iMac was wiped, no more Macintosh HD

I recently purchased a 2nd hand iMac and I went to wipe it to remove the seller’s information of it but I seemed to have accidentally wiped the disk. I was reading up on how to fix that but then also accidentally erased the ‘Apple HDD hts541010a9e662 media’ and now the Macintosh HD is gone. I have been reading for hours and hours trying to see how I can reinstall it but have had no luck. Please help 😭😭

I also attempted to ‘restart NVRAM’ but had no luck.

iMac Pro (2017)

Posted on Nov 5, 2023 6:11 PM

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Question marked as Top-ranking reply

Posted on Nov 6, 2023 7:11 AM

Hi Lana-stuffed-up,


Thanks for posting the screenshot! It looks like the internal drive might have been erased, but not reformatted for Mac use. Complete these steps to reformat your drive and reinstall macOS:


  1. Start up from Internet Recovery: Hold down Option-Command-R as you power on or restart your Intel-based Mac.
  2. If you're asked to authenticate with admin credentials, complete these steps instead: How To Fully Erase A Mac Using Recovery A… - Apple Community
  3. When the list of utilities appears, choose Disk Utility and continue.
  4. In Disk Utility, if a View button appears, click on it, then choose "Show All Devices".
  5. Select the top level of your internal drive (APPLE HDD) and choose Erase. Select these options, then click Erase:
    1. Name: Macintosh HD
    2. Format: APFS, or Mac OS (OS X) Extended Journaled
    3. Scheme: GUID Partition Table/Map
  6. When the reformat is complete, quit Disk Utility.
  7. The list of utilities should reappear. Choose Install macOS (or Install OS X) and continue.
  8. Complete the onscreen instructions to reinstall macOS.


If an error appears in the macOS installer and you can't proceed, please provide the year and model of your iMac. This info helps significantly for finding other solutions to reinstall macOS.


To get the year and model of your iMac, provide your serial number to Apple's warranty coverage site: Check Your Service and Support Coverage - Apple Support


To find your serial number: Identify your iMac model - Apple Support (CA)


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4 replies
Question marked as Top-ranking reply

Nov 6, 2023 7:11 AM in response to Lana-stuffed-up

Hi Lana-stuffed-up,


Thanks for posting the screenshot! It looks like the internal drive might have been erased, but not reformatted for Mac use. Complete these steps to reformat your drive and reinstall macOS:


  1. Start up from Internet Recovery: Hold down Option-Command-R as you power on or restart your Intel-based Mac.
  2. If you're asked to authenticate with admin credentials, complete these steps instead: How To Fully Erase A Mac Using Recovery A… - Apple Community
  3. When the list of utilities appears, choose Disk Utility and continue.
  4. In Disk Utility, if a View button appears, click on it, then choose "Show All Devices".
  5. Select the top level of your internal drive (APPLE HDD) and choose Erase. Select these options, then click Erase:
    1. Name: Macintosh HD
    2. Format: APFS, or Mac OS (OS X) Extended Journaled
    3. Scheme: GUID Partition Table/Map
  6. When the reformat is complete, quit Disk Utility.
  7. The list of utilities should reappear. Choose Install macOS (or Install OS X) and continue.
  8. Complete the onscreen instructions to reinstall macOS.


If an error appears in the macOS installer and you can't proceed, please provide the year and model of your iMac. This info helps significantly for finding other solutions to reinstall macOS.


To get the year and model of your iMac, provide your serial number to Apple's warranty coverage site: Check Your Service and Support Coverage - Apple Support


To find your serial number: Identify your iMac model - Apple Support (CA)


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iMac was wiped, no more Macintosh HD

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