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wfriedwald

macrumors 6502a
Original poster
Jan 1, 2017
554
48
2008 Mac Pro
El Capitan 10.11.6
startup is a relatively new SSD 250 GB

I have been having tons of problems (mostly random crashes and system freezes) - detailed here:
<https://forums.macrumors.com/threads/more-startup-problems.2039885/>

my thought was to reinstall the OS, using the repair partition.

I seem to recall, from a few years ago, that there were two kinds of re-installs:

A - a "gentle" one that left all of one's apps and documents etc in tact.
or
B - a more draconian / severe reinstall that wiped out all the old apps & everything else.

I tried this on Sunday - without giving me any options, the repair partition successfully re-installed via what seemed to be option A. (kinder & gentler)

but Monday & Today the crashes are re-occuring - both in my old user account & the new completely free clean login account ... I could start a new new CLEAN LOGIN 2...

I am still pondering what to do next. a more severe re-install, that would completely obliterate everything on the startup? I should possibly re-boot from another drive and use the APP STORE rather than the repair partition to re-install?

as always, grateful for feedback.
 
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