iPotential
Level 1 (24 points)
iPhone

Q: How do I upgrade from Lion to Snow Leopard?

Snow Leopard has this great feature called Expose which is a great improvement on Lion's App Expose (and Mission Control).

 

Can someone point me to the steps I need to take to upgrade from Lion to Snow Leopard?

Posted on Jul 23, 2011 12:09 AM

by ds store,Solvedanswer
ds store ds store
Level 7 (30,400 points)
A:

Written just for you (ok it's a paste)

 

 

Back to Snow Leopard from Lion install method

 

 

Read and print out these instructions, your computer is going to be offline and you wil be cutoff from help until your machine is restored.

 

Clear the Desktop, Downloads and Trash of anything you wish to keep by placing their files in the respective Documents, Music, Pictures, Movie folders.

 

Disconnect other drives except the backup drive as to avoid any mistake.

 

Backup ALL your Users folders (Documents, Pictures, Movies, Music etc) manually (drag and drop methods) to a (not TimeMachine) external powered drive (HFS+ journaled formatted in Disk Utility) and disconnect, your going to be wiping the entire disk of ALL DATA. (warning, everything will be gone and not recovered, OS, programs, files, Windows etc all gone.)

 

Note: You might want to hold c and boot off the 10.6 installer disk and use Disk Utility to format the new blank external drive instead of using OS X Lion that's hosed. Then reboot into Lion and copy files, be safer that way perhaps.

 

 

Here we go!

 

Hold c and boot off the 10.6 installer disk that comes with your computer and second screen in just STOP there, don't install OS X yet.

 

Look at the Utilities Menu for Disk Utility.

 

On the left is the name of your hard drive maker, click it and Erase (format HFS+ Journaled), give it the same drive name as before, and click Erase...

 

(note: if you want to "scrub" the drive of old files that haven't been overwritten yet, then use the Security Option > Zero Erase, takes a lot longer)

 

This should wipe the drive of ALL partitions (GUID, OS X and 10.7 Recovery, Windows if present)

 

When it's done, quit and install OS X 10.6. Then install all your programs from fresh sources and validate/update.

 

 

When you setup a first account, use the same user name as before, this way you can simply drag and drop the content of your previous Users folders from the external drive right back into the new Users folders and everything should work peachy. Links in iTunes to music, playlists and iPhoto links especially.

 

Update OS X to 10.6.8 using the Combo Update for best results.

 

http://support.apple.com/kb/DL1399

 

(Note: If your original machine had 10.5 and you want the free iLife that comes with the disks with the computer, then you'll have to install 10.5 first using the same c boot/erase/format methods as above, then update to 10.6 via the disk, then Combo Update 10.6.8)

 

 

Final step optional but highly recommended.

 

A lot of people use a Carbon Copy Clone of their boot drive to a new HFS+Journaled external drive (used only for this purpose) as a "hold the option key" bootable backup in case something goes wrong with their boot drive or need to restore to a previous OS X version..  (in addition to TimeMachine drive for more immediate backups.)

 

It's not advised to have a Bootable Clone and a TimeMachine partition on the same external drive, as two drives gives hardware protection in case one fails.

Posted on Jul 23, 2011 12:38 AM

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Q: How do I upgrade from Lion to Snow Leopard?

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  • Helpful answers

  • by baltwo,Helpful

    baltwo baltwo Jul 23, 2011 12:35 AM in response to iPotential
    Level 9 (62,256 points)
    Jul 23, 2011 12:35 AM in response to iPotential

    FWIW, going from Lion to Snow Leopard would be a downgrand. Simplest thing to do is restore the bootable backup/clone or Time Machine backup of your previous Snow Leopard volume. Hardest would be to boot with the Snow Leopard install disc, erase the Lione volume, losing all of your documents, settings, and 3rd-party apps, reinstalling SL and those 3rd-party apps, and resetting your settings.

  • by ds store,Solvedanswer

    ds store ds store Jul 23, 2011 12:38 AM in response to iPotential
    Level 7 (30,400 points)
    Jul 23, 2011 12:38 AM in response to iPotential

    Written just for you (ok it's a paste)

     

     

    Back to Snow Leopard from Lion install method

     

     

    Read and print out these instructions, your computer is going to be offline and you wil be cutoff from help until your machine is restored.

     

    Clear the Desktop, Downloads and Trash of anything you wish to keep by placing their files in the respective Documents, Music, Pictures, Movie folders.

     

    Disconnect other drives except the backup drive as to avoid any mistake.

     

    Backup ALL your Users folders (Documents, Pictures, Movies, Music etc) manually (drag and drop methods) to a (not TimeMachine) external powered drive (HFS+ journaled formatted in Disk Utility) and disconnect, your going to be wiping the entire disk of ALL DATA. (warning, everything will be gone and not recovered, OS, programs, files, Windows etc all gone.)

     

    Note: You might want to hold c and boot off the 10.6 installer disk and use Disk Utility to format the new blank external drive instead of using OS X Lion that's hosed. Then reboot into Lion and copy files, be safer that way perhaps.

     

     

    Here we go!

     

    Hold c and boot off the 10.6 installer disk that comes with your computer and second screen in just STOP there, don't install OS X yet.

     

    Look at the Utilities Menu for Disk Utility.

     

    On the left is the name of your hard drive maker, click it and Erase (format HFS+ Journaled), give it the same drive name as before, and click Erase...

     

    (note: if you want to "scrub" the drive of old files that haven't been overwritten yet, then use the Security Option > Zero Erase, takes a lot longer)

     

    This should wipe the drive of ALL partitions (GUID, OS X and 10.7 Recovery, Windows if present)

     

    When it's done, quit and install OS X 10.6. Then install all your programs from fresh sources and validate/update.

     

     

    When you setup a first account, use the same user name as before, this way you can simply drag and drop the content of your previous Users folders from the external drive right back into the new Users folders and everything should work peachy. Links in iTunes to music, playlists and iPhoto links especially.

     

    Update OS X to 10.6.8 using the Combo Update for best results.

     

    http://support.apple.com/kb/DL1399

     

    (Note: If your original machine had 10.5 and you want the free iLife that comes with the disks with the computer, then you'll have to install 10.5 first using the same c boot/erase/format methods as above, then update to 10.6 via the disk, then Combo Update 10.6.8)

     

     

    Final step optional but highly recommended.

     

    A lot of people use a Carbon Copy Clone of their boot drive to a new HFS+Journaled external drive (used only for this purpose) as a "hold the option key" bootable backup in case something goes wrong with their boot drive or need to restore to a previous OS X version..  (in addition to TimeMachine drive for more immediate backups.)

     

    It's not advised to have a Bootable Clone and a TimeMachine partition on the same external drive, as two drives gives hardware protection in case one fails.

  • by iPotential,

    iPotential iPotential Jul 23, 2011 1:05 AM in response to baltwo
    Level 1 (24 points)
    iPhone
    Jul 23, 2011 1:05 AM in response to baltwo

    baltwo wrote:

     

    FWIW, going from Lion to Snow Leopard would be a downgrand. Simplest thing to do is restore the bootable backup/clone or Time Machine backup of your previous Snow Leopard volume. Hardest would be to boot with the Snow Leopard install disc, erase the Lione volume, losing all of your documents, settings, and 3rd-party apps, reinstalling SL and those 3rd-party apps, and resetting your settings.

     

    I actually have uptodate Time Machine, however I'm thinking that a fresh install might be a good idea anyway to clear out the apps that I don't use anymore.

  • by iPotential,

    iPotential iPotential Jul 23, 2011 1:13 AM in response to ds store
    Level 1 (24 points)
    iPhone
    Jul 23, 2011 1:13 AM in response to ds store

    ds store wrote:

     

    Written just for you (ok it's a paste)

     

    ....

     

    Ha ha, seriously though that is fantastic - I am really looking forward to getting this Mac back to Snow Leopard. 

     

    I don't mind the new features - even learning the "natural" swipe direction was fun - but what they did to Expose is a deal breaker.

  • by iPotential,

    iPotential iPotential Jul 23, 2011 2:21 AM in response to ds store
    Level 1 (24 points)
    iPhone
    Jul 23, 2011 2:21 AM in response to ds store

    ds store wrote:

     

    Backup ALL your ... external powered drive (HFS+ journaled formatted in Disk Utility)

     

    Is that the same as "Mac OS Extended (Journaled)"?

  • by w7ox,Helpful

    w7ox w7ox Jul 23, 2011 11:43 AM in response to iPotential
    Level 4 (2,389 points)
    Jul 23, 2011 11:43 AM in response to iPotential

    iPotential wrote:

     

    ds store wrote:

     

    Backup ALL your ... external powered drive (HFS+ journaled formatted in Disk Utility)

     

    Is that the same as "Mac OS Extended (Journaled)"?

     

    Yes.

  • by iPotential,

    iPotential iPotential Jul 24, 2011 5:29 AM in response to ds store
    Level 1 (24 points)
    iPhone
    Jul 24, 2011 5:29 AM in response to ds store

    Thank you so much for that advice, it worked perfectly. And, my Time Machine backup worked like a charm.

     

    Exposé is such an improvement on App Exposé (and Mission Control).

     

    The upgrade from Lion to Snow Leopard was definitely worth the (minimal) effort.

  • by Michaël Betsch,

    Michaël Betsch Michaël Betsch Nov 23, 2011 11:16 PM in response to iPotential
    Level 1 (5 points)
    Nov 23, 2011 11:16 PM in response to iPotential

    For the love of all that's holy, I don't understand how anyone at Apple can actually consider Mission Control an improvement over even Mac OS 10.3's Exposé.

  • by ds store,

    ds store ds store Nov 23, 2011 11:53 PM in response to Michaël Betsch
    Level 7 (30,400 points)
    Nov 23, 2011 11:53 PM in response to Michaël Betsch

    Steve was off vacationing in Japan the last year of his life, he likely didn't input much on 10.7, and we see the result.

  • by artstu,

    artstu artstu Jul 29, 2012 11:12 AM in response to iPotential
    Level 1 (0 points)
    Jul 29, 2012 11:12 AM in response to iPotential

    Does anyone connected to the development team read these forums?

     

    Expose & Spaces were such a useful [and much loved] part of the OS- why such a huge backwards step? And why not remedy the situation– are they just being pig– headed, or do they really feel they've made a real improvement here? It almost seems as though the OS developers are out to spite us customers.