Installing another operating system

[Cheetah Designs]

I have an old iMac

If I wipe the drive and install another operating system (lets say Ubuntu)....would I be able to restory back to OSX at a later point using the CMD + R boot menu? (I.e. is that boot menu separate from the drive that I will wipe...or do I need to be careful not to wipe a certain partition?)

 

[HACO]

Depends on the specific mac and the existing OS. Generally you'll always have the option of reinstalling from a USB drive (to set that up you still need a mac, so better you make one now). The CMD-R boot menu option may or may not be gone after erasing the drive.

 

[Cheetah Designs]

Its a last 2012 iMac with Mountian Lion on. I think I've figured it out. From Disk Utility there is a separate disk in there called "disk2" which ahs the "Mac OSX X Base System" on it. If I'm reading Google correctly - this is the recovery tool that will allow me to download Mountain Lion from the internet.

 

[dirtybeatfreak]

27"?? If so then use shift option cmd r when connected to internet and it'll install the OS it was shipped with. Or you could option cmd r with net and install latest supported OS. No need to have a partition saved/on it