Between the Lions

Update: Since the original post, Apple published a KB article that you should follow BEFORE updating to Lion: http://support.apple.com/kb/TS3926: OS X Lion: Installer reports "This disk cannot be used to start up your computer". Back to original post...

If you want a great review of the Mac OS X Lion release, you should follow right now to the Ars Technica review. It is likely that, being a Microsoft employee, I wouldn't be the source you would be looking for such review anyway (and I just made some lawyer happy!)

I'll now continue for the other 3 people in the universe interested in having the Mac OS and Windows working from the same hard-disk, without depending on virtualization. It is likely that this is the second graceful exit point for those still interested in having dreams about a future in which using computers are as graceful as those "other lions". Au revoir... After so many opportunities for a graceful exit, pardon me if the language from now on becomes... ungraceful.

The main issue, as cited in the Ars Technica review about the installation process for the OS X Lion, is that now a recovery partition is automatically created during the installation process. Not bad if you have only the Mac OS X in the HD. The problem is that I used to have already both the Mac OS and Windows, and a partition exclusively to hold data (allowing me to quickly reinstall the operating systems without even having to think about the possibility of data loss).

Not only the OS X Lion created the new recovery partition without asking, but it ignored (and removed) the Windows and the data partitions. I tried to just create a partition from the Mac OS Disk Utility and install Windows there. Yet, I got the message: "Windows cannot be installed to this disk. The selected disk is of the GPT partition style". Using the Boot Camp Assistant allowed me to install Windows. But then I would have to merge the data in the Windows system partition.

Decided not to let go of my partition exclusively for data, I tried to shrink the Windows partition, and create a new volume to the data. That brought up the exciting warning message: "The operation you selected will convert the selected basic disk(s)to dynamic disk(s). If you convert the disk(s) to dynamic, you will not be able to start installed operating systems from any volume on the disk(s) (except the current boot volume). Are you sure you want to continue?"

Such message is already enough to send most people running to confession: too many sins in the buffer already. Yet, at such time my restored Windows partition wasn't an active boot partition, and the menu item to make it active in the "Disk Management" plug-in wasn't enabled. Not to let a good crisis go wasted, I decided that I would simplify my life in the future and pay some debt in the present: I would delete the Mac OS recovery partition and "hope for the best", until I can buy install media for Lion (besides, I would have Time Machine backups anyway).

My final partition table looks like something like this:
- GPT Protective Partition
- HFS partition for the Mac OS
- NTFS partition for Windows
- NTFS partition for Data

And the high-level steps to reach such nirvana are:
1) Install Lion
2) Delete the recovery partition
3) Use the Boot Camp Assistant to create the Windows Partition
4) Install Windows
5) Shrink the volume, and create the data partition
6) Restore Windows and data partitions from WHS (Windows Home Server) backup

As one would say: "It is just that easy..."