Installing OS X Mountain Lion from DVD

This is sort of a repost, since I have done a bare-metal install of OS X previously.  I thought I would update my thread based on the new release - as Apple has introduced... more changes?  Ugg...

NOTE: I would NOT recommend going to Mountain Lion Server.  It is actually fairly cheesy and a disappointment.  I say it is cheesy as it now seems like having a "Server" is just an application - that is due to the fact that you now install the "Workstation" release and then purchase/install Server.app.  Fair enough - I guess a Server is simply a few more daemons and configuration files and startup scripts.  Either way this presentation of what a *nix server is, deflated my ego a bit.  But, here is the primary reason I do not recommend moving "forward" to the new release.  The management interface.  I think it is horrible.  I suppose I don't like change (for the sake of change) and this new release certainly seems as though that is exactly what Mountain Lion is.  My fear is that Apple is positioning this release for more things to come and I'm not sure I'm excited about that either.  Anyhow...

Apparently from what I gather, to take my Mac Mini OS X Server 10.6.8 (the most current I can update to with the Install media), I will need to first install OS X Mountain Lion, then install some Server.app.  Whatever...

Anyhow - after you update your machine to get the AppStore installed, you can then search OS X Mountain Lion and purchase the new version.  While the download is streaming, you can do


zion:/ root# find /Users/ -size +1024000
/Users//administrator/Library/Application Support/AppStore/537386512/mzm.vyvjdvsi.pkg
zion:/ root# cd /Users/administrator/Library/Application\ Support/AppStore/
.visibleDownloads  537386512/         537441259/         manifest.plist     
zion:/ root# cd /Users/administrator/Library/Application\ Support/AppStore/
zion:AppStore root# ls -la
total 8
drwxr-xr-x  6 administrator  staff  204 Sep 24 19:44 .
drwx------+ 5 administrator  staff  170 Sep 24 19:07 ..
-rw-r--r--  1 administrator  staff    0 Sep 24 19:44 .visibleDownloads
drwxr-xr-x  6 administrator  staff  204 Sep 24 19:15 537386512
drwxr-xr-x  4 administrator  staff  136 Sep 24 19:08 537441259
-rw-r--r--  1 administrator  staff  579 Sep 24 19:44 manifest.plist
zion:AppStore root# cd *512
zion:537386512 root# ls -l
total 8332896
-rw-r--r--  1 administrator  staff      436064 Sep 24 19:15 flyingIcon
-rw-r--r--  1 administrator  staff  4265181184 Sep 24 21:13 mzm.vyvjdvsi.pkg
-rw-r--r--  1 administrator  staff      813982 Sep 24 19:14 preflight.pfpkg
-rw-r--r--  1 administrator  staff        4689 Sep 24 19:15 receipt

You will see that package (*.pkg) suddenly disappear and you will have to start over.

zion:SharedSupport root# find /Applications/ -size +1024000 

/Applications//Install OS X Mountain Lion.app/Contents/SharedSupport/InstallESD.dmg

zion:SharedSupport root# cd

/Applications/Install OS X Mountain Lion.app/Contents/SharedSupport

zion:SharedSupport root# mkdir ~Administrator/Downloads/OS\ X\ Mountain\ Lion/

zion:SharedSupport root# cp * ~Administrator/Downloads/OS\ X\ Mountain\ Lion/

You can now burn the image using the *.dmg file. (using a dual-layer DVD - which I don't currently have.  Therefore, I will have to update this thread later.)

Once you have installed OS X Mountain Lion, you then need to purchase the Server.app from the App store. You then will find a "Server" icon in the Applications folder.  (side note: it's hard to imagine doing all of this as an upgrade to an existing server, and just hoping it wall works out in the end ;-)