Sep 28, 2020 • Filed to: Solve Mac Problems • Proven solutions
- Hard Reset Macbook Air
- How To Format Your Macbook Air Pro
- Reset Macbook Air To Factory Default
- How To Format Your Macbook Air 2
- How To Format Your Macbook Air Hard Drive
- How To Wipe A Macbook Air
- How To Format Your Macbook Air Louder
'I am thinking about selling my Mac and it has personal data on it. How do I format my Mac High Sierra? What should I do to make it entirely new? '
There are various reasons why people would try to format Mac. Maybe you are selling it or maybe you just want to empty up space. Whatever the reason is, the in-built Disk Utility is the only thing you need to carry out the task. But if you intend to use it afterward, you must gather up some additional information about the Mac file format too.
The biggest decision you have to make before you format Mac is to choose the right file format. Once you pick the right format for your needs, you can move on to how to format a Mac guide. Go through this article and you will know everything you should regarding formatting Mac safely.
NO DISC HOW to Factory Reset MacBook AIR. Step 1: Choose mode 'Erase Hard Drive'. You will see hard drives on your Mac, just choose the targeted hard drive. Step 2: Once the erasing process gets finished, the hard drive on MacBook/MacBook Air/MacBook Pro is formatted, all data.
Part 1. Overview of Formatting Mac
Formatting means deleting, erasing, or wiping out the existing data from a drive. This is done to make space for new data on the storage media. Formatting means erasing data on a drive while keeping the same format. You must have come across forums where people ask how to format NTFS on Mac. Typically, reformatting involves changing the NTFS or exFAT format to MacOS Extended format or APFS format as they are more compatible with Apple systems.
1. Reasons for Formatting Your Mac
The reasons which lead to formatting the Mac hard drive are listed below:
- When you are giving your Mac away.
- If you want to change the format of the disk such as Windows to Mac format.
- When the drive can't be read by Mac.
- When you are trying to resolve a disk error or working issue which can't be repaired.
- If the macOS installer doesn't see the disk or can't install it properly.
- If the macOS installer states that you can't install the volume as it is a part of Apple RAID.
2. Benefits of Mac Formatting
Despite the reason for formatting, there are various benefits of carrying out the task too. The advantages of formatting the Mac hard drive include:
- It will prevent unexpected system crashes and extend the file of storage media.
- It will improve hard drive performance.
- It will prevent data theft as all the important data is deleted without leaving a trace.
- Formatting also fixes glitches and software conflicts in the system.
When you are about to format Mac hard drive, it is vital that you have a complete understanding of the Mac file system format too.
3. When to Format or Reformat Mac?
Under normal situations, you only format Mac as the intention is to wipe away the data and files from Mac. It is a low-level formatting process that only involves erasing the data on the system. It doesn't overwrite the existing data or remove it completely. The traces of the data are still left even after formatting.
But when you change a file format system of a drive, it is called reformatting. The process is accompanied by the deletion of data on the drive as the format changes, the files saved on the drive becomes irrelevant. As you reformat MacBook Pro or any other version, a partition map is created on the selected drive and an appropriate file system is applied which works with Mac such as OS X Extended (Journaled) file system. It is considered as a high-level formatting process.
So, you only need to decide whether you want to use the drive for other data or simply want to free up space on the drive. Once you understand the difference, it will be easier to decide whether you prefer to reformat Mac or simple formatting.
Related: Further, read and get to know the methods to format the USB drive on Mac.
Part 2. How to Format Mac in 3 Ways?
We have gathered up a list of methods on how to reformat/format Mac without any hassle. You can use any of the listed methods according to your requirements.
1. Reinstall Your Mac OS:
It is very well-known that reinstalling the Operating System deletes every data and setting on the system. Luckily, you can install the Mac OS from the Apple server or the recovery partition in your drive whenever you want. This will format HDD on Mac and you will be able to use it as new.
- Reboot your Mac and while it is starting up the press and hold the Command + R keys until you see the Apple logo on the screen.
- A macOS utility window will pop-up on the screen and you will see several options on the screen. You obviously want to format Mac HDD; therefore, you will have to choose the Disk Utility option first.
- When the Disk Utility window opens up, click on the Erase tab and make sure that the format is compatible with the system. Then hit the Erase button at the bottom and wait while the drive is cleaned.
- Now quit Disk Utility and get back to the OS X utility screen. Click on the Reinstall macOS option and install the OS from the Apple server or a bootable disk you have.
- Enter the Apple ID is required and wait while the OS is reinstalled on your system.
Now, you can set up Mac once again as you want. The main advantage of using this method is that you can wipe the drive securely and restore the original version of macOS from the internet. Plus, you get to install the latest compatible macOS on your system.
2. Erase Mac Hard Drive
When you erase a hard drive, you basically format NTFS on Mac and change the format to a compatible one like AFPS or Mac OS X Extended (Journaled). Editar video macbook air.
- Reboot the Mac and press Command + R keys during startup until you hear a chime. Wait as the OS X utility window appears on the screen.
- Switch to the Erase tab and select the volume which you want to erase. If you have no partition, then select the main hard drive.
- Choose the format as Mac OS Extended (Journaled) and ensure that the GUID Partition Map Scheme is used.
- You can choose whether you want the fastest erase or most secure erase under the Erase Free Space option. Drag the slider according to your preference and hit the Ok button.
- Finally, click on the Erase button and the Disk Utility will erase the entire drive in a while.
When you use this method to format Mac, so are only erasing the data and files on the system without making any changes in the OS.
3. Wipe Mac SSD
When you are trying to wipe the Mac Solid State Drive, you need to remember that the Mac SSD is the best-integrated circuit you can get your hands on. As it uses flash memory, the information is retained on the drive more firmly than other Storage Media. Therefore, you will have to use the Cryptographic-Erase instead of standard erase for Mac SSD to format Mac disc.
- While rebooting your Mac, press and hold the Command + R keys to enter the Recovery mode. You will see an Apple icon or hear a chime when you enter the Recovery mode.
Related: Go there and get more approaches to booting Mac into Recovery Mode.
- When the OS X utility window appears on the screen, choose the Disk Utility option.
- In the Disk Utility window, specify the drive that you want to delete and click on the Erase option.
- Select the Mac OS Extended (Encrypted) format under the format list. Then press the Erase button and set a password for the encrypted partition. Make sure that you use an easy password as you are most likely to need it soon enough.
- Let the drive get erased and turn into an encrypted format. Once the process finishes, again access the Disk Utility and change the format to Mac OS Extended (Journaled).
- When you press the Erase button, open the Security option in the pop-up window and you will see the secure erase option. The level of erasing determines the security, i.e. 35 Pass Erase is the most secure option.
- Finally, press the Ok button and proceed with the wiping process.
The main advantage of using this method is that will blank the slate securely. There will be no data left on the SSD whatsoever.
Video Tutorial on How to Format a USB Flash Drive on Mac
Part 3. How to Recover Formatted Data on Mac?
When you are trying to format Mac windows, it is obvious that you are going to lose some important files. But there is no need to panic; we can deal with loss using Recoverit Data Recovery software for Mac. This tool is specially designed to retrieve the lost data on your system.
Recoverit - The Best Mac Formatted Recovery Software
- Recover various data on Mac or Mac-connected devices.
- Scan and preview the files before you recover the data.
After you learn how to format Mac, it is important that you know how you can get the files back on your Mac. Here is the guide you need to follow:
Step 1: Select a location
Run the program and specify a location from where the files were deleted. In case you don't know where the files were located, choose the 'I can't find my partition' and hit the Start button.
Step 2: Scan the location
The software will scan the drive and display the results on the screen sorted out according to their format. You can also pause the scan at any time.
Step 3: Preview and Recover
Select the files that you want to recover and have a preview of the files. You can perform a selective recovery of the files, select as many as you want, and hit the Recover button at the bottom of the interface.
In this way, you can easily get your documents that were disappeared back on Mac. In case if the quick scan was not able to fulfill your requirements, then you can do a deep scan as well. Recoverit would extract data from your Mac's storage. While the deep scan would take more time than the first scan, the results would also be far better.
Part 4. Tips for Formatting a Mac
The long-time users know that NTFS or exFAT format on Mac are not compatible. These formats are more suitable for Windows users. Hence, unless you want to transfer the files from Windows to Mac, it is advised to not use these formats on Mac. Here are some other tips related to formatting Mac that will come in handy:
- The Erase option in the Disk Utility with OS X El Capitan and later performs formatting of a drive and erasing of volume under the same name. So, you can use the Erase command for both tasks.
- Make sure that you create a backup of the data already present on the drive as you might end up losing it permanently.
- Choose between the format APFS or Mac OS Extended format carefully.
- To find out the current format of the drive, you can look into the System Information. The file system column on the Storage sidebar displays the current file format.
- It is advised not to change the built-in APFS-format into Mac OS Extended under any situation.
Hard Reset Macbook Air
Conclusion
In this article, you almost learned everything on how to format HDD on Mac. You can choose the method as per your requirements. And if somehow you end up losing some important files, Recoverit is here to help you as it can recover data from the formatted hard drive. So, if your friends, family, or close ones need help with formatting Mac, forward the guide to help them.
What's Wrong with Mac
How To Format Your Macbook Air Pro
- Recover Your Mac
- Fix Your Mac
- Delete Your Mac
- Learn Mac Hacks
There are mainly two reasons why you want to restore your Mac to factory settings and erase everything.
- You want to erase your MacBook Pro/Air, MacBook, iMac to sell or give away the Mac.
- Your Mac is running slow or having other problems so that you want to delete everything on Mac to start over.
It is not difficult to erase everything on a Mac and reformat the MacBook or iMac. But if you want to reset MacBook Pro/Air, iMac without losing data, or securely and completely wipe a Mac, there are a couple of things you should do. Just follow this guide to complete all the steps that are needed to securely and completely erase everything on Mac. Your Mac will be restored to factory settings after that.
Step 1: Back Up Your Mac Before Factory Reset
I believe that there must be some important files on your Mac. Therefore, it is a must to back up your files before erasing your MacBook or iMac. There are mutiple options to back up your Mac:
Move everything that are important to you to an external hard drive. It is time-consuming but feasible if you have limited documents, photos, videos, etc. that need to be backed up before erasing Mac.
![Air Air](https://img2.cgtrader.com/items/42718/apple_macbook_air_notebook_3d_model_fbx_obj_max_1948f166-d601-4729-82f8-9594b7326432.jpg)
Back up your files on Mac to a cloud storage, such as iCloud. Before doing that, make sure your iCloud account have enough free space.
Make a copy of your Mac data to an external hard drive with a backup program, such as Time Machine, Apple's built-in backup tool for Mac. Learn about the steps to back up a Mac: How to Backup Your Mac with or without Time Machine.
You can wipe a Mac without losing data by using one of the backup methods mentioned above. Macbook backup utility. And to reduce the size of your Mac's backup and incease the backup speed, it is recommended to clean useless junk files on your Mac before a Time Machine or iCloud backup. FonePaw MacMaster can easily delete caches, logs, borwsing history, duplicate files and photos, large files, useless apps and more from your Mac.
Download
- Download and run FonePaw MacMaster on your Mac.
- Select the file type you want to clean, such as system junks, duplicate photos. Click Scan.
- Click Clean to remove the junks you don't need.
Go ahead to back up your Mac. The backup will be finished more quickly, taking less space of your external hard drive or iCloud account.
Step 2: Completely Delete Private Files
Do you know that files on Mac are actually recoverable after factory reset? That's right. Even though you have reformatted your Mac and erased everything on Mac, it is still possible to recover the erased files on the Mac with a professional data recovery program such as FonePaw Data Recovery. If you have confidential files on your Mac and don't want to take the risk that somebody may find the files from the reformatted Mac after performing data recovery, you can use Eraser on FonePaw MacMasterto securely delete confidential files on your Mac before factory reset. The Eraser can erase the trace of a file on the hard drive and make it unrecoverable.
- Install FonePaw MacMaster on your Mac.
- Click Eraser and select the files you want to destroy.
- Click Erase to make it unrecoverable.
Step 3: Turn off FileVault
FileVault encryption is an Apple built-in feature that is designed to encrypt your hard drive and files on the hard drive. It is recommended to turn off FileVault before reset and clean install macOS system. Here are the stpes to disable FileVault encryption.
- Open System Preferences > Security & Privacy.
- On the Security & Privacy window, click the FileVault tab.
- Click Lock button and you will need to enter password of the administrator account the unlock FileVault settings.
- After entering the password, you are able to click Turn Off FileVault. Click it.
All files on your Mac will be dencrypted after FileVault is off.
Step 4: Remove iTunes Authorization and iCloud Account
Reset Macbook Air To Factory Default
You don't want your iTunes or iCloud account to be linking to your MacBook or iMac if you decide to sell it or give it away. You can authorize only 5 computer with your iTunes account so you don't want to lose an allocation to a Mac that you no longer own. So before erasing your MacBook or iMac, you should first deauthorize iTunes and disable iCloud on your Mac.
Deauthorize iTunes on Mac
- Open iTunes on Mac.Click Account > Authorizations > Deauthorize This Computer.
- You'll need to enter the password of your Apple ID. Then click Deauthorize.
Sign out of iCloud on Mac
- Open System Preference > iCloud. Click Sign Out.A window will pop up, asking whether you want to keep a copy of your iCloud data on the Mac.
- Deselect all the options and click Continue, which will ensure that your iCloud data won't stay on the Mac.
Also, don't forget that your iCloud account can also be used to receive iMessage. So run Messages, click Preferences > Accounts to sign out of iMessage.
How To Format Your Macbook Air 2
Step 5: Erase MacBook, MacBook Air/Pro, iMac
After finishing the above steps, you are now offically able to wipe your MacBook, MacBook Pro, MacBook Air or iMac. You need to erase your Mac in recovery mode.
Enter your Mac into recovery mode
Power off your Mac and then reboot it. As it is rebooting, press and hold Command + R (Option + Command + R or Shift + Option + Command + R) until you see the Apple logo.
Generally you can use Command + R combination to enter the Recovery mode. If you need to upgrade you need to the latest macOS compatible with your Mac, use Option + Command + R; If you want to clean install the macOS that came with your Mac, use Shift + Option + Command + R.
Erase everything on your Mac
How To Format Your Macbook Air Hard Drive
When you are in recovery mode on Mac, you will see the macOS Utilities menu. Select Disk Utility.
Select the disk to erase. To erase everything on your Mac, you usually should choose the main hard drive named Macintosh HD.
How To Wipe A Macbook Air
If the Mac is running High Sierra or later, Disk Utility will show all the Macs linked with your Apple ID under Macintosh HD. So be careful not to delete the drive of other Macs.
How To Format Your Macbook Air Louder
Click Erase. Then you need to enter name and format of the drive. You can choose either APFS or Mac OS Extended (journaled) to reformat the Mac. APFS is a new file system introduced by Apple since High Sierra, which is more recommendable.Click Erase to begin wiping everything on your Mac.
Step 6: Reinstall macOS on MacBook, iMac
After deleting everything on your Mac, you can now reinstall macOS. Go back to macOS Utilities menu. Select Reinstall macOS and follow the on-screen instructions to finish.
That's all about how to factory reset your Mac and erase everthing. If you have more question, drop it in the comment section.