How to wipe old Macs running 10.7.5 & 10.5.8?

Question

How to wipe old Macs running 10.7.5 & 10.5.8?

I want to recycle (@Staples) an old MacBook running 10.7.5 and PB G4 running 10.5.8. Target disk mode doesn’t work because, I guess, it shows a floating Firewire icon on the screen. I don’t have any FW cables and the Mac Mini which would do the wiping has no FW inputs anyway. Tried connecting via direct USB cable and Target disk mode and the target drive was not seen in that setup.

Same with the PB G4. I do not have OS installers for those laptops.

Can wipe these over wifi or direct connect with Ethernet cable? If so how?

Earlier Mac models

Posted on May 5, 2024 11:11 AM

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Answer 1

May 5, 2024 1:06 PM in response to Marc Stergionis1

Do you have the recovery discs (optical discs) that came with the PowerBook G4?

You should be able to boot from them (hold down 'C' after powering on the computer), and use them to erase the drive and reinstall a "clean" copy of Mac OS X on it.

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Answer 2

Jan Hedlund

Level 7

22,345 points

May 5, 2024 2:26 PM in response to Marc Stergionis1

Hi,

You could try to open the computers in order to remove the hard drives. This may be more or less difficult depending on the exact models. The now external hard drives could either be destroyed or connected to a universal USB bare drive adapter (the adapter at https://eshop.macsales.com/item/NewerTech/U3NV2SPATA/ is just one example; similar devices may be available locally as well). The bare drive adapter would then allow the hard drives to be read and/or erased when connected to another Mac (or PC, with the appropriate software).

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Answer 3

May 5, 2024 2:24 PM in response to Servant of Cats

Got rid of the recovery disks long ago

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Answer 4

May 5, 2024 2:35 PM in response to Jan Hedlund

Found a FireWire cable stashed away so finally will be able to wipe them. Guess they will end up with blank drives but that won’t matter

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