Creating a Bootable Mac OS X Lion Installer Drive

When it's time to install Mac OS X Lion 'mac os lion installer' on your computer or another device, you'll need a bootable installation drive. This can be a hard drive, flash drive, or even a DVD. In this article, we'll walk you through the steps for creating a bootable Lion installer drive.

Mounting the Volume

To begin, mount the Mac OS X Install ESD volume by double-clicking on the InstallESD.dmg file. This will mount the disk image's volume in the Finder.

Using Disk Utility

Alternatively, you can use Disk Utility to open the InstallESD.dmg file. To do this, select InstallESD.dmg in the sidebar and click the Open button in the toolbar.

Creating a Bootable Drive

To create a bootable hard drive or flash drive, we recommend using a hard drive or flash drive - a DVD will work, but it takes a long time to boot and install. The next steps depend on whether you want to create a bootable hard drive or flash drive, or a bootable DVD.

Right-Clicking the Installer

To view the contents of the Lion installer, right-click (or Control+click) on the InstallESD.dmg file. This will allow you to see the files and folders contained within the disk image.

Dragging into Disk Utility

Drag the InstallESD.dmg disk image into Disk Utility's left-hand sidebar. This will open the contents of the disk image in Disk Utility.

Launching Disk Utility

To launch Disk Utility, navigate to Applications > Utilities and double-click on the Disk Utility icon.

Finding the Lion Installer

Once you've purchased Lion, find the Lion installer on your Mac. The installer is called Install Mac OS X Lion.app and it should be located in the Applications folder.

Creating a Bootable Drive for Newer Macs

If your only Mac was released after Lion, you won't be able to download the Lion installer from the Mac App Store. However, if you create a bootable Lion-installer drive using the current version of the Lion installer (which installs OS X 10.7.3), that drive will work with all current Lion-capable Macs.

Note on Updating the Lion Installer

Unlike CD- and DVD-based Mac OS X installers of old, Apple can and does update the Mac App Store version of the Lion installer. This means that if you create a bootable Lion-installer drive using an outdated version of the installer, it may not work with newer Macs.

By following these steps, you'll be able to create a bootable Mac OS X Lion installer drive for installing Lion on your computer or another device.

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