How can I help a friend with her iMac from my iMac from across town?
I reset my Late 2012 iMac and gave it to an elderly woman in need of a new computer. She's not to tech savvy and is struggling with pushing the wrong key or not knowing how to do something... and getting frustrated. I drive over to her house, show her what she needs to know and come home, min. 3 hours at a time, every other day or more. Can someone please point me in a direction to somehow remotely log onto her machine and show her what she needs, and be done with it in a very short amount of time.
Using screen sharing is easy but does require users to be signed into iCloud on their Mac and signed into the Messages application on the computer using the same Apple ID.
The only training you will have to do is to train her to accept your request to share and control her screen. Without this acceptance you cannot proceed to control the screen to complete your support work.
AppleInsider has posted a very clear tutorial about this in this YouTube video.
You might also want to set her up with a standard user account on the computer rather than have her use the Administration account - and thus risk changing some crucial setting or deleting files and applications in error.
Using screen sharing is easy but does require users to be signed into iCloud on their Mac and signed into the Messages application on the computer using the same Apple ID.
The only training you will have to do is to train her to accept your request to share and control her screen. Without this acceptance you cannot proceed to control the screen to complete your support work.
AppleInsider has posted a very clear tutorial about this in this YouTube video.
You might also want to set her up with a standard user account on the computer rather than have her use the Administration account - and thus risk changing some crucial setting or deleting files and applications in error.
iMac (27-inch, Late 2012) is NOT supported by Apple for macOS Big Sur. Running macOS Big Sur on this Mac will cause many issues, from lots of kernel panics, to file corruptions, to erratic errors. Please, install macOS Catalina on this iMac. To do this, download macOS Catalina and create a bootable installer: How to create a bootable installer for macOS - Apple Support. Follow the steps in that article on how to use the bootable installer, then see the next steps below. Following these next steps will ERASE all data, so backup the Mac:
Once you are in macOS Recovery, verify you are connected to WiFi in the top right corner. If possible, connect directly to the internet with Ethernet.
Go to Disk Utility.
Select "View" in the toolbar —> "Show All Devices".
Select your main hard drive or SSD. This will be the top, non indented hard drive.
Click Erase, and input the following exactly: (If you cannot select erase on the main hard drive, erase the "Container" or “Macintosh HD”.)
Name: Macintosh HD
Format: APFS
Scheme: GUID Partition Map (if shown)
Click Erase. If “Erase Volume Group” is shown, use that instead.
