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I recently wiped my iMac for my sister to use. I wiped the entire hard drive including the OS which was El Capitan at the time. When trying to reinstall the software I receive this error message when trying to log into my Apple ID. I have tried other Apple ID’s and the same message appears. This iMac is second hand and we do not have the original users details to find out their Apple ID. Any help will be appreciated.
iMac, OS X 10.11
Try restarting in the Recovery Partition by holding down Command + R on startup. If the computer has a Recovery Partition you can install Mac OS from the Recovery Partition. You will see on the display an option to install Mac OS.
If the computer does not have a Recovery Partition it is too old to do an Internet Recovery (this became available in late 2011 iMacs) so you would need a Snow Leopard upgrade DVD ($20 and only available from Apples online store) to install OS X. You can buy the DVD from https://www.apple.com/shop/product/MC573Z/A/mac-os-x-106-snow-leopard
Good luck.
Try restarting in the Recovery Partition by holding down Command + R on startup. If the computer has a Recovery Partition you can install Mac OS from the Recovery Partition. You will see on the display an option to install Mac OS.
If the computer does not have a Recovery Partition it is too old to do an Internet Recovery (this became available in late 2011 iMacs) so you would need a Snow Leopard upgrade DVD ($20 and only available from Apples online store) to install OS X. You can buy the DVD from https://www.apple.com/shop/product/MC573Z/A/mac-os-x-106-snow-leopard
Good luck.
What year iMac is it?
2008 I believe.
iMac unable to install software
