I am trying to reinstall the OS on my old Mac Book Air 2011. I tried to get this machine ready for resale. I must have done it wrong and now I cannot reinstall the OS. When I get to the part of the internet reinstall it does not see my hard drive but it does install it on a thumb drive and I can operate the machine. Any suggestions?
[Re-Titled By Moderator]
You do see the physical internal SSD within Disk Utility? If so, then make sure to erase the whole physical SSD as GUID partition and MacOS Extended (Journaled). This assumes you are booting to a macOS 10.11+ installer. If you are booting into a macOS 10.13 installer, then you will need to click "View" within Disk Utility and select "Show All Devices" before the physical drive appears on the left pane of Disk Utility.
Erase and reformat a storage device in Disk Utility on Mac - Apple Support
If you are booting a macOS 10.10 or earlier installer, then you will instead need to partition & format the whole physical SSD by using the instructions in the following article as a guide:
https://eshop.macsales.com/tech_center/formatting/Mac_Formatting_6-10.pdf
The internal physical SSD will be the top most item which will usually have the make & model of the SSD....something like "Apple SSD...", or "Apple SM128.....", etc. (it varies by version of Disk Utility & model of SSD).
You do see the physical internal SSD within Disk Utility? If so, then make sure to erase the whole physical SSD as GUID partition and MacOS Extended (Journaled). This assumes you are booting to a macOS 10.11+ installer. If you are booting into a macOS 10.13 installer, then you will need to click "View" within Disk Utility and select "Show All Devices" before the physical drive appears on the left pane of Disk Utility.
Erase and reformat a storage device in Disk Utility on Mac - Apple Support
If you are booting a macOS 10.10 or earlier installer, then you will instead need to partition & format the whole physical SSD by using the instructions in the following article as a guide:
https://eshop.macsales.com/tech_center/formatting/Mac_Formatting_6-10.pdf
The internal physical SSD will be the top most item which will usually have the make & model of the SSD....something like "Apple SSD...", or "Apple SM128.....", etc. (it varies by version of Disk Utility & model of SSD).
Make sure your internal drive is formatted with Mac OS Extended (Journaled) format and a GUID partition scheme.
If it already is, then you may have a drive that is failing, especially if that drive is the original that the computer shipped with.
To be completely honest, I think it would be best if you simply recycled that MBA.
The hardware is obsolete. The newest macOS version it can run is obsolete and unsupported.
You won't be doing anyone any favors by selling them a Mac of that vintage. You should consider dropping it off to be properly recycled. Of course the choice is yours, my friend.
It is,D.I. I installed the OS on a flash drive and was able to operate it. I ran disk repair on the internal hard drive and it came out ok and it says that the hard drive is formatted with GUID. Thanks for taking the time. I welcome any other ideas.
You’re right. I’ll have to say goodbye to my old friend!
Thank you, HW, I'll give it a shot. Getting close to parting ways with this old MacBook Air who had served me well for many years. Thanks again.
Can you tell me how to close this case?
gordon_s wrote:
Can you tell me how to close this case?
There is no closing of threads on the Apple forums at this time.
Did it work, or are you giving up?
Giving up. It's a 2011 Mac. I was just playing around with it to see if I could easily get it running but I couldn't. Time to send it to the recyclers.
I appreciate your helpfulness.
Gordon
Why can't I see my hard drive for macOS reinstallation?
