Need to reinstall Lion without Recovery HD

I need help in reinstalling Lion on my iMac after a Time Machine Backup. I found problems with Macintosh HD aduring Disk Verification nd followed directions to erase it and restor from TM. When I went to do a clean reinstall of Lion by depressing Option or Cmed-R, the Recovery HD is no longer visible. I am positive that I didn't erase the Recovery partition, but now it's not there. I would much rather do a clean install with the installer but the Apps Store tells me I already downloaded it. Any help in recovering the Recovery HD or getting an internet download is much appreciated.

First, make sure you're not pressing cmd-R too early. Wait until you hear the chime.
If that still doesn't work, go to the App Store and option-click the Purchased tab. You should then be able to install it again.

Similar Messages

  • How to reinstall Lion without recovery disk

    I want to reinstall Lion Mountain (I have downloaded it from apple store) and I dont have a recovery disk....Can anyone help me with this?

    You can make a bootable copy using:
    Lion Disk Maker

  • Reinstalling lion without wiping drive

    i need to reinstall lion without wiping my drive because i haven't made a backup yet. how do i do this?
    thanks.
    carl

    Can't you first make the backup?
    Reinstalling Lion
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    Reinstall Lion: Select Reinstall Lion and click on the Continue 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.

  • Do I need to reinstall Lion because my iPhone stopped being recognized by...

    Do I REALLY need to reinstall Lion because my iPhone stopped being recognized by Image Capture, Aperture and iPhoto but still shows up in iTunes?
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    - Recorded some video on iPhone and then tried to get iMovie to recognize device
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    Several Apps not seeing iPhone while others are recognizing the device?
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    Make a "Genius" appointment at an Apple Store, or go to another authorized service provider. You may have to leave the machine there for several days.
    Back up all data on the internal drive(s) before you hand over your computer to anyone. There are ways to back up a computer that isn't fully functional—ask if you need guidance.
    If privacy is a concern, erase the data partition(s) with the option to write zeros* (do this only if you have at least two complete, independent backups, and you know how to restore to an empty drive from any of them.) Don’t erase the recovery partition, if present.
    Keeping your confidential data secure during hardware repair
    Apple also recommends that you deauthorize a device in the iTunes Store before having it serviced.
    *An SSD doesn't need to be zeroed.

  • What happens if i need to reinstall Lion from a disc after my iMac ***** itself?

    What happens if i need to reinstall Lion from a disc after my iMac sh**'s itself?

    It depends on how bad your iMac sh**'s itself.  If you can boot into the Recovery partition, then there is  re-install option which will automatically download Lion from the store and install it.  If you can't boot into recovery then you would have needed to create a bootable Lion dvd or thumb drive to do an install.  In this case you would need to create the bootable image after downloading the Lion installer and before performing the install as the installer gets deleted upon successful upgrade to Lion.

  • Reinstall Lion without losing data?

    I bought a Mac Mini with Snow Leopard on it over the summer. I had nothing but problems with permissions. I eventually decided to buy the Server part of Lion. That has also been a headache. I have scoured the forums to find out how I can reinstall the Server hoping that would take care of the issues. It appears that reinstalling Lion then adding Server are my only options. However I need help doing this right way. I have a virtual machine and data from address book to Calendar that I can't loose. I have time Machine but I am scared of just relying on that as the permissions issues I have been having keep coming back. Apple support has been of no help with just the one issue I was having with contacts. That problem came right back after I got off the third call to Apple.
    Can I reinstall Lion without loosing my data?
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    I would do as you said, save data, or do a clone first.
    But, reinstalling Lion should only affect  those things that
    lion installs and not anything else, unless you do a clean
    install of course.  Backing up is a good precaution though
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  • I need to reinstall lion but CANT????

    i need to reinstall lion but it asks for my apple id and password, which then says this is not the apple id that purchased lion and therefore will not allow me to reinstall. help what can I do?
    i called apple yesterday and they got me to do a secure erase of the whole hard drive, but now I cant reinstall lion as per the abve reason?????

    I forgot to mention, I bought this mac book pro from ebay and cannot not contact the seller to find out what their apple id and password is. Therefore I need to reinstall Lion again, hapy to purchase it in order to install it, although not sure how I install it given I have the computer, but no operating systems came with it.
    is it possible to install Snow lepoard instead? I have the operating disks for snow leapoard although when I put the disk in, and tried to start up from the disk, it came up with a black screen and jumbled writing telling me to restart, which I did, although it did the same thing.
    Therefore what should I do?

  • Problems reinstalling Lion from Recovery service

    I'm trying to reinstall Lion from the Apple Recovery service but keep getting told after 10 hours downloading, that installation has failed.
    I'm having to do this as my machine crashed a few days ago and lost access to the operating system. I did not loose files as the machine was Bootcamped and i could access from there.
    Initially, I was told that the hard drive needed repairing, which has now happened and it's passed all it's tests via the Disk Utility but still no installation.
    I tried booting from a usb and the download recovery but no sucess.
    Can anyone advise.

    Philip Keller wrote:
    John,
    I think I'm "reinstalling OS X by booting OS X Recovery": I reboot with command-R depressed, or I reboot with Alt depressed and choose the recovery parition, and then I start the installation process from the list of things I can do. Are we talking about the same thing?
    Yes, exactly.
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    I'm surprised that Internet Recovery works at all, given that your Mac is not one of those allegedly eligible to use it.
    Without a similar 2006 iMac to test, I can only speculate that the "abysmal distribution system" as baltwo describes it just doesn't work well with earlier Macs, and that Apple may not have tested it extensively with them. If I were you I would rely upon that USB installer much more than OS X Recovery or OS X Internet Recovery. I prefer not to rely upon any installation method that can possibly result in "the server is not available at this time" or such nonsense, but that is the direction in which Apple has been going for a long time.
    An OS X installation log exists at /var/log/ that you can examine using Console, probably named "install.log". Deciphering it is another challenge.

  • Trying to erase and reinstall Lion without Apple ID

    A while back I bought a MacBook Pro from a friend. It came with a Lion Installation Disk.
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    FWIW, Lion did not come on a disk.

  • I need to reinstall lion but the control-r does not work

    My Macbook is about 3.5 years old and runs with Lion.  The System Preferences froze what in the process of changing the decktop wall paper. So I forced quit and repaired permissions/rebooted.  That did not clear up the problem and I tried Verify Disk.  The result showed that the is a HD corruption and I need to reinstall an O/S before I can repair the disk with the Disk Unitlites. 
    However, I purchased Lion through the App Store and the instructions state that I need to press Control-R to get the Apple menu that will start the process. ("OS X Lion includes a built in set of utilities in the Recovery HD. Restart your Mac and hold down the Command key and the R key (Command-R), and keep holding them until the Apple icon appears, indicating that your Mac is starting up.") This doesn't work but I wonder if that means hold these keys down WHILE or AFTER the restart happens.
    Please advise...
    M

    Control was a brain freeze... I meant command.... Bygones.
    I did get it working and Lion is now reinstalling. The time estimate started at five hours but it's, thankfully, going faster than that.
    I appreciate the help guys!

  • Crash on Update to Thunderbolt 1.2, need to reinstall Lion and failures!

    Yesterday, after the WWDC'12, Apple released many software updates, including Thunderbolt Software Update 1.2.
    When I tried to update it, I got a error, a failure that Software Update could not find this update to download it. So I close it and tried again. In this second time, it "worked".
    So, after it, my Macbook Pro (2011) restarted and then I could not login on my Administrator account anymore! I put my password and it was stuck loading for a long time, without going forward. (PS: Guest account worked fine).
    After several reboots, I tried cmd+R, used the Lion Recovery and reinstalled Lion over the old Lion.
    It didn't work.
    So I went to cmd+R again, and tried scan the disk (no errors found) and repair the permissions.
    My MBP rebooted again and, when I put my password to my Administrator acc, I got a Kernel Panic! And this also repeated every time I rebooted my Mac.
    So, I decided to erase my Macintosh HD and install a clean Lion. The installation went fine (so it seems, because I left it over night), but when I woke up this morning, my Mac was stuck again, in this screen:
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    Not sure if relevant, but yesterday I also deleted my non admin account (which it was that I used as primarily), because it was a little slow and I decided to erase it. But I think I couldn't mess up things because, for delete it, I was logged into my admin account and used System Prefs > Users & Groups (or something like that... my SO is not in English)
    PS: English is not my native language, so forgive for any mistakes I could have made.

    == yeeeha! ==
    source fix: http://www.alexhutnik.com/2012/06/13/how-to-fix-kernel-panic-from-thunderbolt-up date-1-2-without-reinstalling-os-x-lion-or-booting-from-another-mac/
    combo update:http://support.apple.com/downloads/DL1524/en_US/MacOSXUpdCombo10.7.4.dmg
    data status: RESTORED
    Note: This is only a workaround for thunderbolt driver problem. If you download and update “it” again, you’ll get your kernel panic again.
    “it” – thunderbold update driver.
    == Good to have colleagues around. ==

  • Last Time Machine back-up is 45 days old and only of User Account files (not entire HD) and I must now reinstall Lion without being able to perform a new back-up. Will any new User Account files, since my last back-up, be lost when Lion reinstalls (via i

    My last Time Machine back-up is 45 days old and only of User Account files (not entire HD) and I must now reinstall Lion (via internet) without  performing a new back-up. Will any new User Account files, since my last back-up, be lost when Lion reinstalls ?

    Reinstalling OS X doesn't affect user data, provided nothing goes wrong. But it would be very unwise to assume that nothing will go wrong, especially if you're having (unspecified) system issues. You should try to back up all data before you reinstall or do anything else. There are ways to do that, even if you're unable to boot.
    If your backups include only user files, you won't be able to access them in Setup Assistant.

  • Dmg files are not executable - need to reinstall Lion( but will mount)

    iMac 27, 2.8 Quad Core, 16 GB RAM, 3 TB HD running 10.7.3
    Hi,
    lead in > Lately I am having trouble with Aperture 3.2.3 who doesn't let me make some image adjustments "out of the blue". To correct this I usially have to reinstall Aperture from scratch. Trying to do so made me find out that I can't execute the Aperture trial 3.1 dmg file or any other dmg file on my iMac. When i double klick on a dmg file it will flash once and then just sit there doing nothing. The dmg "Get Info" window shows that the file is associated with the DiskImageMounter.app as supposed to. I have no glue why it won't execute these files and open the installer. I have tried everything from executing with disk image to repair permissions etc, etc. and I have read all forums and threats I could find but to no avail.
    The only way to fix this is reinstalling OSX 10.7.3. After reinstalling Lion everything is just fine  - for a while. I am able to reinstall aperture with the trial version dmg file. All other dmg files will also execute. For now I was able to work with my reinstalled system for the last seven days with no glitches, but last night same problem occured as described earlier. I have also checked my harddrive with disk utility and onyx. Both apps say HD is just fine. I wonder how long I will be able to work this time before desaster strikes me again. I should probably mention that the non executable dmg file problem only kicks in after I experience the Aperture problems I mentioned.
    Should I reformat my HD and reinstall all my content and OS from a clone Super Duper copy that I have? I appreciate any comments/suggestioms you guys might come up with. Thanks.

    Launch the Console application in any of the following ways:
    ☞ Enter the first few letters of its name into a Spotlight search. Select it in the results (it should be at the top.)
    ☞ In the Finder, select Go ▹ Utilities from the menu bar, or press the key combination shift-command-U. The application is in the folder that opens.
    ☞ If you’re running Mac OS X 10.7 or later, open LaunchPad. Click Utilities, then Console in the page that opens.
    Click the Clear Display icon in the toolbar. Try the action again. Post any messages that appear in the Console window – the text, please, not a screenshot.

  • Can't reinstall lion without Apple ID used to purchase???

    Can't reinstall lion. It's asking for an Apple ID that was used to purchase OS X Lion?? I don't understand why I'm being asked that when it came already setup so I didn't have to buy it.
    How do I get pass this question to install??
    Or, how do I buy lion

    I can't remember downloading it when I brought the mac but if I did I would of only used one ID and it's not working. I did buy the newer version at some stage that would change anything would it?
    Iv brought lion from the store waiting on the redemption code now(waste of money) see if that works.
    Just when I thought apple were becoming easy to work with!!!

  • "Recovery system can't be created" error when reinstalling Lion from recovery system

    I get the infamous OS installation error "Install failed... because a recovery system can't be created" – but in fact, the recovery system already exists, since I'm installing from it, and incidentally, I've previously already used it for an Internet reinstallation. I've tried about a half dozen iterations now.
    Here's the exact sequence of events:
    Reboot on recovery drive.
    Select option to reinstall the OS from the network.
    License agreement, etc; then select drive -> install -> sign into Apple store.
    "Downloading additional components" message. 1st attempt consistently fails at this stage, need to restart at step 2.
    Download for roughly 20 minutes, then automatic reboot -> "Installing Mac OS X".
    After about 10 minutes: "Install failed. Mac OS X could not be installed on your computer. Mac OS X can't be installed on the disk ..., because a recovery system can't be created. Visit www.apple.com/support/no-recovery to learn more."
    I've pawed through innumerable posts of people who have gotten the same error message, but haven't found one that reproduces my circumstances. I've reviewed the KB articles "OS X: About OS X Recovery" and "OS X Lion: Installer reports This disk cannot be used to start up your computer", with no luck. Based on a suggestion in the second KB article, I've reduced the primary partition size by roughly a GB and retried - no luck.
    See this thread if you want to know why I'm reinstalling the OS, even though it's (more or less) functioning and I have Time Machine backups. It would also make me feel a lot better to know that the reinstallation would work in case of real need. Thanks in advance for any help.
    -- Phil

    Philip Keller wrote:
    John,
    I think I'm "reinstalling OS X by booting OS X Recovery": I reboot with command-R depressed, or I reboot with Alt depressed and choose the recovery parition, and then I start the installation process from the list of things I can do. Are we talking about the same thing?
    Yes, exactly.
    I think that OS X Internet Recovery would be necessary only if you were to attempt a Lion installation with a completely empty HD, implying that even a Recovery partition has not been created. Your USB flash drive is the way to cope in that circumstance. If you can install Lion by booting the recovery partition as you described, it seems to me that it is all that is necessary and there is nothing to fix, despite the error message you see.
    I'm surprised that Internet Recovery works at all, given that your Mac is not one of those allegedly eligible to use it.
    Without a similar 2006 iMac to test, I can only speculate that the "abysmal distribution system" as baltwo describes it just doesn't work well with earlier Macs, and that Apple may not have tested it extensively with them. If I were you I would rely upon that USB installer much more than OS X Recovery or OS X Internet Recovery. I prefer not to rely upon any installation method that can possibly result in "the server is not available at this time" or such nonsense, but that is the direction in which Apple has been going for a long time.
    An OS X installation log exists at /var/log/ that you can examine using Console, probably named "install.log". Deciphering it is another challenge.

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