Is there some way to tell which version of Lion is on the Recovery partition? I.e., whether it's the latest, 10.7.3?
I did upgrade the OS to 10.7.3, but am unsure which version of the installer I used and hence unsure whether the recovery partition is 10.7.3.
(The post http://hints.macworld.com/article.php?story=20120316132618149#lsrc.nl_mwhints_h prompted me to ask thisl.)
iMac, Mac OS X (10.7.3), 3.4GHz Corei7, 16GB, SSD + 2T HD
The recovery partition is updated along with the boot partition, so has the same version.
According to the cited MacWorld article in my original post: "Recently, 10.7.3 came out, however, and the RecoveryHD partition is not updated if you use Software Update; it will stay at 10.7.2."
Go to the App Store and download and install the full version OS 10.7.3 as suggested in that article.
Pete
I have no idea whether that's true or how the author of the article would know it. You'd have to ask him.
I was hoping to avoid having to go through the work of installing the full OS 10.7.3 as suggested in the article, or even doing what the article said to do with a script, since I already upgraded to 10.7.3 (first to 10.7.2 and later to 10.7.3). Which is why I wanted to know how to tell what version the recovery partition holds.
Does it really matter? If you ever need to reinstall for some reason from the restore partition you will get the latest OSX installed on your computer anyway won't you? I think you are over complicating things for yourself and worrying needlessly.
Pete
Just download the Full Client Combo from the Apple download website.
Here is a link directly to the download.
Shootist007 wrote:
Just download the Full Client Combo from the Apple download website.
Here is a link directly to the download.
I believe that's what I did when I upgraded from OS 10.7.2 to 10.7.3. The issue is whether using that Full Client Combo also updated the recovery partition.
If you downloaded the REAL Client Combo update, not using Software Update< and then ran that download it should of updated the RHD. But from what I read the RHD is at Version 1. I just rebuilt mine the other night and mine now reads on About Mac OS X Utilities Version 1 (33).
I haven't bothered re-running the Client Combo update as I already have 10.7.3 installed.
I found a way to directly determine the version number of a Recovery HD partition.
First, enable Disk Utility's Debug menu. This can be done in Terminal via
defaults write com.apple.DiskUtility DUDebugMenuEnabled -bool true
and can also be done using Onyx (Parameters tab>Misc tab >Disc utility section.
Then launch Disk Utility, and choose:
Debug menu > Show every partition
All the partitions, including any Recovery HD partitions, will then be visible in the left pane of Disk Utility. Select the Recovery HD partition you want to explore, and click Mount in the Disk Utility toolbar. A disk icon for Recovery HD will appear on the Desktop, and you can open it with Finder.
Next navigate to
Recovery HD > com.apple.recovery.boot > SystemVersion.plist
You can then peek into that file with QuickLook or with Finder's column view, or you can open it with a property list editor. When I looked there with Finder in my own OS X 10.7.3 system, I saw that the Recovery HD version was still 10.7.2:
.
.
When opened with a property list editor, it looked like this:
.
However, even though my Recovery HD version was not updated, it likely doesn't matter. I expect that it would always download the "current" version of Lion if a reinstall were needed, as was mentioned earlier. I haven't tested this, though.
The solution by jsd2 revealed the ProductVersion on Recovery HD to be 10.7.2.
Now I have to consider whether to go to the trouble of updating that now. My OS is at 10.7.3. And my experience is that sooner or later I'll somehow let some system file get corrupted that will require a re-install. The only question is whether that will happen before or after 10.7.4 is released.
You do realize that the recovery partition will download the entire OS? I have tested it and that is what it did: with my connection, it took almost 90 minutes to download. It was the entire OS - the only difference: instead of presenting me with an installer I could copy to a safe place (in case I need it again), it automatically went into the install process when if finished with the download.
jsd2 wrote:
However, even though my Recovery HD version was not updated, it likely doesn't matter. I expect that it would always download the "current" version of Lion if a reinstall were needed, as was mentioned earlier. I haven't tested this, though.
Doing a bit of reading jsd2 and you are correct in all answers. And it appears that even having 10.7.2 show on the Recovery HD a reinstall will update that to 10.7.3 (apparently) but the most important thing as you say is that it will not stop the Mac installing the most current version of Lion back onto your system. You can of course do a complete reinstall now just to update the Recovery partition to 10.7.3 but I wouldn't bother doing that for the tiny gain of comfort you would get.
Thanks also for the tip.
Pete
Murray,
I agree with Peter, and don't really see an operational problem here. There may be something that the Recovery HD version 10.7.3 does "better" than version 10.7.2, but re-installing Lion itself doesn't seem to be a significant issue. For example, I am currently running Lion 10.7.3. If I damage that OS, and need the Recovery HD to reinstall Lion, the Recovery HD will have to then download a full version of Lion from Apple's servers. And even though my Recovery HD is labeled 10.7.2, it will apparently download and install whatever full Lion version is the "current one", in this case 10.7.3.
But even if it instead downloaded and installed v 10.7.2, one would then just be in the same situation that has been the case all along for OS versions prior to Lion- you would just run software update or download the appropriate updater to bring the system version back to the current one. For example, I have a dual-boot setup, and am currently running Snow Leopard 10.6.8 on some of my disks. If I need to re-install Snow Leopard at some point, I don't have version 10.6.8 directly available on an installer. My only Snow Leopard install DVD is the one that came with my computer, and that is v 10.6.2. That's not a significant problem - I would just install 10.6.2 first, and then update back to 10.6.8 via a combo updater.
How tell which Lion version on Recovery partition?
