Okay so I recently purchased a used Macbook Pro & tried factory resetting it but I did something wrong because it didn't work. I've only used any Apple device less than a handful of times so I need someone to please tell me what to do & also HOW to do it. Step by step please.
This will be quite a long post so please just try & bear with me! I do apologize for taking up so much of your time & I am very appreciative of all the help anyone can give me!! I got this laptop from my Dad as a gift, who bought it from someone he works with.
This is the information about the laptop:
Model Identifier- MacBook Pro 5,1
Version- El Capitan 10.11.6
Processor- 2.4 GHz Intel Core 2 Duo
Memory- 4 GB 1067 MHz DDR3
Serial Number- *********** (Not sure if I should put actual serial # here)
So when I got the laptop it worked perfectly normal. I could turn it on & use it, no problem. But it was still personalized to the original owner. I could get into the Admin profile & use it just fine because it never asked me for any type of password to login. I don't know what the previous owners usernames or passwords are or anything like that. So I went onto google & searched "How To Factory Reset My Macbook Pro".
I followed the following intructions:
Step 1: Restart Your Mac in Recovery Mode
This is pretty simple. Go to the Apple menu in the top left corner of your screen and choose Restart. As the system restarts, hold the combination of Command and R keys together — you’ll notice the Recovery Mode window.
Step 2: Erase Mac hard drive
Congratulations, you’ve reformatted your hard drive and now you can reinstall a clean Mac operating system. Simply click Reinstall macOS or Reinstall OS X. Confirm that you really want to do it and follow the instructions you’ll see on the screen.
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
So I did all those things step by step & then tried to reinstall a clean mac operating system, but after watching a loading screen for about 20 minutes a window popped up saying that I needed to enter my apple ID & password so that it could reinstall El Capitan from my apple account. I didn't have an apple account at the time & there wasn't a "create new account" option anywhere either. So I used my phone & created a new apple ID & then went back to the laptop & entered my new Apple ID & password but that still didn't work because I didn't have a copy of El Capitan on my apple account for the laptop to reinstall. This is when I figured out I needed a "bootable usb/disc" with El Capitan on it. I went onto Amazon & purchased the Mac OS X 10.11 System Repair Install/Reinstall DVD (Picture Attached Below). I verified it's authenticity with apple so I know that the disc works, but when I follow the instructions on the back off the DVD case it just goes to a screen with the Apple logo & a loading bar underneath (Another Picture Attached Below) & I waited until it loaded all the way to the end but then nothing happened. It just stayed on that screen for hours. Someone suggested a link to me titled "Booting a Mac From a CD/DVD" & I followed those instructions which were to reboot the laptop & when it restarts hold down the 'C' key but it just went to the same loading screen & has stayed on that screen for over 2 days now.
IMPORTANT: Going back to the very beginning when I was still able to use the laptop before I factory reset it, I didn't log out of anything like I now know that I was supposed too. It says before you factory reset the laptop you need to de-authorize Itunes, turn off FileVault, etc. etc...
I didn't learn about needing to do those things until after I had already factory reset the laptop. & I think that that could be my problem. Is that a possibility or maybe even a probability? & Can anyone tell me what I need to do next in order to fix it? Or do I need to take my laptop into an Apple store somewhere & hope they can fix it?
Pictures of the discs I purchased off of Amazon:
Picture of the loading screen that's been on for over 2 days now:
This will be quite a long post so please just try & bear with me! I do apologize for taking up so much of your time & I am very appreciative of all the help anyone can give me!! I got this laptop from my Dad as a gift, who bought it from someone he works with.
This is the information about the laptop:
Model Identifier- MacBook Pro 5,1
Version- El Capitan 10.11.6
Processor- 2.4 GHz Intel Core 2 Duo
Memory- 4 GB 1067 MHz DDR3
Serial Number- *********** (Not sure if I should put actual serial # here)
So when I got the laptop it worked perfectly normal. I could turn it on & use it, no problem. But it was still personalized to the original owner. I could get into the Admin profile & use it just fine because it never asked me for any type of password to login. I don't know what the previous owners usernames or passwords are or anything like that. So I went onto google & searched "How To Factory Reset My Macbook Pro".
I followed the following intructions:
Step 1: Restart Your Mac in Recovery Mode
This is pretty simple. Go to the Apple menu in the top left corner of your screen and choose Restart. As the system restarts, hold the combination of Command and R keys together — you’ll notice the Recovery Mode window.
Step 2: Erase Mac hard drive
- Choose Disk Utility in the Utilities window.
- Click on the Continue button.
- Choose your startup disk.
- Click Erase from the buttons at the top of the Disk Utilities window.
- Choose Mac OS Extended (Journaled) from the menu.
- Click Erase
- When the process is complete, go the Disk Utility menu in the top left corner of your screen and select Quit Disk Utility.
Congratulations, you’ve reformatted your hard drive and now you can reinstall a clean Mac operating system. Simply click Reinstall macOS or Reinstall OS X. Confirm that you really want to do it and follow the instructions you’ll see on the screen.
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
So I did all those things step by step & then tried to reinstall a clean mac operating system, but after watching a loading screen for about 20 minutes a window popped up saying that I needed to enter my apple ID & password so that it could reinstall El Capitan from my apple account. I didn't have an apple account at the time & there wasn't a "create new account" option anywhere either. So I used my phone & created a new apple ID & then went back to the laptop & entered my new Apple ID & password but that still didn't work because I didn't have a copy of El Capitan on my apple account for the laptop to reinstall. This is when I figured out I needed a "bootable usb/disc" with El Capitan on it. I went onto Amazon & purchased the Mac OS X 10.11 System Repair Install/Reinstall DVD (Picture Attached Below). I verified it's authenticity with apple so I know that the disc works, but when I follow the instructions on the back off the DVD case it just goes to a screen with the Apple logo & a loading bar underneath (Another Picture Attached Below) & I waited until it loaded all the way to the end but then nothing happened. It just stayed on that screen for hours. Someone suggested a link to me titled "Booting a Mac From a CD/DVD" & I followed those instructions which were to reboot the laptop & when it restarts hold down the 'C' key but it just went to the same loading screen & has stayed on that screen for over 2 days now.
IMPORTANT: Going back to the very beginning when I was still able to use the laptop before I factory reset it, I didn't log out of anything like I now know that I was supposed too. It says before you factory reset the laptop you need to de-authorize Itunes, turn off FileVault, etc. etc...
I didn't learn about needing to do those things until after I had already factory reset the laptop. & I think that that could be my problem. Is that a possibility or maybe even a probability? & Can anyone tell me what I need to do next in order to fix it? Or do I need to take my laptop into an Apple store somewhere & hope they can fix it?
Pictures of the discs I purchased off of Amazon:
Picture of the loading screen that's been on for over 2 days now:
