El Capitan PB1 bootable USB

[crjackson2134]

FYI - I just tested and DiskMaker X 4b4 works with PB1 and an 8GB USB 2.0 thumb drive. It installs all the usual utilities and it works fine.

It does however label the drive as Yosemite 10.11, so you need to rename it when finished, other than that it's good to go.

 

[Zakzilla]

Just curious -- is this to boot into the installation, or to actually boot into a usable copy of El Capitan?

 

[S.B.G]

Just curious -- is this to boot into the installation, or to actually boot into a usable copy of El Capitan?

It's for booting into the installer.

 

[freeskier93]

Has anyone been able to boot from USB on a Mac with an optical drive? I know this was an issue at one point and UEFI on those Macs wouldn't do it, huge PITA when you've removed the optical drive. I can test because I get the "Mount of outer dmg failed" message when trying to create the bootable USB. I'm thinking it might be easier to just boot into the recovery partition, and wipe/re-install from there.

 

[S.B.G]

Has anyone been able to boot from USB on a Mac with an optical drive? I know this was an issue at one point and UEFI on those Macs wouldn't do it, huge PITA when you've removed the optical drive. I can test because I get the "Mount of outer dmg failed" message when trying to create the bootable USB. I'm thinking it might be easier to just boot into the recovery partition, and wipe/re-install from there.

I successfully made the installer yesterday with my 2012 cMBP and it still has the original ODD.

 

[tywebb13]

Has anyone been able to boot from USB on a Mac with an optical drive? I know this was an issue at one point and UEFI on those Macs wouldn't do it, huge PITA when you've removed the optical drive. I can test because I get the "Mount of outer dmg failed" message when trying to create the bootable USB. I'm thinking it might be easier to just boot into the recovery partition, and wipe/re-install from there.

It is not the optical drive causing the "Mount of outer dmg failed" error. It is that some usbs are too slow or too small to accommodate the transfer of the invisible files which make the usb bootable. As I said before the simplest workaround is to use a faster USB3 instead of USB2 and use a 16GB instead of a 8GB. Otherwise use some of the other methods posted by myself and others in this thread.

 

[freeskier93]

I successfully made the installer yesterday with my 2012 cMBP and it still has the original ODD.

And you can boot from it on that 2012 MBP?

It is not the optical drive causing the "Mount of outer dmg failed" error. It is that some usbs are too slow or too small to accommodate the transfer of the invisible files which make the usb bootable. As I said before the simplest workaround is to use a faster USB3 instead of USB2 and use a 16GB instead of a 8GB. Otherwise use some of the other methods posted by myself and others in this thread.

I know that's not the issue, what I want to know is if the optical drive Macs can actually BOOT from the USB installer once it is created. Many moons ago when I installed my data doubler my MacBook Pro flat wouldn't recognize any bootable USB installers. Even third party bootloaders like rEFInd wouldn't let me boot from USB installer.

As I already said I can't test because I can't make the USB installer... USB drive I'm using is 16 GB, not USB 3.0 but that isn't going to change anything since my MBP doesn't have USB 3.0.

Can't burn a DVD, no optical drive installed.

 

[Apple_Robert]

And you can boot from it on that 2012 MBP?



I know that's not the issue, what I want to know is if the optical drive Macs can actually BOOT from the USB installer once it is created. Many moons ago when I installed my data doubler my MacBook Pro flat wouldn't recognize any bootable USB installers. Even third party bootloaders like rEFInd wouldn't let me boot from USB installer.

As I already said I can't test because I can't make the USB installer... USB drive I'm using is 16 GB, not USB 3.0 but that isn't going to change anything since my MBP doesn't have USB 3.0.

Can't burn a DVD, no optical drive installed.

Yes, you can boot to a USB El Capitan install stick. Hold down the option key when booting and you should see the USB install disk as an option.

 

[S.B.G]

And you can boot from it on that 2012 MBP?

Yep, sure can. I'm typing this from it right now. I have an external Samsung 830 SSD plugged into the USB 3 port running the 10.11 PB.

 

[freeskier93]

Yes, you can boot to a USB El Capitan install stick. Hold down the option key when booting and you should see the USB install disk as an option.

Yes, I am aware of how to choose the boot device... Again though, booting from USB installer used to be blocked on a firmware level on Macs equipped with optical drives.

 

[freeskier93]

Yep, sure can. I'm typing this from it right now. I have an external Samsung 830 SSD plugged into the USB 3 port running the 10.11 PB.

Great, thanks.

 

[Apple_Robert]

Yes, I am aware of how to choose the boot device... Again though, booting from USB installer used to be blocked on a firmware level on Macs equipped with optical drives.

It hasn't been an issue in many years.

 

[S.B.G]

Great, thanks.

No worries.

I like to run the betas on the external SSD and not overwrite my primary, internal, SSD with my good, stable, Yosemite install.

 

[freeskier93]

It hasn't been an issue in many years.

And it has been many years since I last did a fresh install and had to deal with this

No worries.

I like to run the betas on the external SSD and not overwrite my primary, internal, SSD with my good, stable, Yosemite install.

I just used CCC to make a bootable backup of Yosemite, if something goes drastically wrong with El Capitan it's a couple hours to clone the Yosemite install back. The cloud keeps all my files up to date.

 

[S.B.G]

And it has been many years since I last did a fresh install and had to deal with this



I just used CCC to make a bootable backup of Yosemite, if something goes drastically wrong with El Capitan it's a couple hours to clone the Yosemite install back. The cloud keeps all my files up to date.

I like CCC a lot. I use it and Time Machine to keep all my stuff backed up.

I have the luxury of having several external SSD's to pull from to use as beta disks or for whatever else I need. This way it's a simple reboot to get back to Yosemite when I need to; especially if 10.11 gets hosed.

 

[crjackson2134]

And you can boot from it on that 2012 MBP?



I know that's not the issue, what I want to know is if the optical drive Macs can actually BOOT from the USB installer once it is created.

Works fine for me. Made/Used it earlier today.

 

[You are the One]

I made an applescript a while back to make things a bit easier. I just tested with El Capitan and updated the info. If anyone is interested here is the link.

http://musings.silvertooth.us/2015/...tan-os-x-bootable-media-creator-1-25-is-here/

Are you sure that script doesn't contain anything else? I ran it and suddenly postfix/master wanted incoming access through the firewall. The script isn't editable/viewable either.

You have made 5 posts here, all promoting your script. Nothing else.

I wonder what I just installed