Warning: Do not re-install Lion unless you really have to

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Warning: Do not re-install Lion unless you really have to

I always pay the price by being an early OS X upgrade adopter! 😟

After two days worth of dealing with the new Mail's failure to migrate my former 60,000+ email respository, I decided to re-install Lion... thinking that the Mail app may have been at fault. BIG MISTAKE!

My Mail problems remain (see the HUGE stream of problems on that front in the Mail-related forum(s)), but the re-install totally clobbered all my system related settings, by desktop geography, and god knows what else. I had about 100 icons in my dock. All of them were trashed, leaving only the basic 15 or so Apple apps.

The re-install took over 4 hours compared to my original install of about 3 hours. There were no indications at any point along the way that anything was wrong, and my final indication from the installer was that everything is cool. Not so!

I doubt if there's a quick fix for this, but if there might be, please let me know ASAP. Otherwise, I suspect that I have many hours of work ahead of me rebuilding the left-side, Finder window list, resetting all of my System Preferences, rebuilding my Dock, etc.

I know this is the first time that Apple has built the re-install into your hard-drive, but I have have nothing good to say about this. Give me an old-fashion DVD disk re-installer anyday.

...Charles

Posted on Jul 22, 2011 9:59 AM

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Answer 1

ebinellis

Level 3

685 points

Jul 22, 2011 10:03 AM in response to cp_whaley

Did you have a Time Machine backup?

You can restore your preferences to obtain most of your settings back.

Sorry to hear about the troubles though, thats never fun.

EE

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Answer 2

Jul 22, 2011 10:04 AM in response to cp_whaley

SO IS LIKE REINSTALL IS A CLEAN INSTALL,I MEAN IT DOESN'T SAVE YOUR FILES OR APPS JUST INSTALL LION IS LIKE IT DELETE EVERYTHING AND INSTALL A FRESH NEW COPY OF LION.

AM I RIGHT?

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Answer 3

cp_whaley Author

Level 1

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Jul 22, 2011 10:12 AM in response to Thebestplacehere

Thebestplacehere wrote:

SO IS LIKE REINSTALL IS A CLEAN INSTALL,I MEAN IT DOESN'T SAVE YOUR FILES OR APPS JUST INSTALL LION IS LIKE IT DELETE EVERYTHING AND INSTALL A FRESH NEW COPY OF LION.

AM I RIGHT?

No, it's not that bad. All files and apps are still there, but it seems that all the settings that you've made for everything were erased, so you have to redo it. Just resizing and moving all my desktop icons back were they were before tokk me over a half-hour.

Thebestplacehere wrote:

SO IS LIKE REINSTALL IS A CLEAN INSTALL,I MEAN IT DOESN'T SAVE YOUR FILES OR APPS JUST INSTALL LION IS LIKE IT DELETE EVERYTHING AND INSTALL A FRESH NEW COPY OF LION.

AM I RIGHT?

Thanks, I should have thought of that. I should have a TM back that's pretty current. I'll just need to figure out which files to restore. Any suggestions from anyone. Maybe just the Library Preferences folder? My concern is that Lion may have a whole new set of Preferences that I shouldn't be overwrting.

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Answer 4

Jul 22, 2011 10:11 AM in response to Thebestplacehere

I think that's right, and you are prompted to use a TM backup to get all the settings / apps / etc. back from there. But for the love of pete, why people would ever rely on TM or any other method of disaster recovery other then having a clone is beyond me. A clone is the best way to get things back when you really need them. But in the op's case, that would not help, as you need a clone of a stable system in the first place.

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Answer 5

ebinellis

Level 3

685 points

Jul 22, 2011 11:11 AM in response to cp_whaley

You are fine to restore your Preferences folder and all contained contents, the Lion folder structure is largly unchanged, and the changes that have been implemented are not on a level the average user will come into contact with. save the hiding of the library and such.

You could also create a new user completely, log into it and remove your user, and then use Migration Assistant to pull your user back from your Time Machine backup for a complete restore of everything (be sure to back up any new documents and data created since your last Time Machine backup prior.)

In regards to clones (coocooforcocoapuffs), I've run into a number of problems with users employing cloning software, both CCC and SuperDuper, you would be suprised how many of the people on these boards with issues upgrading are dealing with underlying issues caused by cloning in the past.

In my opinion Time Machine treads the line between recovery and rebuilding well, allowing you to have a clean OS reinstalled if needed without the excess work of starting from scratch in terms of settings and configuration.

Then again I've got an old school mindset to computers, and think a new OS install every once in awhile isn't a bad thing.

To each his own...

EE

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Answer 6

Philly_Phan

Level 7

20,707 points

Jul 22, 2011 11:13 AM in response to cp_whaley

cp_whaley wrote:

I had about 100 icons in my dock.

Wow. How could you find anything?

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Answer 7

cp_whaley Author

Level 1

0 points

Jul 22, 2011 12:09 PM in response to ebinellis

ebinellis wrote:

You are fine to restore your Preferences folder and all contained contents, the Lion folder structure is largly unchanged, and the changes that have been implemented are not on a level the average user will come into contact with. save the hiding of the library and such.

Your second suggestion sounds a little inimidating, but I think I need help just restoring Preferences from TM. I actually decided to pick a good restore shortly after my first Lion Install and restore the whole Library. Unfortunately I got a message that I couldn't do the Restore since OS X is using it. Same thing if I just selected the Preferences folder inside Library.

Suggestions? I hope this works, because I'm going crazy not being able to find stuff as quickly as I used to, and every app launched seems to require a reconfiguration.

You also suggested that one could do a full OS restore this way. Again, I'm not sure how you'd do that while your current OS X is running.

...Charles

BTW "Philly" People who see my Mac can't believe it, but 100 icons in the Dock is OK with me. I know roughly where they all are even though the icons are small. As I scroll over, the labels pop up to confirm.

Right now, I just wish that I was spending my time learning the new features, instead of fixing things to work like they used to work.

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Answer 8

Jul 22, 2011 12:20 PM in response to cp_whaley

Where, where, where is the Mail forum????

And I completely agree with cp_whaley's last sentence 100%.

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Answer 9

cp_whaley Author

Level 1

0 points

Jul 22, 2011 12:30 PM in response to Alex Zavatone

Alex... I guess I should have been more specific. I kicked off a topic on Lion Mail on Wednesday. Just search on my subject "Lion ate ALL my mail". Since this was Lion installation specific, I didn't go looking for a Mail forum even though I assumed that there probably was one somewhere.

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Answer 10

cp_whaley Author

Level 1

0 points

Jul 23, 2011 9:07 AM in response to ebinellis

ebinellis...

You indicated that restoring my Preferences and all other app configuration info that was lost during my Lion re-install shouldn't be a problem.

Unfortunately, it seems to be. If I try a Time Machine restore of the Preferences folder in my Library, I'm informed that the folder is in use by Mac OS X and can't be done.

Will I have to reboot from another system disk to pull this off?

I'm also wondering what other Library folders I should retore? I've basically lost my Dock contents, all setup/configuration files for my apps, the layout of my desktop since before I did the re-install, my sidebar lists from Finder windows, and possibly some other goodies.

...Charles

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Answer 11

The hatter

Level 9

60,990 points

Jul 23, 2011 9:35 AM in response to cp_whaley

Clone what you have now. Make and maintain multiple backup types and sets.

Use another drive if you can to do a clean install of Lion also, then point Setup Assistant where you want to import from (TM, clone, etc).

Mail threaded view can eat up 80% of all your processor cores so it really can hog and bog down.

How to prepare your Mac for OS X 10.7 Lion

How to create an OS X Lion installation disc MacFixIt

Upgrading to Mac OS X Lion Protocol

OS X Lion Install to Different Drive

Using Cloning as a Backup Strategy

How to keep Snow Leopard when upgrading to Lion

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Answer 12

Jul 23, 2011 9:57 AM in response to The hatter

Mail threaded view can eat up 80% of all your processor cores so it really can hog and bog down.

Ha! Where did you pull that number from? Seems to me firefox is still the biggest pig in the pen.

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Answer 13

cp_whaley Author

Level 1

0 points

Jul 27, 2011 2:24 PM in response to cp_whaley

Just saying that I was able to do a complete system restore form Time Machine from a date between my original installation and the date that I did the destructive Lion re-install.

So, I'm declaring that I've solved my own problem, although I think the warning is still appropriate... especially for those who don't use Time Machine.

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