The conversion only took a few minutes, about the same time it took to complete the initial Mountain Lion setup (admittedly, both the Zalman and the MacBook had solid state drives).
UPDATE: For Mavericks, simply converting InstallESD.dmg to ISO no longer creates a bootable image. However, this script by wurst001 (a simplified version of this one posted by CrEOF) does:
#!/bin/bash
ESD=$1
TMP=$2
if [ -z "$ESD" ] || [ -z "$TMP" ]; then
echo usage: "'$0' /path/to/esd /path/to/tmpdir"
exit 1
fi
if ! [ -e "$ESD" ]; then
echo "file '$ESD' does not exist"
exit 1
fi
if ! [ -e "$TMP" ]; then
echo "dir '$TMP' does not exist"
exit 1
fi
MPAPP=/Volumes/install_app
MPIMG=/Volumes/install_img
IMGSPARSE=$TMP/install.sparseimage
IMGDVD=$TMP/install.cdr
detach_all() {
if [ -d "$MPAPP" ]; then hdiutil detach "$MPAPP"; fi
if [ -d "$MPIMG" ]; then hdiutil detach "$MPIMG"; fi
}
exit_all() {
echo +++ Command returned with error, aborting ...
exit 2
}
trap detach_all EXIT
trap exit_all ERR
echo +++ Trying to unmount anything from previous run
detach_all
echo +++ Mount the installer image
hdiutil attach "$ESD" -noverify -nobrowse -readonly -mountpoint "$MPAPP"
echo +++ Convert the boot image to a sparse bundle
rm -f "$IMGSPARSE"
hdiutil convert "$MPAPP"/BaseSystem.dmg -format UDSP -o "$IMGSPARSE"
echo +++ Increase the sparse bundle capacity to accommodate the packages
hdiutil resize -size 6g "$IMGSPARSE"
echo +++ Mount the sparse bundle for package addition
hdiutil attach "$IMGSPARSE" -noverify -nobrowse -readwrite -mountpoint "$MPIMG"
echo +++ Remove Package link and replace with actual files
rm -f "$MPIMG"/System/Installation/Packages
cp -rp "$MPAPP"/Packages "$MPIMG"/System/Installation/
echo +++ Unmount the installer image
hdiutil detach "$MPAPP"
echo +++ Unmount the sparse bundle
hdiutil detach "$MPIMG"
echo +++ Resize the partition in the sparse bundle to remove any free space
hdiutil resize -sectors min "$IMGSPARSE"
echo +++ Convert the sparse bundle to ISO/CD master
rm -f "$IMGDVD"
hdiutil convert "$IMGSPARSE" -format UDTO -o "$IMGDVD"
echo +++ Remove the sparse bundle
rm "$IMGSPARSE"
echo "Done"
echo "Find your DVD at '$IMGDVD'"
/mac | Sep 13, 2012