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Mountain Lion Didn't Install Recovery Partition

E

ehmjay

macrumors member
Original poster
Apr 26, 2006
99
10
So here's a weird one...

Upgarded my harddrive a while back while I was still on Lion and in the process of cloning from my 500gb drive to my new 750gb drive I didn't end up getting the recovery partition cloned over. Didn't really think much of it, hopefully I wouldn't need it and even if I did I made a bootable Lion USB.

Fast forward to today. Decided to install Mountain Lion. Made a bootable key (just in case) but didn't bother doing my usual clean install method and just upgraded the system. Everything went fine and dandy but it looks like I still have no recovery partition (opening up disk utility simply shows Macintosh HD, and if I recall when the recovery partition existed it showed up there too).

No where in the install process did the install mention that the partition couldn't be made. No warnings were given. It just looks like it straight up didn't bother to do it.

So did I miss out? Am I SOL? I really wanted to avoid a clean install... I mean if I have a bootable thumb drive with Mountain Lion it's probably a moot point anyways but the idea of not having it JUST IN CASE is a little troublesome. Any ideas?

My drive had the right partition table (GUID?) and was HFS journaled, so I see no reason for it NOT to have done so (and like I said, gave me no warning or indication that it didn't).
 
sidewinder

sidewinder

macrumors 68020
Dec 10, 2008
2,425
130
Northern California
Did you enable the "Debug" menu in Disk Utility? Did you select the "Show Every Partition from the "Debug" menu?

Of course, you could just boot and hold down the Option key to see if the partition is there....

S-
 
Weaselboy

Weaselboy

Moderator
Staff member
Jan 23, 2005
34,481
16,195
California
It is there as a hidden partition, so you will not see it in Disk Util. Open Terminal app and type in "diskutil list" (without the quotes) and you will see a 650MB Recovery HD that is the recovery partition.
 
E

ehmjay

macrumors member
Original poster
Apr 26, 2006
99
10
Derp derp derp. Just checked by booting. It's there.

I could have SWORN in Lion I had actually seen it in Disk Util (must have had debug enabled or something) but it's there.

Crisis averted.
 
M

modernmagic

macrumors member
Sep 14, 2003
49
0
I see the Recovery HD but I can't get it to boot when holding down Command+R during restart or option during restart.

/dev/disk0
#: TYPE NAME SIZE IDENTIFIER
0: GUID_partition_scheme *500.1 GB disk0
1: EFI 209.7 MB disk0s1
2: Apple_HFS Macintosh HD 499.2 GB disk0s2
3: Apple_Boot Recovery HD 650.0 MB disk0s3

Is my only option to make thumbdrive recovery HD?
 
Comeagain?

Comeagain?

macrumors 68020
Feb 17, 2011
2,190
47
Spokane, WA
modernmagic said:
I see the Recovery HD but I can't get it to boot when holding down Command+R during restart or option during restart.

/dev/disk0
#: TYPE NAME SIZE IDENTIFIER
0: GUID_partition_scheme *500.1 GB disk0
1: EFI 209.7 MB disk0s1
2: Apple_HFS Macintosh HD 499.2 GB disk0s2
3: Apple_Boot Recovery HD 650.0 MB disk0s3

Is my only option to make thumbdrive recovery HD?
Click to expand...

Don't just restart. Try completely shutting down and then using the power button to boot, while holding option or Command. + R.
 
Fishrrman

Fishrrman

macrumors Penryn
Feb 20, 2009
29,239
13,312
I'd like to say that if you keep a fully bootable backup in your stable, a "recovery partition" is simply not needed and is actually a waste of space.

I have -numerous- available boot volumes (10.6.x, 10.7.x, 10.8) and can choose amongst them at will. In an emergency, these are far more useful than booting to the recovery partition, which leaves you little in the way of options other than to re-install the OS, or possibly work with Disk Utility.

A second "boot volume" is worth much more....
 
Weaselboy

Weaselboy

Moderator
Staff member
Jan 23, 2005
34,481
16,195
California
Fishrrman said:
I'd like to say that if you keep a fully bootable backup in your stable, a "recovery partition" is simply not needed and is actually a waste of space.
Click to expand...

It is required to use FileVault2 and Find my Mac. So if you use those features it is not a waste of space.
 
M

modernmagic

macrumors member
Sep 14, 2003
49
0
[solved]

Comeagain? said:
Don't just restart. Try completely shutting down and then using the power button to boot, while holding option or Command. + R.
Click to expand...

That didn't work but....... I realized that since no key commands were working that..... wait for it..... it must be the bluetooth keyboard.

Luckily I have old macs in various states and used an "antique" wired keyboard and wahla! Command-R worked.

Ran disk utility, everything was repaired and working great now.
 
Cloudane

Cloudane

macrumors 68000
Aug 6, 2007
1,627
217
Sweet Apple Acres
Mine genuinely didn't. I did a full wipe of the SSD (via ATA secure erase so it's like a new) on my Mac Mini then installed ML. I like to do things clean. I was expecting it to create a recovery partition but.... nope! So I can't use FileVault.

Any idea how to force it to create one? It seems horribly messy and long-winded to have to dig out my Lion installer, extract it, create a Lion disc, install Lion, drag the Mountain Lion installer across and do an upgrade. But it seems that only Lion *creates* the recovery partition, whilst ML just upgrades it. If its' not there, you don't get a new one :(


(I'm almost tempted to bung Linux on. You know it's coming to weird times when you have to install Linux to get things done - such as disk encryption - because it's too much like hard work with OS X. Complete opposite to the situation a few years ago...)
 
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