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Apple finally admits that if your boot drive fails, you can’t boot from your boot drive

For Mac OS X Lion users paranoid about traveling without carrying an emergency boot disk for their computer, worry no longer. Even if you have already hacked your own installer on a USB thumb drive, you can now make an officially sanctioned one using the Lion Recovery Disk Assistant.

It’s easy. Download the 1MB application (from Apple’s support site, not from the Mac App Store) and run it. You’ll be prompted to connect a USB stick and warned that everything on that stick will be erased. Agree, enter your password and wait for a minute or two, and that’s it.

This Recovery Disk obviously doesn’t contain the full Lion installer. Instead, it acts like the Recovery Disk Partition that Lion hides on your boot drive when you first install it. Thus, you can “reinstall Lion, repair the disk using Disk Utility, restore from a Time Machine backup, or browse the web with Safari.” To use it, restart the Mac, hold down the “option” key and pick your new USB drive from the list.

If you choose to reinstall Lion, you’re still going to have to wait for it to download. So, short of making sure you only have a disk breakdown when in range of a fast Internet connection, you might still want to make your own installer stick.

Worth noting is the compatibility of sticks you make with Apple’s little app. If you make a Recovery Disk on a Mac that shipped with Lion, it will only work with that Mac. If you made it on a Mac which has been upgraded from Snow Leopard to Lion, it will work with any similarly-upgraded Mac. Thus, you’ll have to make a separate stick for each Mac you have with Lion pre-installed. This isn’t a big problem as you only need a 1GB stick to do it.

You should probably go do this right now.

Lion Recovery Disk Assistant [Apple via Mac Stories]

About Lion Recovery Disk Assistant [Apple]

As flash memory chips continue to get smaller the main advantage is more storage in the same space. For example, the 64GB USB stick of today, will hold double or triple that in the same chip space within just a few years. However, there is another advantage to decreasing the size of the storage chips: […]

You’re so over corded gadgets, but you can’t justify replacing every device in the house with a pricier wireless version just because being leashed to a USB printer or external hard drive is a slight inconvenience. We get it, and it looks like IOGEAR does too. The peripheral company’s Wireless 4-port USB Sharing Station makes any connected gadget WiFi-enabled, letting you wander far away from those desktop devices without dropping your connection. The compact hub includes one USB 2.0 port on the front and three on the rear, along with an Ethernet port and wireless antenna, and it’s compatible with a variety of USB gadgets, including printers, hard drives, memory card readers, scanners, and webcams. Oh, but why would you want to wander far from your webcam, you ask? A remote webcam can be used as an instant, inexpensive home security system, providing access from anywhere within your wireless network. Sure, $100 may seem like a lot to spend on a wireless USB hub, but considering the cost of WiFi-enabling four individual devices, it’s probably the way to go.

IOGEAR USB Sharing Station connects to WiFi, cuts the cord on four of your devices originally appeared on Engadget on Fri, 05 Aug 2011 03:09:00 EDT. Please see our terms for use of feeds.

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Still trying to convince your friends that you’re a mad scientist DJ with a shrink ray? Show those heretic doubters you’ve still got some (miniaturized) old-school cred with this 8GB TR-808 flash drive. This snappy Roland replica won’t actually lay down your mad beats, it only stores them, and the privilege of pre-ordering that trendy track storage will set you back $40. If you actually want to sound awesome, you could always satiate your portable mixing lust with the Korg Monotron, which actually, you know, makes noise. Hit the break for a peek at what a real TR-808 can do, and dream the dream that only a true novelty flash drive / synth enthusiast can.

Continue reading Roland TR-808 flash drive takes synth style, leaves music to the pros (video)

Roland TR-808 flash drive takes synth style, leaves music to the pros (video) originally appeared on Engadget on Thu, 04 Aug 2011 09:25:00 EDT. Please see our terms for use of feeds.

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Today’s Samsung Galaxy Tab 10.1 event in NYC wasn’t just about software — okay, it was mostly about software, but the company also unveiled a slew of accessories for its slick Android tablet. High atop the list is a number of new docks for the slate, including a $50 Multimedia Dock, which props the device up in landscape mode while charging it and offering HDMI out. The $80 Ultra Productivity Tool, meanwhile, also charges the device and includes a full-sized keyboard with Android shortcut keys. The $150 Premium Protective case turns the Tab into a makeshift notebook with a full-size Bluetooth keyboard and a hinge that lets the user adjust the tab’s viewing angle.

A new $40 HDTV adapter gives the tablet full 1080p HDMI output. The company also announced a $40 SD card adapter and a USB adapter for easy accessory input. For $60, Tab owners can pick up the Premium Book Cover, a high end case for the device that lets you prop it up for typing or viewing movies. And somewhere in the distance, you could hear Steve Jobs audibly shudder when the company unveiled a pen stylus for the device. The stylus has an aluminum body and a silicon tip, for when you need to give your fingertips a break. It’ll run you $20, and sadly won’t include meat.

Samsung reveals new Galaxy Tab 10.1 accessories: multimedia dock, HDTV adapter, case, and more originally appeared on Engadget on Wed, 03 Aug 2011 12:29:00 EDT. Please see our terms for use of feeds.

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