Though many people will disagree, installing an operating system like macOS isn't such a daunting task. If you're willing to follow the prescribed steps, you can do it even without having the expertise of a systems administrator. What makes it confusing is that there are usually several ways to clean install, re-install or upgrade macOS. Each type of installation requires a slightly different approach. In this article, we'll outline one of the simplest ways to clean install macOS Mojave from a USB flash drive. It's split up into four parts. Read each one carefully and make sure you understand what to do.
Part 1: Download macOS Mojave or High Serria DMG File
The OS X 10.11 El Capitan installer from the Mac App Store in your Applications folder. The installer will delete itself when you install the operating system, but it can be re-downloaded if. Install El Capitan. Now that the installation USB drive is ready, let's install OS X El Capitan! Boot from the USB Drive. Restart your computer and boot from the USB drive (Press Esc/F8/Del to access the boot selection menu). Use the arrow keys to select Boot OS X Install from Install OS X El Capitan (It should be.
Created a bootable USB with El Capitan installer. Booted from it, erased my MBP (mid 2009), clean install from USB installer. Decided to use migration assistant, most apps not working plus all the clutter from pre clean install. Decided to do another clean install but MBP won't boot from USB and uses the recovery version instead. I finally succeeded, but had to install 10.6 Snow Leopard on the newly partitioned drive, go through all the updates (ending up with 10.6.8 and all the other Snow Leopard updates). From then on I ran the 10.11 El Capitan installer (from a USB stick using Diskmaker X), and keeping in mind to adjust the clock in the Terminal so as to be within. For an OS X El Capitan installation, the file gets saved as a disk image named 'InstallMacOSX.dmg'. To install, open the disk image and run the installer named 'InstallMacOSX.pkg'.
DMG is the format that Apple now uses for packaging software as a disk image. It's somewhat similar in function to ISO for Windows environments, but there are many differences as well. The one thing they can both do is to be burned as bootable media so an OS can be installed from a portable storage medium like a pen drive.
To download a macOS DMG file, you'll need to go to the Mac App Store and look at your Purchased section. If you already have it installed on that machine, it will appear there. You can also search for a particular version in the store. Make sure that once you download the file, it doesn't automatically start the installation. If it does, quit the process. You need the installation files, which will be deleted if the OS is installed.
Part 2: Burn macOS DMG File to USB Drive
Install El Capitan From Usb Windows
This step requires some care because you can't create bootable media by just copying a DMG to a USB stick. You will need a disk authoring software that can write the DMG file with all relevant boot information to make it bootable. If you cannot boot from the drive you create in this step, you can't proceed with the installation. You can use the third-party apps to burn DMG to USB and follow the steps shown below:
Step 1: Get the DMG file from the Mac App Store.
Step 2: Install and launch DMG to USB burning utility such as UUByte DMG Editor, and insert a USB drive with at least 12GB of space (for macOS 10.14 Mojave; some require up to 16GB.) Since the drive will be formatted for the macOS installation, make sure you back up any important information that's already stored there.
Note: Your USB may need to be formatted with Disk Utility before it can be used to create bootable media. To do this, go to your USB drive within Disk Utility and click on the button or tab that says Erase. Now fill out Name, Format and Scheme fields, click Erase and Done. The format should be set to Mac OS Extended (journaled) and the scheme, if required, should be GUID Partition Map.
Step 3: Import the macOS installer and click the Burn function after selecting the appropriate USB drive.
How To Clean Install El Capitan From Usb
Step 4: You may need to specify certain parameters such as burn speed, but in most applications, you can leave the default values as they are.
What you now have is a bootable USB drive containing the macOS installation files in the DMG format. The next step is to boot your Mac from this installer, and there's a special way to do that.
Part 3: Boot Mac from USB
You can now insert your USB drive into the Mac you want to install macOS on. Restart the Mac, but when you hear the startup chime, hold down the Option (alt) key on your Mac until you see the Startup Manager. Several drives will be displayed, but only the ones that have bootable media installed. Pick your USB drive using a double-click with the mouse pointer or by using the arrow keys and Return (enter) on a keyboard. Now the Mac is booting from external USB.
The process of installation has now begun. Let's go through the final steps to install macOS from USB.
Part 4: Clean Install macos Mojave or High Serria from USB
The last part of the installation process is simple. Just choose a language when prompted, and follow the instructions shown on screen as macOS Mojave is installed. You will need to first choose the right OS version and select Reinstall a New Copy of macOS. Click on Continue, and then on Continue again when the installer opens, and click Install to complete the process.
This is one of the easiest ways to install macOS from a USB. You don't require any experience and you don't need any additional tools. The key things to be careful about are the creation of the bootable USB, formatting it properly and booting your computer from the media instead of from the regular installation files. If you can replicate the steps shown in this article, you'll be installing macOS like a pro in no time!
Install OSX El Capitan on a PC (MBR)
Prerequisites
- A real Mac or Hackintosh
- A spare disk drive – at least 8Gb, preferably USB
- An 8Gb or larger USB stick
- The Install OSX El Capitan.app from the App Store
- A disk partition to install in
Install on spare disk drive
Download From Usb
Connect your spare drive to your PC. Use the method described here to build the El Capitan install USB stick and install OSX using the GPT partition scheme on your spare disk drive. Check it boots up OK and works OK.
Copy to your MBR partition
Use the Disk Utility to either copy the El Capitan partition to your MBR partition, or create a disk image and restore it to your MBR partition. Install Clover on your new El Capitan partition using the MBR options.
Copy the kexts you used to build the USB stick to the new El Capitan partition in EFI>CLOVER>kexts>10.11. I needed FakeSMC.kext, NullCPUPowerManagement.kext and a ethernet driver AppleRTL8169Ethernet.kext. Disconnect the spare disk and reboot to check the El Capitan installation boots OK and works OK. If it worked on your GPT disk then it should be OK on MBR with the same drivers.
The problem with creating a GPT partitioned disk and installing on it is that you end up with a bios boot menu item ‘Mac OSX’ which you can’t delete, even using the Clover EFI shell or the linux utility efibootmgr. I’ve got two flavours of linux and efibootmgr refuses to work on both of them. It may be possible to get around this by installing on a USB drive.
I have since found you need to run the Clover EFI shell while doing a UEFI boot to get access to the bios boot menu items.
Later releases
I couldn’t get this to work on Sierra and High Sierra because the installer automagically creates a recovery partition which doesn’t get transferred. So I have converted to UEFI, which works fine using the USB stick method.