Apple Training Series: Mac OS X Support Essentials

Knowledge Base document TS3926, “OS X Lion: Installer reports ‘This disk cannot be used to start up your computer’.”

Mac will not automatically restart during the system installation process as long as the Installer Log window is the foremost window

Knowledge Base article HT4718, “OS X Lion: About Lion Recovery.”

the Installer has determined that your Mac cannot start from that item. Possible reasons are:

This can be an internal or an external drive

If you install Lion to the system drive hosting the Install Mac OS X Lion application (as is typical of a standard upgrade installation), the Installer will delete the original installation assets to save space.

If you are upgrading or installing while running from a standard Mac system, you will have to authenticate as an administrative user.

If you want to perform an erase and install, you must manually erase the destination system drive

Install Mac OS X Lion There are two primary types of installations

Knowledge Base document HT2681, “What’s a ‘computer-specific Mac OS X release’?”