installing lion with external display

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I have a Macbook with a broken internal display

When I try to install lion it boots up to the installer but all I get is the grey texture screen on my external display. The alt key also doesn't let me choose a boot drive

Is there any way of getting the installer to mirror the display, tried various key shortcuts to no effect and i believe the installer goes in to a full screen app.

I'm stuck and at this rate will have to just re-install Snow leopard and Time machine everything back to 10.6
 

chscag

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I've seen this question asked a number of times in the forums. Unfortunately without another Mac to use for Target mode, there's no way to accomplish it with just an external monitor and broken display on the installing machine.
 
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louishen
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Thanks, it wasn't using target disk mode, but the solution is simplicity itself.

Close the lid and restart, forces the mac to use the external display only
 

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Ah, forgot about the clamshell mode. Thanks for posting that.
 
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The question becomes, what do you do when the notebook has no lid? For example, I have a MacBook 2,1 that is lidless from having a damaged screen which has been converted into a media machine to control my HD television. Since the function key no longer mirrors the display with Lion, the trick is to figure out how to get it into a closed clamshell state. I'm assuming there are magnetic triggers or I'm missing a switch somewhere. Going to have to research this more when I get some time, but if anyone knows off the top, I'd much appreciate the information as it would be great to just simply run it in a closed state continually given it's circumstances.
 
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The following worked great to get the unit to install Lion without the primary display working on a MacBook or MacBook Pro: http://bit.ly/nWqnlm

Turns out that simply a magnet over the frame lock slot is the trick. Mine was on the left side and down in the middle of the unit. Lion is purring along.
 

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