Are you considering giving away your old Mac with anM-series chipthis holiday season? If so, it’s wise to erase the hard drive and do a factory reset of the machine. This will protect your data from being accessed by anyone else and provide the new user with a like-new experience on your old Mac orMacBooklaptop. It will also un-sync services and software connected to your old Mac, preventing any issues in the future with accessing them.
The M-series processors brought about a new way to factory reset your Mac, so if you’ve never reset a Mac, or haven’t reset a Mac since the M-series chips came out, this guide is for you. If you’re using a Mac with macOS Monterey or later, and have a Mac with an M1, M2, orM3 processor, the steps for resetting your Mac are easier than they were before.
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The first step to wiping a Mac
You already know… back it all up
It should always be noted that doing a factory reset means deleting everything stored on your Mac. While you may think you can just rest assured with your automatic iCloud saves, think again. An iCloud back-up will back-up nearly everything on your Mac (or iPhone, iPad, Watch). However, it will not treat non-Apple software the same way. That lengthy proposal you are working on with a word editor? If it’s not pages, it’s probably not backed up to iCloud.
Fortunately, it’s easy to back up a Mac, so long as you have anexternal drive. With an external drive, you can use Apple’s Time Machine program to back up everything on your Mac to your trusty external drive, and go on with your day. It’s easy to use, and there’s a step-by-step guided backup tool that will help you connect to your external drive and create the backup.
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Prepare to erase macOS
Log out of everything, including non-Apple services
You’ll want to make sure you log out of everything first, including software services that are signed in on your Mac. This includes things like DropBox or Microsoft Drive, as well as the Adobe Creative Suite and even programs such as Grammarly. Any program that’s running in the background on your Mac needs to be signed out and turned off. This works differently for each app, but you’ll also need to do this for iCloud. Here’s how to log out of iCloud:
Once everything is signed out, you’ll be prepared to move onto the next step of formatting and factory resetting your MacBook.
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Erase your macOS
Give your Mac a clean slate
Thanks to the introduction of macOS Monterey in 2021, there’s an easier way to erase your macOS with a new setting in System Preferences. With just one click, you may erase your entire macOS by clicking onErase All Contents and Settings.However, this will only work with M-series Macs, or one with the T1 or T2 security chip. You also will need to have your Mac updated to macOS Monterrey or macOS Ventura in order to access the wipe.
Erase all contents and settings will erase everything, including biometric data such as fingerprint scans from your Mac. The process is different depending on which macOS version you are running, so let’s start with a Mac runningmacOS Ventura or later (Sonoma and Sequioa):
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If you have a Mac that is runningmacOS Monterrey,follow these steps:
At this point in the process on either OS version, you’ll receive a friendly reminder to back up anything you want to save usingTime Machine. A window will appear showing you what is being deleted, and should include your Apple ID, Touch ID, and Find My settings from your Mac, along with any saved passwords.
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After your data is deleted, you’ll be asked to sign out of your Apple ID and your Mac. You’ll get a second warning before completing this process, and it’s truly your final chance at stopping your Mac from being fully erased. Your Mac will restart after you click through the Erase All Contents and Settings popup.
Once your Mac has restarted, it will boot to the guided first-time Mac setup.
After you’ve erased and reset your Mac
You’ll have to log into everything on your new Mac
Congratulations, your old Mac is now fully ready to be sold or given to someone else, and you’ve completed the task of erasing and factory resetting it. You will need to log into everything on your Mac, and use your external drive and iCloud backups to restore your data to your new Mac. you may also take your old Mac to an Apple Store if you want to sell the Mac back to Apple for store credit on an upcoming purchase.
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