clean out, before returning.

[KasperH]

Hi Guys,

I just got my iMac yesterday but unfortunately i will have to return it monday for another one because of a defective ram slot. I'm hoping they will let me keep this one until the new ones arrive.

I had really been looking forward to the arrival of the iMac so instead of just sitting and waiting until monday or whenever they pick it up, i actually started using it (with 4 gigs instead of 16) installing apps and so forth.

I have a time machine backup of the machine i intend to restore to the new one once i get it, but what do you advice me to do with my current installation? Should i boot from the installation media and do a clean install to rid the machine of my personal files and settings, or is there an easier way to clean or remove/revert back to factory defaults or at least return it without my own software. I didn't configure time machine until after i did a lot of configuring because i didn't know about the broken ram slot until later.

So how do you go about returning a machine with at working hard drive?

br - Kasper

 

[GGJstudios]

Mac 101: Preparing your old Mac for sale or recycling

 

[KasperH]

thanks

Thanks

I'll do this:

step Four: Nuke it from orbit, it's the only way to be sure
Here, I'm talking about erasing your hard drive. You never know where it's going to end up, so you want to make darn sure none of your personal information is retrievable. The best way to do this is to boot from a Mac OS X installer DVD, go to the Utilities menu when the installer comes up, and select Disk Utility. Select the drive (usually given the horribly unoriginal name of Macintosh HD), and then click on the Erase tab of Disk Utility.

 

[Matthew9559]

Yup, that's exactly what I would do. Time Machine is great!