lion on your computer's boot drive after creating the external Recovery HD.
Important notes
Your storage device must have at least 13 GB available (after formatting) to install Lion and an Internet Restore partition.
These steps will erase and reformat the storage device. OS X Lion: About Lion Recovery will instruct you on setting up the storage device to use the GUID partition scheme and the Mac OS Extended (Journaled) format, which are required to install Lion and an Internet Restore partition on your external storage device. You should back up any important files that are on the device to a different drive.
This procedure will install a version of the OS X Lion that is compatible with the Mac it was created with. Using this Lion system with a different kind of Mac may produce unpredictable results.
Your computer's serial number will be sent to Apple to help authenticate your request to download and install OS X Lion.

Tried to install XP Pro, Deleted Restore Partition, Now Lenovo 3000 = Useless Paperweight

I ordered a Lenovo 3000 K100 57068347 from TigerDirect back in April with the intention of using it as a remote help desk workstation and a virus definition 'server'...
Well anyway, it shipped with Vista Home Premium, and I was much more interested in having XP on it for obvious reasons.
Last night, I attempted to install XP by booting off an XP Pro SP2 volume install CD. Everything was going well until it tried to load the HDD controller drivers and the install bluescreened -- I've had this experience with other Lenovos in the past and I know just to disable ACHI and set it to "compatible" IDE mode and it will work.
This time, all the drivers loaded without a problem, and the install began. I got to the screen where you choose the partition to install, and I chose to delete the first 2, and leave the restore partition alone. I wanted a clean XP install with as much HDD space as possible while still leaving me a parachute instead I needed to restore to factory default.
Problem was, once the system rebooted to continue the XP install, I got a "cannot read from disk -- press ctrl-alt-del to restart" in BIOS. No matter how many different ways I tried to configure the ATA options in the BIOS, I kept either getting a blue screen (when in ACHI mode) or the message above (when configured any other way).
Like an idiot, I thought -- "hey, maybe the restore partition is causing some conflict" and in haste, I deleted that partition too, thinking "there's no way I can't get a XP install on this totally clean drive." Well of course you know by virtue of me posting this message that didn't solve anything, and I kept getting the "cannot read from disk -- push ctrl-alt-del to restart" message.
So I decided... might as well use the restore DVD that came with the system and start over. This is where I started to hit the roof..... I booted off the LENOVO-PROVIDED VISTA SYSTEM RESTORE DVD, and when I got to the "choose a disk/partition to install to," I selected the now clean 298gb partition, and clicked next.
Imagine my shock and horror when the install gave me an error that "Windows cannot find a suitable volume to install." Keep in mind, I'm staring a brand new clean 298gb partition in Windows install, and it's telling me it cannot find a suitable volume to install to. At the bottom, there was another error message that said (paraphrased) "This system may not be able to boot off the selected disk." This makes me think again that it doesn't have the correct driver to boot off the disk.
I tried it in ACHI mode, IDE compatible mode.... again trying every possible combination to get it to work. Nothing. Then I remembered -- "Ahh the Vista driver pack CD" that also came with the restore DVD. Pop that in, choose "load driver" for the disk, scan the entire CD, NOTHING....
So, to make a long story longer, I now have a $500 Dual Core 1.6ghz 3gb 300gb paperweight sitting under my desk. I can't boot off and install using the XP CD, I can't boot off and install using the Lenovo restore DVD, and I can't even boot off and install Vista Ultimate off a DVD that I had.
Can anyone tell me:
1) What the hell drivers do I need to make the XP install work? I would REALLY like XP above all else.
2) Why the hell doesn't the Lenovo system restore DVD work? Why would Vista not be able to boot off and install the disk when it's the manufacturer-provided disk to restore your system to factory state??
3) (more of a side note) Why does my serial number display as "invalid" in BIOS and also as "invalid" when I attempt to enter it on the Lenovo support site? This scares the hell out of me -- if I call, they're probably just going to tell me it's invalid. Can I get support from ANYWHERE with this issue? I'm not very happy with Lenovo at this point (but I'm just looking for a scapegoat to blame my own haste on)
Help!!

My apologies for the frustration that you have felt with your system. I just want to let you know that this is not a normal experience and I will help as much as possible to get you back towards having a working system. My experience with these boxes is rather limited since we do not normally see many escalations on them here but I will do my best to answer your concerns/issues.
1) The support site is still segmented a bit for the Lenovo IdeaCentre and Ideapad systems. For your K series desktop you have to go here to get drivers/support docs. All the available drivers should be downloadable from this link. Unfortunately I don't see any XP Drivers listed for that system however. You may have to locate drivers from the chipset manufacturers sites themselves if you want to go with a retail copy of XP. I've also found that the latest service pack for XP contains updates to many drivers and may contain the ones you need.
2) Your Recovery CD set should work. Have you tried booting off of the first CD? What errors are you encountering?
3) have you recently had anything that could have wiped out the BIOS settings? I'm curious because normally the machine type and serial are loaded from the factory.
4) For your XP Installation it appears that you got all of the XP files installed on the drive but when you rebooted it then lost site of the HDD? Is it seen in the BIOS? If so you may just have a Master Boot record that got scrambled. You can run FDISK /MBR using a XP Boot diskette and that should fix the issue if that is the source. You'll know its fixed if you get the xp logo soon after you reboot.
I would suggest that you contact the Consumer support line and get the system serviced ASAP. They can get the serial number loaded properly, fix the startup sequence problem it appears your having, and get the system reloaded properly.
You can contact them at 1-877-453-6686
Ed Shumpert
Thinkcentre/Desktops Launch Readiness Program Manager
US Service & Support

How do I install LION and partition SL 10.6.8 run on same imac?

Hello If one could tell me step by step instructions:
I would like to install LION ( because icloud), but can I install LION and partition the OS so that my imac can run both SL 10.6.8 and LION?
SL 10.6.8 still runs some applications that LION will never be able to run.
So I really need LION installed,but also have SL 10.6.8 partitioned so I can run imovie HD6 with plug ins with SL 10.6.8.
Please if this can be done so I can run Lion and SL 10.6.8 on same computer
thank you so much in advance
please advise
scott

Wow, thank you Niel. I have looked on this site and have found many different ways listed on partitioning and using 2 OS on a computer. But there steps seemed very long and tedious- but of course if that is what is needed then i would do it that way. Again i was seeing a lot of different ways. But yours seemed direct.
I went thru the steps up until using the thumb drive for LION to install. I went in to disk utilities, i selected mydrive, clicked on the partition tab, and then i saw i had 96.7 GB available--without changing SL10.6.8 HD size.
it looks like you can drag and increase/decrease the partitions with the mouse control.
I really need LION for icloud, and if so all other applications EXCEPT imovieHD6
So i need to run SL for imovieHD6 the other applications like word, adobe creative suite, excel, etc ican use LION.
do you recommend having the partitions equal in GB?
I have a 250gb hard drive
should I split the partitions evenly between the two OS?
or should one OS get more GB than another?

How do I resize my Lion startup partition?

Hi there,
I just upgraded from Snow Leopard to Lion by partitioning my drive and clean installing Lion on a blank partition. I copied most of my documents from the Snow Leopard partition onto an external hard drive to free up some space for the Lion partition. Then I made a blank partition and installed Lion on that partition, and used Migration Assistant to pull in my Applications, Settings, etc. Now I have a fully functional version of Lion, with most of my files on the Lion partition. However, the partition is virtually full, and I still have files on my external hard drive I need to swap onto the Lion partition. So naturally, I need to enlarge the Lion partition. The problem is that it's also my startup disk and the only partition with an operating system on it.
I deleted my Snow Leopard partition because frankly I'm satisfied with Lion and I don't need the old one. Yet my Lion partition cannot expand to fill that empty partition. I can leave my former Snow Leopard partition as unformatted Free Space (which is of course not writeable) or format it with HFS+ and use it as a regular storage partition. I would like to have just the one partition for my entire disk, though. I want all my files on the same partition, on the same drive, so my goal is to expand the Lion partition to occupy the entire drive. My understanding is that I can resize the startup volume, but I can't move it. Since my startup volume is #2 and the former Snow Leopard partition is #1, I would need to swap their order and delete the Snow Leopard partition to expand the Lion partition.
(The diskutil command in Terminal lists my blank/useless partition as disk0s2 and the Lion partition as disk0s3, so my current startup disk is definitely sequentially after my old one.)
The solutions I can think of:
-Use the Snow Leopard installation disk to run Disk Utility and resize the Lion partition while it is not the boot disk (but Disk Utility doesn't move partitions)
-Use iPartition to move the Lion partition and expand it to fill the entire disk (but iPartition can't resize the live disk - I would need to make a bootable DVD to run it)
-Use the former Snow Leopard partition for storage - say, a photograph archive or my iTunes library (acceptable but not ideal)
I would really appreciate any suggestions or information. Thank you!

Unfortunately, you cannot enlarge a Lion OSX partition with Disk Utility now (perhaps after an update), so even if you copy it to the old SL partition, you won't be able to expand it afterwards. Plus, the Recovery HD won't be copied.
You could "clone" your Lion partition, boot from the clone, reformat your internal HD, and re-clone back to it. That will work, with one very large exception: the Recovery HD will not be cloned, so you'll be out of luck trying to do anything from it. See Using the Recovery HD
You might be able to do the clone, reformat your internal HD, re-download the Lion Installer, install it on the internal, then use Setup Assistant to copy your stuff from the clone. See Using Setup Assistant on Lion

How do I restore new SSD on pavilion DV7 from 2nd HDD restore partition?

My DV7 came with two drives, an SSD and an IDE with the recovery on a partition of the large HDD. The SSD died. I've got a new drive and put it in, but when I hit F11 to do a restore, I get a "no bootable device" message. I sort of thot F11 would send it to the restore partition and it w/b bootable. I don't have disks. What am I doing wrong? (Other than not to make disks in the first place.)
I can't get the bios to cough up the system's installed hard drive information. I'm running a startup test now and it shows a primary hard disk self test and SMART test passed and is now working on that secondary hard disk self test which, from the length of time it's taking, must be the much larger HDD. So I'm assuming it's found the new SSD.

I've always made the rescue disks before (I'm old...My partner and I have had several laptops over the last 20 years! ) but I've looked all over and can't find them for this machine. And I honestly didn't remember this machine asking me to do it. Likely it did. Likely I made them and put them somewhere safe...which of course means I'll never find them!
I didn't know much about SSDs when I got the machine, except they were fast. I was seduced by the speedy side of the force when I was talking to the HP salesperson. My understanding was, because SSDs were still unknown quantities and more likely to demise catastrophically than HDDs, HP put the restore on the secondary drive. From what you say, this was obviously not the case. Also, the SSD is so small, you kinda need all the room you can get!
I've made DVDs from iso files before, but sadly, I can't read the windows key on the bottom of the machine. Again...I have a belarc printout...somewhere...with all the registry info on it. Probably in that safe place with the rescue disks. *facepalm*
I DID find my original receipt and turns out it had home premium, not pro (I got pro for my desktop and for my previous laptop and assumed I had for this one.) However, it also turns out I've got an extended warrantee and it's still covered (barely). I'm going to send the whole machine in for a complete overhaul. Yipppeeee!
So...I think we can mark this solved, even if somewhat unorthodoxically. Thanks very much for you help. I learned some important details about the machine, which is always a very good thing.

How to restore a question and secret answer?

How to restore a question and secret answer?

Security Questions
http://support.apple.com/kb/HT5312
Apple ID Contact
http://www.apple.com/support/appleid/contact/

Will reinstalling Lion via the Lion recovery partition cause you to loose all of your applications, documents, etc or does it just replace the Lion operating system and leave everything else untouched?

Will reinstalling Lion via the Lion recovery partition cause you to loose all of your applications, documents, etc or does it just replace the Lion operating system and leave everything else untouched?

The latter. I cant tell you how many times I've reinstalled lion! all your apps will be fine!
Things that will change are system graphics if you altered them with something like candybar or did it manually.
Having said that, you should always backup your stuff with time machine incase something does happen.
This is a very important step which will insure the safety of your files while doing things like updating or installing the OS.
Please exercise caution when doing things with a Hard Drive.

Lion restore partition question

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