Apple Updating Keyboards and Packaging for MacBook Pros: No Install Disc or Internet

Apple Updating Keyboards and Packaging for MacBook Pros: No Install Disc or Internet Recovery


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Hmm...

Apple will offer a USB thumb drive in the future for $69 to users who want to maintain their own machines, and only the current MacBook Air and Mac Mini include Internet Recovery for users who need to reinstall OS X in case of a failure — Apple is encouraging users to visit the Apple Store for hardware failures.

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I can see a lot of people crying about that. "There isn't an Apple Store where I live." "I can't lug my 27" iMac all the way from the car to the store." ...and so on.

The new "Recovery" option on the MBA was a bit disconcerting at first. I tried it for grins and it worked, but took a long time. I ended up downloading a copy of Lion and burning it to DVD and USB. It may take me a while to trust the manufacturer's servers and my ISP to get me what I need in an emergency.

XJ-linux said:

It may take me a while to trust the manufacturer's servers and my ISP to get me what I need in an emergency.

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My ISP's modem keeps dropping the connection (and thus not only our internet but our landline as well), but the ISP says everything is fine with it.


So I'm pretty much saying "ditto" here.

XJ-linux said:

The new "Recovery" option on the MBA was a bit disconcerting at first. I tried it for grins and it worked, but took a long time. I ended up downloading a copy of Lion and burning it to DVD and USB. It may take me a while to trust the manufacturer's servers and my ISP to get me what I need in an emergency.

Click to expand...

Not saying it's never going to happen, but let's be honest, how many "emergency" situations have you had where you need to immediately have access to reinstall the OS?

In my decade of using a Mac I've had that exactly zero times.

schweb said:

Not saying it's never going to happen, but let's be honest, how many "emergency" situations have you had where you need to immediately have access to reinstall the OS?

In my decade of using a Mac I've had that exactly zero times.

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Congratulations. ;D

Not too surprising that Apple is not including an OS install disk...since all new Mac's will ship with Lion...and Lion does not come on a disk.

Maybe it's a little surprising that Apple does not include Lion on a USB thumb drive...which it supposed to be available for $69 in August. Probably a cost cutting measure...and possibly Apple did some research to find out very few users used the included "gray" disks...or just lost/misplaced them (like we seem to find in many threads on Mac-Forums).

I would venture a guess (maybe someone who has a purchased a new Mac since Lion was released) that maybe a code is included for additional downloads of Lion...thus Lion could be downloaded & burned to a DVD or copied to a thumb drive for "emergency" or reinstall purposes.

- Nick

I've got to agree with schweb on this one. I have had to use my disks zero times. Besides, there's nothing to stop someone from burning their own disk or thumb drive after downloading from the MAS. Nick is likely right in that even with a preinstalled copy, another copy can be downloaded without having to pay for it.

This is just a new way of doing things so of course people are nervous or assuming it will be a disaster.

People thought the same thing when Apple:
- Dropped floppies
- Dropped Firewire in most machines
- Dropped optical in the Air

And look how all that turned out.

In the end the market will decide how this gets done.

pigoo3 said:

I would venture a guess (maybe someone who has a purchased a new Mac since Lion was released) that maybe a code is included for additional downloads of Lion...thus Lion could be downloaded & burned to a DVD or copied to a thumb drive for "emergency" or reinstall purposes.

- Nick

Click to expand...

Nope. With the new MBA (Lion) you need to use the internet method. If you want a physical copy to store locally, you need to buy and download it from the MAS like everyone else. I have a 2010 Mac Mini to upgrade, so I bought a copy and burnt it. The new Lion MBA and Mini do have a partition of about 655MB for recovery purposes and a variation of the Control-R command to access it upon boot.

Nope. With the new MBA (Lion) you need to use the internet method. If you want a physical copy to store locally, you need to buy and download it from the MAS like everyone else.

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Are you sure of this? I would have thought that even with a preinstalled copy that you could still download it for free from the MAS. It would seem to me that the recovery partition could be used for that purpose?

chscag said:

Are you sure of this? I would have thought that even with a preinstalled copy that you could still download it for free from the MAS. It would seem to me that the recovery partition could be used for that purpose?

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I tried on the Mac Mini using my Apple ID. No dice. You must pay to download it. On the new MBA, it shows as "Installed" but is not downloadable nor is any new version of anything else like Garageband, iPhoto, etc that is already installed. Those show up as installed but are not re-downloadable. Oddly enough, on the Mini, Lion now shows as "installed", even though it's only been downloaded. It does not give the option to download it a second time, but after downloading Lion to the Mini the new versions of iLife apps are available for download. I'm guessing it has to do with the receipts files.

XJ-linux said:

I tried on the Mac Mini using my Apple ID. No dice. You must pay to download it. On the new MBA, it shows as "Installed" but is not downloadable nor is any new version of anything else like Garageband, iPhoto, etc that is already installed. Those show up as installed but are not re-downloadable. Oddly enough, on the Mini, Lion now shows as "installed", even though it's only been downloaded. It does not give the option to download it a second time, but after downloading Lion to the Mini the new versions of iLife apps are available for download. I'm guessing it has to do with the receipts files.

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I'm not doubting you or anything, but try something and let us know if it works.
Go into your purchases on the MAS and hold Option while clicking on Lion. See if it doesn't give you the option to install it again. I've done the Option-click with my Lion purchased through the MAS but I haven't actually gone any further and tried to reinstall it that way. Didn't need to. I'm wondering if that will work for Macs with Lion pre-installed. Just a thought...

Good call. I'll give it a shot once Xcode is downloaded - may be a few, but I'll try.

ETA: doing the "option" trick won't install on the "new" MBA because: "A newer version of this app is already installed on this computer" and suggests moving the app (the OS?) to the trash. It says "Install" below the Lion icon in the MAS as if installing it is an option, but then throws the above error stating it's already installed.

Apparently, one needs to use the recovery option at boot to do a reinstall or possibly remove the com.apple.pkg.MacOSX10.7Leo.bom and com.apple.pkg.MacOSX10.7Leo.plist receipts. Of course, in the Receipts folder there are apparently 38 receipts with the snippet "Leo" in them from com.apple.pkg.ApplicationLoaderLeo.bom to com.apple.pkg.XcodeToolsLeo.plist... I'm guessing it's probably not worth messing with renaming all of these to see what happens with the download of Lion.