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Selling iMac; How to prepare?

B

BLDun

macrumors regular
Original poster
Jan 22, 2005
164
0
I am selling a 17" iMac I have since I bought a new 24". I have stripped the hard drive clean with a fresh install of the original system. Is there any way I can do this without filling in all the questions they want answers for so the buyer can input his own info? I would like to install some additional things just for their benefit but I can't get past the opening question panels
 
BLDun said:
I am selling a 17" iMac I have since I bought a new 24". I have stripped the hard drive clean with a fresh install of the original system. Is there any way I can do this without filling in all the questions they want answers for so the buyer can input his own info? I would like to install some additional things just for their benefit but I can't get past the opening question panels
Click to expand...

you should be able to cancel past everything except the username/home folder. i usually just use 'default' for both fields (when setting up the machine for sale).
 
BLDun said:
I am selling a 17" iMac I have since I bought a new 24". I have stripped the hard drive clean with a fresh install of the original system. Is there any way I can do this without filling in all the questions they want answers for so the buyer can input his own info? I would like to install some additional things just for their benefit but I can't get past the opening question panels
Click to expand...

Could you boot the 17" in Firewire Target Disk mode and install from the 24"?
 
It won't let me go past the registration form without filling in the info. I had wanted to set it up so that when the new owner turns it on he goes through the process much like buying a new mac
 
BLDun said:
It won't let me go past the registration form without filling in the info. I had wanted to set it up so that when the new owner turns it on he goes through the process much like buying a new mac
Click to expand...

What you'll need to do is go ahead and set it up (temporarily) install anything you want to install, updates, etc. and then follow the instructions here to get rid of the temporary account and reset things back to new.

Those instructions are for OS X 10.5 Leopard , I don't know if they work for OX X 10.6 Snow Leopard.
 
DewGuy, Thanks for the help! The original disks that came with the iMac are for OSX 10.5 so that should work. I have the upgrades for Leopard but am wondering if I can use them. We'll see.

Thanks!
 
Just doing a fresh install won't delete all the data on the HD. Did you zero it out? You need to go in to disk utility (boot from installation cd) and select security option -> zero out. I guess you could also do a 7 time zero out but that'll take a long time.
 
When you install the disk you are presented with the option of doing and erase and install. The warning says that it will erase all content from the hard drive. Is this not true? Does it, in fact not erase the hard drive??
 
Generally, in hard drive terms, 'erasing' simply refer to removing the pointers to the data while leaving the data in place. It may or may not get partially overwritten by the new software install, but it's easy enough to recover lots of data.

You NEED to zero the drive...and if you want absolute security, chose the multiple-zeroing options as they continue to write zero over the disk many times. Some software can recover even 'zeroed-over' data. :( The more zeroing, the less likely this becomes.
 
Sorry, I missed that. Must be Friday! Thanks for everyone's help!!
 
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