The Easiest Way to Reinstall a Mac Operating System

I say this of course tongue in cheek. I have an old MacBook. I have not used this MacBook in some time, and I wanted to sell it on eBay, or even Craigslist before it lost value. However, because of my worry about information security, and the desire to leave the hard drive in the computer, I have not touched it in six months. I looked for a while but could not find the original disks. I check on eBay and Craigslist for someone selling the original disks, and no luck. Yet, this problem has been eating away at me. Whenever I look at the MacBook, it looks like $500 to me.

So, today, like many other times, I wander into an Apple store. I was looking at the new iPad, like many people do nowadays, and wondering if I should purchase one. The ones that have that have the internet connection actually require you to open a new account for $25 a month. I am already paying AT&T for my data plan on my Blackberry, so that would be $55 each month going to AT&T each month for mobile internet. I am sure with taxes that would come out to about $70 a month.

That would be $700-800 for the iPad plus $300 a month before taxes for the internet service. But, I digress, then in one moment it all came together for me. I walked up to a blue shirt (there are many of them around any Apple Store), and asked him if I could bring my MacBook in and have someone at the Genius Bar do a complete reinstall for me. With a wonderful smile, he said, “Of course, just make an appointment, bring it in, and we will take care of it for you.” That is it, months and months of anxiety disappeared in a single moment. With that I was happily on my way.

I had previously asked a friend with a MacBook about his operating disks, but nothing ever came of it. More anxiety and more months passed by. If you are an owner of an Apple product, it never hurts to ask about the customer service at the store. It is amazing how months and months of anxiety can disappear when you ask the right question to the right person. I have an old Apple iphone that I want to get rid of as well, but the operating system would lock up whenever I wanted to save the information on their one last time.