Figure H Once the source and destination fields are selected, click the Restore button.

Unfortunately, business operations often dictate a different method than that, leaving it up to IT to bridge the gaps caused by fragmentation between multiple OS, hardware, and software instances.

For IT staffers, theres seemingly no end to the number of tools they must carry with them, doubly so if they provide mobile support.

Below is a solution to ease the load by providing access to any versions of OS X in one small, easy-to-carry, bootable flash drive.

There are a few requirements Id like to share with you prior to beginning the tutorial: Apple computer with OS X 10.9 Install DVD mediaDMG or installer for each version of OS X to be included USB flash drive with at least 8 GB for each version of OS X to be supported.

Also, since many Macs include SD card readers, a large capacity SD card could be used instead of a USB drive as well.

I. Partitioning the drive.

Launch Disk Utility.app and partition the external drive as three separate partitions of 8 GB each.

I suggest naming each partition with the OS X version that will occupy the space to make it easier to identify later ( Figure A ).

Figure A Click the Options button, select the GUID Partition Table, and then click OK and Apply to commit the changes ( Figure B ).

Certain versions of OS X will require a different procedure to complete.

II. Apple OS X 10.7 (Lion), 10.8 (Mountain Lion) Right-click the installer and select Show Package Contents from the context menu ( Figure C ).

This reveals the contents of the installer itself and makes navigating the structure possible.

Figure C Drill-down through the Contents Shared Support directories and drag-drop the InstallESD.dmg to the desktop ( Figure D ).

Figure D Launch Disk Utility and click on the partition to copy the install files to, then click the Restore tab.

Next, click the Image button next to Source and point to the InstallESD.dmg file recently copied to the desktop.

Next, drag-and-drop the partition created on the USB to the text box next to Destination ( Figure E ).

Figure E Once the source and destination fields are selected, click the Restore button.

Youll be prompted to confirm that the process will erase the contents of the partition by clicking Erase ( Figure F ).

Figure F The process takes about 30 minutes, depending on the speed of the computer.

However, once its completed, the partition will be ready to be used to install OS X.

Simply repeat the steps in this section to create an installer for 10.7 and 10.8 ( Figure G ).

For this process, either the original DVD media or ISODMG images of the DVD are required.

Next, click the Image button next to Source and point to the DVD drive or ISODMG.

Drag-drop the partition created on the USB to the text box next to Destination ( Figure H ).

Using Rufus For Mac Os X