Enable the debug menu in Disk Utility

OS X Disk Utility has a hidden debug-menu that, when enabled, can give you access to more advanced Disk Utility features. The debug-menu gives you access to the restore partition (OS X 10.7 and above). The ‘Debug’ option will appear after applying this command in OS X Terminal: 

defaults write com.apple.DiskUtility DUDebugMenuEnabled -bool true

Restart the Disk utility to make the changes affect.

Disable the debug-menu:

defaults write com.apple.DiskUtility DUDebugMenuEnabled -bool false

Screenshot:

2 thoughts on “Enable the debug menu in Disk Utility”

  1. Just for your reference. I had to actually log out and log back into my macbook pro in order to see the debug option appear in the menu.

    I didn’t have to reboot, just log out and log back in and then open up Disk Utility.

  2. However what the items in that menu do (besides show hidden partitions) is not well documented. I invite anyone who knows more about what “start process”/progress bar/1000 minute/10000 line does to post it or link it here.

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