I need to erase the HDD and reload OSX on my new mac mini without a DVD

I have purchased a Mac Mini and restored from a time machine backup, however I need to erase all the data so that I can give this computer to my son, how do I delete everything and reload OSX. Please I need some help. Thankyou

erdmd wrote:
...I need to erase all the data so that I can give this computer to my son,...
See Thomas Reed's How to Prepare your Mac for sale
Also see Kappy’s comprehensive post here...
https://discussions.apple.com/message/21565512?ac

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I have a white Macbook 2009 on OSX Lion. It came with the OSX Snow Leopard CD, I erased the HDD and am trying to install the OSX from disc but am getting "cannot install OSX from disc" message. What can I do?

I have a white Macbook 2009 on OSX Lion. It came with the OSX Snow Leopard CD, I erased the HDD and am trying to install the OSX from disc but am getting "cannot install OSX from disc" message. What can I do?
I got the macbook from a friend a few years ago and it already had OSX Lion installed. Whenever it boots from the Snow Leopard disc it says it cannot install from disc. Is there anythingI can do or should I take it to an Apple store to get them to boot OSX Lion for me?

Insert your Snow Leopard disc and restart, press and hold the C key as soon as you hearthe startup chime, hold C until you see the Apple Logo. When your computer starts up you'll be at the first install screen, choose your language and click the arrow to go to the next screen. This screen has a menu bar, from the Utilities menu select Disk Utility, select your hard drive, this is the one with the manufacturers name or numbers, click the partition tab and then delete any existing partitions by selecting them and clicking the minus. In the drop down box select one partition and click apply. Name your hard drive and click erase. When it's done quit DU and go back to the installer, install Snow Leopard. When the installer is done and the computer is back up and running run Software Update to get to 10.6.8

HT201363 My iPhone, iPad and iPod are all associated with the same Apple ID. How can I remove the iPod and associate it with a new Apple ID without affecting the data on the other devices (note: there is no data on the iPod I want to keep)?

My iPhone, iPad and iPod are all associated with the same Apple ID. How can I remove the iPod and associate it with a new Apple ID without affecting the data on the other devices (note: there is no data on the iPod I want to keep)?

Very simple. Turn off Find my iDevice, then Tap Settings, General, Erase, Erase all content and settings.

How do I clear the Disk and reinstall the OS on my new Mac Mini without an Optical Drive?

How do I clear the Disk and reinstall the OS on my new Mac Mini without an Optical Drive?

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How do I set up my Mac mini to read iTunes and iPhoto files from my new Mac mini server?

Want my old Mac mini to read iPhoto and iTunes files from my new Mac mini server. Old Mac has no more room to store files. How do I do this?

Hello,
Have you tried enabling iTunes Sharing & iPhoto Sharing on the Server?
Or maybe...
http://support.apple.com/kb/ht1449
http://www.apple.com/itunes/inside-itunes/2011/02/how-to-move-your-itunes-librar y-to-another-hard-drive.html
http://support.apple.com/kb/PH2506
http://support.apple.com/kb/ht1229

Need to have the keyboard and mouse 100 feet away from Mac

I need to have the Keyboard and Mouse/Track-pad 100 feet away from Mac Mini.
What are my options ?
Thanks

In your case with the need to control it from multiple locations the best and realistically only solution is to use Screen Sharing to remotely control the Mac.
With this solution you can control it from anywhere you have a network connection and could use a laptop to control the Mac mini. This is the solution I use in a very similar situation.
Bluetooth does not have enough range, even RF wireless keyboard and mice devices also would not have the range, and I don't believe there is a suitable USB solution.
The only other possibility that occurs to me is to use an IP based KVM. A KVM (Keyboard/Video/Mouse) switch box allows multiple computers to be controlled from typically a single keyboard and mouse. However there are versions which allows you to do this over a TCP/IP network i.e. Ethernet. Then again you would be able to do this anywhere on your network. Here is one example - http://www.aten-usa.com/products/productItem.php?model_no=CN8600
Personally I still strongly recommend using Screen Sharing. Its built-in and completely free!

I am unable to use my external CD player. I am told that the player is being used by another application, and that is not true. I have quit everything and restarted. I've unplugged the unit. I have a fairly new mac mini 10.8. What can I do?

I am unable to use my external CD player. I have a fairly new mac mini 10.8. I am told that the player is being used by another application, but it's not true. I've forced everything to quit and restarted. I've even unplugged the unit and let it rest. I've turned off and unplugged the mac too. I cannot make a CD. Why?

I misread your message. I thought it said I did not have burn support with the Samsung hardware.
When the CD goes in it says You inserted a bland CD. choose an action from the popup menu or click ignore
open finder
open itunes
open disk utility
make this action the default
eject ignore ok
However, when I am making CDs. I am in itunes. That is where my recordings areI haven't tried to do it from this vantage point.
I don't know how to make a screen shot on a mac.
I go to my playlist and click on the little gear icon at the bottom left and I leave things as they are - preferred speed - maximum. I leave it on audio CD - and then I select BURN.
When I tried this the other day, I could not get it to burn, no matter how hard I tried - everything I could think of, using a different CD, force quitting everything I was not using, restarting the computer, unplugging the CD hardware and plugging it back in after a little while, nothing worked. I got that message that said my player was being used by another application every time I tried to make the CD. This took over an hour. I don't know of another way to make a CD on the mac; I was not using another program or application. Now it seems to be working fine. I am burning another copy of something I gave away.
I wish I knew what caused this. It was a real problem Saturday morning.

I have a new mac mini without an optical drive and an older mini.

Can I use the DVD drive and HD from the older mac mini over firewire?

Hi, 2 ways possibly....
Enable CD/DVD Shaing inSys Prefs>Sharing, or boot the older one using the t key to put it in Target Mode.

Dropping WiFi Connections after new Mac Min and Upgrade

First of all does anyone know why this discussion was archived when there was never a solution posted?
https://discussions.apple.com/message/12586041?tstart=0#12586041
Secondly (why I found that thread among many others addressing the same problem). I received a new Mac Mini for XMas (cool, I needed it) which worked fine with my other computer and devices (2 iPads, 2 iPhones, 2 Win7 Laptops and 2 Win7 desktops) for a couple days, so I thought. Now all these devices got along very well until Mr. Mini comes along. Then I note wireless drops occasionally, it seemed to come back so I wasn't too upset, yet and decided to deal with it later and enjoy my vacation.
Now, after I allowed Leopard to do its upgrade (I had deferred that) I now have all the above devices dropping wifi and physical LAN connections as long as this Mini is powered on. I shut it off, Internet is blazing, I turn it on, Internet falters and screeches to a halt.
Since all my other devices have worked cooperatively for several years and this device comes along and crashed the party im pretty convinced its not my router or computers. I am not interested in trial and error here. i have many better more important things to do and this is Apples responsability to figure out. I am a very savy IT dude (career professional) and want to get to the bottom of this for everyone.
Soooo.... What changed? Why does this device kill my network when it is turned on (note, no alterations from out-of-the box to any network protocol or config.) and why does a thread (one of many) without a solution get trumped on by Apple?
Apple?

How to Create & Burn a Bootable Mac OS X Lion Install DVD
Summary
OS X Lion includes a new feature called Lion Recovery that includes all of the tools you need to reinstall Lion, repair your disk, and even restore from a Time Machine backup without the need for optical discs.
To redownload the installer on a computer running OS X Lion, press and hold the Option key while you click the Purchases tab. If the button to the right of the Install Mac OS X Lion item doesn't change to "Install" and allow you to download Lion, use Spotlight to search for "Install Mac OS X Lion" on your computer....
http://support.apple.com/kb/HT4718

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Any time I have a DVD in my brand new mac mini, from commercial DVDs to trying to author a blank DVD, I get the dreaded chainsaw sound that plagues anyone who has owned an xbox 360. Has anyone else suffered with this with their new mac mini or should I send it back to apple

I should have been a little more specific. This happens usually when I try and do slightly disc intensive tasks, such as burn a disc, import a disc to itunes, and I can even get it to sound when I leave a disc in the drive, turn the computer off, and as it's booting it will make the grinding noise. I first thought that the computer couldn't lay on it's side as that's when I first noticed it (sort of like the wii on it's side because this fits my setup), but it makes the same noise whether I have it on it's side or not. This is also not disc specific, I can re-create the noise with different discs, DVDs, CDs when importing to itunes. Guess I'll be taking it to an iTunes store to get it checked out.

Errors with Time Machine (not completing backup, and needing to erase the ".inProgress" package)

I have in a previous discussion been talking about errors with my Time Machine backup. The errors were with a problem with Indexing a file, it fails and stops the whole backup. Each time it attemps another backup, it fills my ".inProgress" package with a (nearly) whole backup, filling my Time Machine hard drive, and thus errasing my previous good backups. The error occurs after about 95% completion.
In my last post of a similar disscussion, the problem was indexing the Preference Pane files and this caused the whole backup to fail. This was my last post there: (below in some additional info of my situation)
I did exclude the MobileMe.prefPane. And I got:
12/16/11 9:24:50.468 PM com.apple.backupd: Starting standard backup
12/16/11 9:24:50.556 PM com.apple.backupd: Backing up to: /Volumes/3 TB GoFlex Drive/Backups.backupdb
12/16/11 9:25:14.418 PM com.apple.backupd: Waiting for index to be ready (101)
12/16/11 9:27:02.366 PM com.apple.backupd: Deep event scan at path:/ reason:must scan subdirs|
12/16/11 9:27:02.366 PM com.apple.backupd: Finished scan
12/16/11 9:33:37.119 PM com.apple.backupd: Deep event scan at path:/Volumes/Mac OS Lion GM reason:must scan subdirs|
12/16/11 9:33:37.119 PM com.apple.backupd: Finished scan
12/16/11 9:36:15.650 PM com.apple.backupd: 758.92 GB required (including padding), 830.32 GB available
12/16/11 10:25:14.873 PM com.apple.backupd: Copied 22.8 GB of 630.5 GB, 782749 of 2357620 items
12/16/11 11:25:15.335 PM com.apple.backupd: Copied 86.6 GB of 630.5 GB, 1167675 of 2357620 items
12/17/11 12:25:16.227 AM com.apple.backupd: Copied 152.2 GB of 630.5 GB, 1393795 of 2357620 items
Dec 17 01:25:16 Thomas-P-Kellys-iMac com.apple.backupd[99858]: Copied 305.2 GB of 630.5 GB, 1413946 of 2357620 items
Dec 17 02:25:16 Thomas-P-Kellys-iMac com.apple.backupd[99858]: Copied 457.1 GB of 630.5 GB, 1419190 of 2357620 items
Dec 17 03:19:07 Thomas-P-Kellys-iMac com.apple.backupd[99858]: Copied 1736865 files (568.3 GB) from volume Macintosh HD.
Dec 17 03:25:16 Thomas-P-Kellys-iMac com.apple.backupd[99858]: Copied 572.1 GB of 630.5 GB, 1848939 of 2357620 items
Dec 17 03:40:33 Thomas-P-Kellys-iMac com.apple.backupd[99858]: Indexing a file failed. Returned 200 for: /Volumes/Mac OS Lion GM/System/Library/PreferencePanes/Mouse.prefPane, /Volumes/3 TB GoFlex Drive/Backups.backupdb/Tom iMac/2011-12-14-171406.inProgress/7DB524DD-EFB9-42A6-8A21-0A2A312EDA6D/Mac OS Lion GM/System/Library/PreferencePanes/Mouse.prefPane
Dec 17 03:40:33 Thomas-P-Kellys-iMac com.apple.backupd[99858]: Aborting backup because indexing a file failed.
Dec 17 03:40:33 Thomas-P-Kellys-iMac com.apple.backupd[99858]: Stopping backup.
Dec 17 03:40:33 Thomas-P-Kellys-iMac com.apple.backupd[99858]: Copied 2164998 files (581.1 GB) from volume Mac OS Lion GM.
Dec 17 03:40:33 Thomas-P-Kellys-iMac com.apple.backupd[99858]: Copy stage failed with error:11
Dec 17 03:40:50 Thomas-P-Kellys-iMac com.apple.backupd[99858]: Backup failed with error: 11
This time it was the Mouse.prefPane that caused the error. I'd like to exclude the entire PreferencePanes directory.
This was my error message this time:
I just realized this was on my small Developers partition. Perhaps there is an error with the build, OR an error with the initial restore. I'd like to perhaps exclude the entire /Volumes/Mac OS Lion GM. I expect that Time Machine is working fine with my main partition and the error happens when it's almost done with the Mac OS Lion GM partition.
The problem now is that I only have 265 GB of 3 TB available on my Time Machine HDD. If attempt another backup, it'll surely erase about 410 GB of my past saved backups. I've already lost 6 months, and I only have two months left of backups. I need to erase the ".inProgress" package again. That'll take time, and it's impossible to do from this main partition, even at root access. This ".inProgress" has a total of two (nearly) full backups; it didn't cleanup the first full backup attempt while starting the second,perhaps it would have had it finished. But I fear even if I exclude the whole "Mac OS Lion GM" partition, It'll create a third full backup before cleanup and erase ~400 GB of previous good backups. Then, I'll have a total of 4 (nearly) full backups! 3 TB is just enough without any past backups.
Maybe I'll just copy my documentations of my 'errasing the ".inProgress" package' last time (from the Mac OS Lion GM partition) and do a full restore of just that partition. Thus erasing the errors all together. If it doesn't fix the errors then this could be a bug in the build that doesn't allow Time Machine to work. I've always included this partition in Time Machine before, even with other Lion builds, so I suspect that it was an error in the initial restore. (I may be answering my own questions, and that the inital restore (of the small partition) is the problem, and I just need to re-restore the small partition)
Again, I'm going to have to erase the ".inProgress" file to regain 1.53 TB of space before proceeding.
Also, I gave myself permission to read the ".Backup.345781513.887697.log", the log that was created last night when I first started Time Machine this last time. It was interesting, but didn't show the error I could see from the console.
Right now, mds and mdworker appear to be going crazy even after I just now turned off Time Machine. I think I'll let it go for the rest of the night. Then I'll work on erasing the ".inProgress" package from the other partition boot up.
That was my entire last post. To add some information, I have two OS X partitons, both Mac OS X Lion. One is my large main partition, the other is one I don't mind testing with. I recently replaced my internal hard drive in my iMac and restored from Time Machine both partitions. This appeared to go smoothly. But I have yet to create a single successful Time Machine backup since. At first it was doing a Full Backup, which I didn't like, but now it just aborts around 95% completion. Each, time, it tries it fills the Time Machine hard drive with duplicate (nearly) full backups errasing my older good backups. I would like to erase the ".inProgress" file to save space.
My main question in this new discussion is does anyone know of a good way of erasing the ".inProgress" file? This is so I can preseerve my previous backups. ACLs and other permissions seem to make it impossible to erase from this startup partition, the one I'm running Time Machine from. Even at root level, if I give myself permission to change permissions or delete a file, it'll say Operation not Permitted instead of Permission Denied. I have been able to delete this ".inProgress" package before when booting from the other partition, but with great difficulty. I have had much help from another Member in this Support Community when it comes to solving my Time Machine problems. I think I have found the problem (indexing files in my small OS X partition), as stated in my copy& pasted post above, but I really need to delete this inProgress package first to save space before continuing!

Pondini wrote:
Gator TPK wrote:
Now I'll have to fix the small partition? How's the best way to do this? There could be thousands of files that won't index fine.
See if there's anything you haven't done, that applies, in the pink box of #C3 in Time Machine - Troubleshooting
Otherwise, since most (or all?) of the indexing errors are in OSX, you might want to just reinstall it. Something may have gone wrong sometime, that damaged those files.
I reviewed #C3 in Time Machine - Troubleshooting and I have already done most of those things. I have just learned something new though:
When I included my Main OS X partition again, I got an indexing error for the first time for that partition. I might be interesting to note that the _spotlight process was running, and it's running again (the magnifying glass has a dot and it generically says "Indexing Tom's iMac"). mdworker, mds and backupd processes really are working hard, one moment they used over 500% of my CPU. It's nice to know for once quad core is good for something other than video encoding. (Now if they could just get the Finder to do more than 100.1%, only 1 thread is doing 100%, I'd like to see file size calculations 8 times quicker!)
I never got an indexing error once in the past 2 weeks for that large Mac OS X v10.7.2 main volume, and it had appeared to finish that partition backup before running into problems with my smaller test partition. Also, I had just updated the smaller test partition with a later build of Mac OS X. But It appears that the beta builds are clearly not the problem. I thought I could just restore again (from the December 4th backup) the small partition and both would be fine.
I'll finish reviewing all the suggestions on Time Machine - Troubleshooting and go from there. Hopefully, the _spotlight indexing simutaniously was the only problem. It's strange that the indexing hasn't happened since the original restore last week untill I finally got a good clean complete partial Time Machine backup. Why would the first Time Machine backup trigger indexing again?
For now, I'm going to exclude the Main Partition again, and let another good backup run. And try your suggestions. (And wait till mds, mdworker, etc. to finish!)
I have the logs of the first two sucsessful backups and the last two failed backups from the last 3 hours, if that would help.?

I need to erase the contents of my phone and restore to factory settings. Does anybody know how to save your texts so you don't lose them? Can I back those up to iCloud? My phone was very likely hacked (Apple's advice was to call the police!)

"I need to erase the contents of my phone and restore to factory settings. Does anybody know how to save your texts so you don't lose them? Can I back those up to iCloud? My phone was very likely hacked (Apple's advice was to call the police!)"
That was all I could put in the initial "box." Then it brought me to this page with instructions on how to write a good sentence.
Proceeding ...
After going back and forth between Apple, AT&T and the police (all telling me to go to the other two) I took AT&Ts suggestion and got a new number. One tech warned against doing a backup, especially on my Mac, saying if my phone had been hacked then whatever bug was there would then invade my computer. But nobody knows how to determine if the phone has been hacked or a virus was planted there. Unfortunately I know who would have reason to do such a thing and all I can say is that he is at the top technologically and could easily do it. Almost impossible to prove, however.
So I need to preserve my text messages and my emails as well. I backed up my photos to that Microsoft product (One-Drive) and it froze (Surprise, Surprise) with four short videos to go, and no way of stopping that (when I tried it crashed repeatedly) so I'm in crisis mode here.
Help ...
Running 8.0 on 5S
Thanks!

Betty I don't know if you fixed your hacking problem but I feel your pain. I've seen some strange things going on between my iMac and my iPhone and Apple has told me the same thing, call the police which I have done. The hackers have stole 500.00 out of my checking account have access to every internet account I use and no matter how often I change the password their right back on the account. I closed my FB account 3 times only to have someone reopen it. Right now I've got a link in my reading list (Safari) that if I click on it, it allows me to log onto my FB account anonymously.
I've seen a green folder come out of no where while I was trying to delete my passwords out of keychain when that green folder was put into the key chain I was immediately locked out. I than went into system preferences to try to make changes to my security settings, when I clicked on the icon it wouldn't open. I've seen log files of automator receiving commands and sending out my personal information thats on my computer.
I have a legitamate program called iExplorer that allows you to look at the contents of your iPhone back ups and saw a transaction someone made at the Apple store for some full length movies, some albums, ibooks and other apps but when I called the iTunes store and they said none of those items were showing up on my account. If their not on my account how can they be on my iPhone 6? One day someone was using my gmail account and unknowingly used google maps to search for an Italian restaurant, than a Mexican restaurant than a coffee shop and their search showed up on my iPhone but I didn't have my gmail account installed on my iPhone 6. Using my computer I logged onto my gmail account and looked at the maps history and sure enough there were the searches when I'd hover my curser over the link it gave me the longitude and latitude of the where the hacker was when he was using google maps. I know whoever reads this thinks Im crazy but I've documented everything and can prove the things that I have mentioned in this post actually happened.
One day I had my laptop (pc) and my iMac next to each other as I was using both. when I clicked on airport it showed that my laptop and my iMac had made a connection and were actually communicating with each other. I know I didn't do it I don't know how. The iMac was logged into my iCloud account while my laptop wasn't. I have formatted my iPhone at least a dozen times, Apple and an Apple retailer have formatted my hard drive not to mention the numerous times I have formatted it but the hackers keep getting on my devices. Im formatting my lap top at this very second because during the course of the night I left the ethernet cable plugged into it and they locked me out of my c: drive, and configured the system so I can't download any updates from Microsoft, overtime I type in www.microsoft.com it changes to ww38.microsoft.com which takes me to a blank page. I right clicked on the page I was redirected to and read the java script and couldn't believe that someone had actually configured Internet Explorer to redirect me to a blank page when I tried to go to Microsoft. Apples answer to all this is there was nothing wrong with my iPhone or my iMac and if I thought there was a problem to call the police which I have done.
Theres no doubt the hackers are reading this while I type it or will read it and I simply don't care anymore. I no longer email anyone, don't use my iCloud account and have taken precautions to protect my credit but if I ever find out who has invaded my privacy to this extreme the police are going to want to talk to me because Im going to hurt them like they've never been hurt before

I need to know how to edit a drawing - basically remove the arrows and text but at the same time match the background of the existing pic. then re add new text. how do i erase the arrows and text and arrows but match current background of pic. step by ste

i need to know how to edit a drawing - basically remove the arrows and text but at the same time match the background of the existing pic. then re add new text. how do i erase the arrows and text and arrows but match current background of pic. step by step explanation please beginner

Please post (a relevant section of) it right on this Forum.

I need to erase all Contents and Settings from my i phone 5 but I forgot the restrictions passcode. How can I get it. ( Idon't have access to i tunes). Thanks.

I need to erase all Contents and Settings from my i phone 5 but I forgot the restrictions passcode. How can I get it. ( Idon't have access to i tunes). Thanks.

Not possible. You need access to iTunes.
The passcode will be required to make changes to these settings or to disable Restrictions. Note: If you lose or forget a restriction passcode, you will need to perform a factory restore to remove it.
The above comes from here:
http://support.apple.com/kb/HT4213

What is the factory set restriction passcode? I need to erase all content and settings on my handset as I have just upgraded to 4S and need to wipe my old handset off all content. It keeps asking for a passcode even though I never set one. Thanks

Restrictions passcode for iPhone 4. I need to erase all content and settings for handset

There is no factory set restriction code. If you need to completely reset then follow the instructions you find here:
IPhone, iPad, iPod touch: Wrong passcode results in red disabled screen
Please Get the iPhone User Manual for iOS 5

I need to erase the HDD and reload OSX on my new mac mini without a DVD

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