recreate deleted recovery partition in Lion

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recreate deleted recovery partition in Lion

My iMac (27-inch, Mid 2011) came with Lion installed. I deleted the recovery partition when I triple booted with Windows 7, Ubuntu and Mac OS.

Is there any way to re-create a deleted recovery partition in Lion? I've read that you can download Lion from the App Store & write it to a USB using the Disk Utility.

I am currently dual booting with Mac OS X Lion (10.7.4) and Windows 7 (installed via Boot Camp).

Please give step-by-step instructions if possible.

iMac, Mac OS X (10.7.4), iMac 27-inch, Mid 2011

Posted on Jun 30, 2012 9:01 AM

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Answer 1

_wli

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Jun 30, 2012 10:04 AM in response to Andrew_Snod

If your system initially had a recovery partition but after cloning and formatting it is no longer available, then one method of getting it back is to simply download and reinstall Lion from the Mac App Store. Doing this should keep your data and installed applications intact, but result in a fresh local Recovery HD partition installed along side your OS installation.

source: http://reviews.cnet.com/8301-13727_7-57366205-263/how-to-restore-a-missing-recov ery-hd-partition-in-lion/

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Answer 2

Andrew_Snod Author

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Jun 30, 2012 10:46 PM in response to _wli

I saw that article a while ago _wli. Thanks though!

Do you think reinstalling Lion from the App Store would affect my Windows 7 partition? Windows 7 gets lost easily if partitionts are created or the any other sort of hard drive manipulation is carried out.

I could delete the Windows 7 parition, expand Lion so it takes up the entire hard drive then try updating from the App Store to be on the safe side. What do you think?

Thanks for replying!

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Answer 3

_wli

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Jul 1, 2012 12:57 PM in response to Andrew_Snod

Actually, have you tried the Internet Recovery Firmware mentions in the article I sent you before?

If you have a newer Mac system, then as long as you have the latest firmware updates installed you should be able to use Apple's Internet Recovery feature and can bypass the need for a local Recovery HD partition. Apple recently released new EFI firmwareupdates for mid-2010 MacBook and Mac Mini systems that enable Internet Recovery, but there are also updates available for newer 2011 Mac models that do the same thing. With the Internet Recovery enabled in the Mac's firmware, to use it you just need to restart with the Command-R keys held down. If there is no local Recovery HD partition available, then the system will ask you to join a network. You will need a Wi-Fi connection available that is secured with a WPA or WPA2 password (other forms of connection such as WEP and certificate-based authentication will not work), and then the system will download and boot from a recovery image file obtained from Apple's servers.

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Answer 4

Andrew_Snod Author

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Jul 3, 2012 5:09 PM in response to _wli

The internet recovery doesn't work. I tried that a while ago. I think it's because I deleted the recover partition.

Do you know if reinstalling Lion from the App Store will mess up my Windows 7 partition? If you don't know I will probably delete Windows 7, expand Mac OS then download Lion from the App Store like you originally suggested.

That seems to be that way that will cause less confusion to the hard drive.

Thanks!

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Answer 5

_wli

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83 points

Jul 3, 2012 8:57 PM in response to Andrew_Snod

while I am not 100% sure, but you can try installing Lion over current install (without formatting or anything).

once reinstalled, try to see if you can still boot into bootcamp.

if the windows booting is gone after the new installation of Lion, just run bootcamp again to clear up the problems with windows boot... maybe you can keep everything the way it is 🙂

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Answer 6

Andrew_Snod Author

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Jul 12, 2012 7:49 AM in response to _wli

Yeah, I might do that. I'll backup whatever important stuff I have in Windows 7 just in case. I'll backup data in Mac OS X Lion too for the same reason.

Ha, I installed Ubuntu 12.04 in VirtualBox on my iMac tonight! It was pretty fun. Tried triple booting with rEFIt a while ago which is what caused me to delete the recovery partition in the first place. Oh well. VirtualBox works pretty well.

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Answer 7

Andrew_Snod Author

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Jul 13, 2012 7:17 PM in response to _wli

Hey _wli,

Just letting you know I removed Windows 7 with Boot Camp, downloaded Lion from the App Store, reinstalled it & everything was fine. I have all my data & programs still and all my settings are the same. I read that if you reinstall the OS it keeps the home folder (where all your data is) intact and I'm glad that this is corrent 🙂

I also have the Recovery HD again so I can access all the tools in there. Thanks for your help!

I'll just reinstall Windows 7 again in Boot Camp. I backed up the important stuff on there first so it's no loss. Apart from having to download all the Windows 7 updates again... oh well. I removed it just to be on the safe side. I find it helps to be cautious because things can go wrong if you don't do it by the book.

Andrew

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