Apple
rolled out OS X Lion this morning as well as several new Mac Mini and MacBook Air models. And they have a very cool
new system recovery option: You can reinstall OS X over the internet.
In other words, you don’t need a disc to install the operating system. That way if your hard drive fails or you install a new hard drive, you can use the new Internet Recovery option. It will download and install the operating system from Apple’s servers.
Even if you don’t need to do a complete reinstall, you can use lion Recovery to run a disk utility to check for hard drive errors or restore from a backup. From the recovery area you can also use the Safari web browser to go online and get support if you’re having problems getting OS X to boot.
To enter the new recovery mode you just have to hit Command-R while your computer is booting.
This is the sort of feature it would be nice to see other computer makers offer — but it’s a bit trickier when you don’t control both the hardware and software. There are an awful lot of different configuration options for most Windows or Linux computers, while Apple has a finite set of devices to support.
