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I want to do a clean, clear install of Mavericks on my MB Pro. And I'm confused. The Mavericks page on Apple.com says I need to have Mountain Lion, Lion, or Snow Leopard already installed.

But then I've read that I can format my hard drive (erasing any OS), then boot the Mavericks installer and it will let me do a clean install.

If that's true, I'm great with that. But I want to confirm that's the case before I start erasing things...

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You can install from scratch.

To do so:

  • Download the update from the App store.
  • Create an install DVD or an install USB flash drive.
  • Boot from the install drive (Holding alt or option during boot).
  • Using disk utility format the desired partition.
  • Launch the install process on the newly formatted partition.

Enjoy the fresh install.

Edit: One thing to note is the fact that you don't have to format the entire hard drive. You can only format the partition containing your OS and do the install on that partition.

If you want to install Mavericks on a different partition to allow multi boot (Mavericks/Mountain Lion) you can use another partition to do so as long as there is enough free space on it.

One important tip to remember is the ability of disk utility at creating additional partitions :

  • Open DiskUtility.app
  • Select the desired hard drive
  • Go to the Partitions tab
  • Under the partitions list click on the add button to create a new partition.

Disk Utility Add Partition

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  • @eric: Happy it helped. Read the edit if you want additional tips with the install.
    – Coyote
    Nov 9, 2013 at 8:22

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