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I recently bought α 2012 MacBook Pro, it was under the name mac for α while and I changed it tonight with the users setting and when it restarted the background was changed and a few of the docks had question marks, also my stickies were gone, how can I restore this? It is also being super slow not letting me click on finder or much, any advice?

MacBook Pro 13″, macOS 10.15

Posted on Oct 6, 2021 9:44 PM

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Posted on Oct 7, 2021 5:50 AM

Whenever you purchase a used computer you should always perform a clean install of the OS by first erasing the whole physical drive before installing macOS. This will ensure the OS is absolutely clean with no nasty surprises from the previous owner. It also helps to make sure the laptop does not have a firmware lock enabled and that the Mac is not being managed by a previous owner. While booted to the macOS installer use Disk Utility to erase the whole physical drive the details depend on the OS being installed and may require clicking "View" within Disk Utility and selecting "Show All Devices" so that the physical drive appears on the left pane of Disk Utility (macOS 10.13+). Here is what the previous owner should have done before selling the Mac:

https://support.apple.com/en-us/HT201065


It sounds like you incorrectly modified the short user name of the user account. FYI, here is an Apple article with the correct instructions for modifying the short user name of a macOS user account:

https://support.apple.com/en-us/HT201548


Since this is a "new" to you computer I highly recommend performing the clean install. If you have important files that are not backed up, then I suggest transferring those files to an external drive so you can perform a clean install. Otherwise you can restore from a backup made before the change.

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Question marked as Top-ranking reply

Oct 7, 2021 5:50 AM in response to Kiana_777

Whenever you purchase a used computer you should always perform a clean install of the OS by first erasing the whole physical drive before installing macOS. This will ensure the OS is absolutely clean with no nasty surprises from the previous owner. It also helps to make sure the laptop does not have a firmware lock enabled and that the Mac is not being managed by a previous owner. While booted to the macOS installer use Disk Utility to erase the whole physical drive the details depend on the OS being installed and may require clicking "View" within Disk Utility and selecting "Show All Devices" so that the physical drive appears on the left pane of Disk Utility (macOS 10.13+). Here is what the previous owner should have done before selling the Mac:

https://support.apple.com/en-us/HT201065


It sounds like you incorrectly modified the short user name of the user account. FYI, here is an Apple article with the correct instructions for modifying the short user name of a macOS user account:

https://support.apple.com/en-us/HT201548


Since this is a "new" to you computer I highly recommend performing the clean install. If you have important files that are not backed up, then I suggest transferring those files to an external drive so you can perform a clean install. Otherwise you can restore from a backup made before the change.

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