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@shadow 25

It appears Shadow 25 has had his share of "run-ins" with the police, has probably been arrested numerous times and/or has had tickets issued to him!!!What's the deal with your hatred for Police?? I'm sure you were arrested for "no reason" or because you're a "minority," grow up junior. @OP, call applecare and give them the macbook serial number that is on the bottom of the macbook. They can email her or call her.........
 
Target mode without resetting anything...

Target mode might work, but you don't have to change any permissions.

You can probably get her e-mail address if you can attach her MB to yours, if you both have a firewire port. Connect the boxes and hold down T while booting her machine. It will mount like a hard drive on your desktop.

Then find her home directory in Users. Navigate to her home directory/Library/Application Support/AddressBook.

Look for a file like this: AddressBook-v22.abcddb

Open it in TextEdit and search Alicia. You'll see an e-mail address. There may be more than one, so you may need to guess. Then you can contact her.

Actually kind of scary that you can get at data on another machine so easily. I just tried it on my MBP connected to my MacPro.
 
lol. i think someone probably stole the mbp then couldn't figure out what to do and panic and just left it there :D
i would post it on craigslist, park, and notify the police. it's worth quite a bit...=/
 
maybe you should just keep it. finders keepers. if they were careless enough to leave in the park, you probably care more than they do...
 
*UPDATE*

My girlfriend and I took our lunch break and plastered the park with a flyer stating we found a Macbook Pro. And to contact her or I at an email address we created on Yahoo just for the lost laptop. We also posted signs at the local apartment complexes, and some street corners stands. bout 25 fliers in total...maybe we over did it, but my girlfriend just hit print. :)

We also spoke to the person in charge of the grounds for the park, and we exchanged info with their office in case the person calls we can arrnage to give it to them.

The only reason I am holding off on going to our local police station, is because, I dont think they can do much. Plus, I think odds are if this girl left it there she must run at that Canyon trail, or eat her morning bfast their or something. And will be back and see the signs.

I'll try and contact Apple, maybe even see a Genius at store(have to make a visit anyway to pick up new heaphones anyway). Maybe the Genius can help me find the owner....

As far as trying to get into the laptop, I can try those suggestions, maybe get her name or FB page, but I'd hate to violate this girls privacy if I dont need too, maybe by end of week I will if its not claimed...

Thanks all, I really appreciate your efforts to aid me. I will keep you all updated on what comes about. If anyone lives in So Cal and has a friend Alicia missing a MBP, let me know :)
 
First thing i would do is call apple, or look up the serial number on applecares website. Theres probably a 50% chance they could give you the persons number right there. Second, is when i would try to find the persons email address. Last thing i would do is try the police. If i lost anything like that i wouldn't bother to report it to the police, unless it was insured.
 
Trust me on this one, go to the police, explain what happened. You can even request to be part of the search for the girl, go and put up posters or do anything you think convenient, BUT, and this is VERY important, GO to the POLICE and LEAVE the COMPUTER WITH THEM.

Ok. Now you know. Trust me. Do this if you want to first of all be of as much help as possible and most importantly, protect yourself against any wrong doing or some other type of thing that can come up later. So, once again, GO TO THE POLICE and LEAVE THE COMPUTER WITH THEM. After that you can, like I said above, keep searching.

Finally, and for the third time in case it hasn't stuck yet, GO to the POLICE and LEAVE the COMPUTER WITH THEM.
 
Have you tried calling Apple and giving them the serial number?

They may be able to contact her if she have registered her computer with them.
 
I dont know why you haven't called Apple yet. The serial number should be under her name if she bought it, so just go to your local apple store, give it to them and they'll know exactly what to do
 
I also plan on posting signs at the park saying I have a lost macbook pro and providng my email for contact....

Give it to the local police or hand it in to an Apple Store. Otherwise, put it back where you found it, so that there's a better chance of someone finding it who will do what is needed without talking about it for days.
 
It's great what you're doing in your effort to return the computer, but it wouldn't surprise me if the owner saw the beach as pretty empty so she could leave her MBP there for ten minutes and come back, and didn't forget/lose it.
 
so that there's a better chance of someone finding it who will do what is needed without talking about it for days.

Yeah like nuke the drive, scrub the serial, swap the mac addy , grab a box off of ebay and ship that sucker overseas.

It's great what you're doing in your effort to return the computer, but it wouldn't surprise me if the owner saw the beach as pretty empty so she could leave her MBP there for ten minutes and come back, and didn't forget/lose it.

What's the point of having a notebook if you don't bring it with you?
 
you probably care more than they do...

I doubt it, mistakes happen.

I found a few thousand pounds worth of equipment a while ago, reported it to the police and they told me to keep it unless they get back in touch with me. If they want to claim on insurance they have to notify the po po. Couldn't find the owner in the end, but tried my hardest.

If it was me, I'd do all I could to get it back to the owner. Good luck.
 
Call Apple and give them the S/N written on the bottom of the MBP... Explain the situation and ask for advice ;)

NEVER CALL THE POLICE :D
 
Did the owner ever come back to claim the macbook pro?

I hope so.
 
When you do find her, ask her why it was turned off? And then tell her to get undercover :)
 
Here's how to reset the password on her user:

Code:
1. Power on or restart the Mac.
2. At the chime (or grey screen if your chime is turned off), hold down Command+S on your keyboard to enter single-user mode.
3. Type mount -uw / and press Enter.
4. Type launchctl load /System/Library/LaunchDaemons/com.apple.DirectoryServices.plist and press Enter.
5. Type ls /Users and press Enter. This lists all of the usernames on the computer – helpful if you don’t know or remember what these are.
6. Type dscl . -passwd /Users/username password and replace “username” with one of the users displayed in the previous step. Replace “password” with a new password of your choice. Press Enter.
7. Type reboot and press Enter.

Great that you are trying to return the laptop!
 
If it was indeed found in a completely random park, my bet is that it was stolen by some amateur and they got scared and just left it. I mean how much crap can you be carrying in the middle of a park to not realize you left a giant brick of aluminum? Contact Apple and provide them with the serial, contact the park, contact the local police but don't hand it over to them. If no hits after a week, go ahead with "hacking" into it to find personal info. Maybe the owner wants nothing to do with it because it was from a BF/Spouse that just cheated on them, or maybe they are just "paying it forward", or maybe you are on a new show about Greedy, Dishonest Americans and they are trying to find people that will really do the right thing.

I can think of no logical reason a MBP could or would be left on a park bench short of an abandoned theft.
 
I hope so.

YES! I did find the owner....I went into an Apple Store closest to my home and park where I found it, and gave it to the Apple guys....THANKFULLY, the owner had apple care and her name and numbers were all in the computer....My wife, and apple genious in myself then gave her a ring, and she came to the store like a lightening bolt, never saw a person smile as big as she did
Nice to see someone do the right thing...Cheers to you! :)
Thanks, my old lady helped me too! I put myself in the owners shoes, I'd cry if I lost my MB.

When you do find her, ask her why it was turned off? And then tell her to get undercover :)
LOL, I didn't ask her this unforotunately

Did you find her?
:)

See above answer

To the other man above, regarding if it was stolen by an amateur....actually, the girl herself lost it and left it there....she had her MB and her dog with her, her dog ran off, so she ran off after it. She then totally forgot to go back and get her MB off the bench/stool/sitting spot....silly mistake, but I think catching her dog made her forget her MB.

Well case closed all, owner found, MB back in the hands of a happy MacHEAD. All is right with the world! :D
 
not even going to read the last two pages, go to the apple store and they'll look up the serial number on the macbook, see who it was sold to and notify the owner... I don't think anyone files anything with police now days because anyone who found something now days will more than likely keep it rather than try to return it to the original owner... that's just how the world is now days
 
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