Partition question

[gyoung08]

I have already downloaded the Yosemite beta and am wondering if it is possible to partition my hard drive and install Mavericks on the partition? I did it out of order once I realized Creative Suite won't work in Yosemite.

 

[Prof.]

Make a USB drive with Mavericks then partition the HDD and install 10.9 on it via the USB drive. Just know you'll be starting from scratch, unless you have a TM backup.

 

[gyoung08]

So if I just did an external backup before downloading Yosemite, I should just be able to use that on the partition?

 

[Prof.]

Yes. Partitioning a HDD is like having two separate hard drives. So,

1. Make a 10.9 install USB
2. Install 10.9 on the partition you just created.
3. Use your backup to transfer files to the newly created 10.9 partition.

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I made a partition on my MBP while 10.10 was downloading. Then once it was done downloading I selected the "OS X Yosemite" partition I made and installed 10.10 on that newly created partition.

Now I have two virtual HDD's. One with 10.9 with all my files and another one with 10.10 that is just 10.10 - no files, music, movies, etc. Just a clean install of 10.10.