Broadband - choked masses , exult : You too can enjoy Lion , Apple ’s new Mac operating arrangement , as the company on Tuesday unloose an prescribed $ 69USB thumb drive installer .

The OS X Lion USB Stick was announced when Lion shippedback in July ; now , anyone can purchase the $ 69 crusade from the Apple Online Store , though the product description highlights those without a broadband connection as Apple ’s elemental focus .

The Lion installer driveway — which resemble the USB thumb drive packaged with the premature iteration of the MacBook Air — functions almost - identically to itsMac App Store compatriot , with one exception : According to Apple ’s , those set up Lion from the USB stick will not be able-bodied to reinstall Lion usingLion Restore . or else , if your figurer runs into a problem , you ’ll need to boot from the USB joint to address it ( or bring it into your local Apple Store ) .

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Alternatively , if you desire a boot private road on hand but would prefer not to beat out out $ 69 for it , control out Dan Frakes ’s tutorial on creating your own rush disc or drive using the Mac App Store Lion Installer , or his walkthrough on using theLion Recovery Disk Assistant . Or , heck — both !

If you ’re planning on using the USB installer to upgrade to Lion , keep in creative thinker the system requirement . You ’ll need a Mac run OS X 10.6.6 or later on with a minimum of 2 GB of RAM , 8 GB of free hard drive space , and one of the following Intel processor : Intel Core 2 Duo , i3 , i5 , i7 , or Xeon ( former Intel - based Macs with Core Solo or Core Duo central processor are n’t eligible ) . you may determine your Mac ’s processor and the amount of installed RAM by opt About This Mac from the Apple menu and front at the Processor and Memory melodic phrase , respectively . you’re able to also agree out our article onprepping your Mac for Lionfor more information .

Updated 8:43am to clarify reinstall limit of USB stick .