can't sign in to icloud from my macbook pro

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1. Sign out of your account

(If you are unable to do this because System Preferences has frozen, Force Quit System Preferences and try again)

2. When prompted, opt to delete, contacts, calendars etc from your Mac.

(You are only deleting this data from your Mac, not from iCloud, the data will be reinstated when you log back in. If you need to check that the data is in iCloud before deleting it go to iCloud.comand check each section for data)

3. Having logged out, check that the iCloud accounts along with their data have disappeared from the Mail, Address Book and iCal Applications.

(If necessary, delete the iCloud accounts from each of these application separately from each Applications Preferences)

4. At this point it may be worth trying to log into iCloud from the System Preferences iCloud settings again, if this works, all well and good, if it doesn't continue to step 5.

5. Open your User Library folder in the Finder. (When in the Finder, go to the Go menu, hold down the option key (alt) and choose Library when it appears in the Go menu)

6. Navigate to Library > Application Support > iCloud and drag the iCloud folder to your desktop. (This action only copies the folder and will provide you with a back up)

7. Select the iCloud folder again in Library > Application Support and drag it to the trash, enter your administrators password when prompted.

8. Restart your computer.

9. You should now be able to enter your ID and Password in system Preferences > iCloud and log into your account. Check the services you wish to use and once you are satisfied it's working as it should, trash the iCloud folder you copied to your desktop earlier.

I have the exact same issue. Recently all iCloud services, iMessage and Facetime stopped working on my MacBook. On my Mac Mini it works and all my handheld devices.

I tried the 9 steps with no success. WIth some more questions to the allmighty Google Search, I tried most of those solutins aswell with no luck.

Help...

Got a very similar issue with my iCloud account, and by the way, with the AppStore which I can't use at all (do your ear me, Mr. Apple?). Tried all that I found on the net, and still "Try later", or "Unknown error". Changed Apple ID, passwords, system disk, no way! Which leads me to think this could be related with some obscure way of identifying the computer itself via its MAC adress. Is it silly? Of course, it works fairly well on my iPhone, but I want to use my Mac too... Help!

I have this same problem. Winstons suggestion did not solve my problem.

So I got mine to work by resetting the keychain. Open keychain access. Go to preferences. Then there should be an option towards bottom of the popup that says reset keychain.

This worked for me, had been trying all the suggested solutions from various forums.

When they actually tell you to go and erase your keychain that wasent enough for me, my keychain still

had several entries left.

Create a new keychain that's completly blank, then set that one as the default one.

You dont have to erase the old one, just make sure it wont use that one anymore.

When i did this i was able to login to icloud and set a apple id on my computer.

Hope this help anyone.

I have tried every one of the "fixes" on the numerous threads on this and related issues to no avail.

It all went south when Mavericks was installed. I have a bone stock Apple iMac machine that's always up-to-date.

Once Mavericks arrived on the scene, I can no longer download via AppStore, or login to iCloud via System Preferences. I made the (dreadful) mistake of taking someone's advice on these threads and deleted my iCloud account on the local machine. Now Mail doesn't work anymore. Of course it still works via Safari with web-iCloud access. But, "native access" does not work for anything else. I wiped the sytem and reinstalled from the factory CD (that would not work even!). Curiously the factory CD thought it couldn't install because it thought the root partition was wrong. Really!? So, I had the system Time Machine backed up by physically removing the disc and 3rd party backing it up, then completely wiped and fresh install of the real O/S. (An Apple service depot did this for me.) That did not help.

My opinion is that Apple has done "something cute" in their authentication process to attempt to bind the OS and user to the legit (apple) physical hardware. This was probably an attempt to break the clones. But, this has hosed people who are innocent bystanders with 100% "designed in California and made in China" Apple products.

Heck, we have 10 Apple MACs in our home, and now this feels a lot like MS Windows used to feel -- buggy and it's beyond the ability of the developers to comprehend the side effects of their code.

Just sayin folks....

+1 to the "dirty trick" hypothesis! In fact, down to the guts of my iMac, I think I've found the fingerprint of one possible culprit: the authetification process of the machine (not the system, nor the disk, I tried those without success) seams to read the "name" of the Ethernet card! Even if you use wifi, you must have an Ethernet card. Since a power burst during a storm, I have no more, and rejected to the limbo...

Well, it's tricky, and understandable that Apple finds ways to prevent piracy. But I, and so many others, are asking this question for years! Doesn't seem very fairplay from Apple not to answer once in a while...

Hope this could help someone, I haven't found how to bypass this failure.

I don't know if I'd call it a dirty trick -- but it certainly is a sloppy and ill-conceived trick. I don't think Apple set out to purposely harm legit Apple customers. If this goes on for a long time with their knowledge and no fix, then the sloppiness of the trick morphs into a dirty trick. Perhaps that's what you are suggesting. I would agree with that. I also think that they don't really understand how their system works inside and this side effect is the result. So, legit Apple customers are harmed by this. It's likely they have a calculation on this lack of software reliability which goes something like this -- if X% of the customers complain about a problem it's all hands on deck to fix it immediately. X has to be fairly large for that to happen. If Y% complain about something, we'll either get a patch out or incorporate a fix on the next software train to leave the station. Y has to be moderately high for that. If Z% complain about something and Z is a small #, then you all are on your own. This is what we are dealing with here, I think.

However, hacks like this inside the system are basically what created MS Windows. I hope they are not stumbling and bumbling down that well worn path, littered with software catastrophies.

Curiously, in my travels down this mink hole, at one time my Ethernet BSD name spontaneously changed (after Mavericks was installed). Then it appeared I had 2 Ethernet interfaces. The hardware has no such thing. In fact, the RJ45 receptacle has never even had an Ethernet cable plugged into it. The machine has been WiFi since taken out of the box.

I have seen on one thread the suggestion that you must rename the Ethernet back to "en0". Right now, mine has decided it wants to be "en3". At one point I had renamed it back to "en0". But, this does not cure the problem with native iCloud access/authentication.

There are a variety of ways for them to authenticate the actual hardware without a hack like tying it to the name of the ethernet interface.

Deleting the "icloud" folder worked for me - thanks Winston Churchill ✅

1. Sign out of your account

(If you are unable to do this because System Preferences has frozen, Force Quit System Preferences and try again)

2. When prompted, opt to delete, contacts, calendars etc from your Mac.

(You are only deleting this data from your Mac, not from iCloud, the data will be reinstated when you log back in. If you need to check that the data is in iCloud before deleting it go to iCloud.comand check each section for data)

3. Having logged out, check that the iCloud accounts along with their data have disappeared from the Mail, Address Book and iCal Applications.

(If necessary, delete the iCloud accounts from each of these application separately from each Applications Preferences)

4. At this point it may be worth trying to log into iCloud from the System Preferences iCloud settings again, if this works, all well and good, if it doesn't continue to step 5.

5. Open your User Library folder in the Finder. (When in the Finder, go to the Go menu, hold down the option key (alt) and choose Library when it appears in the Go menu)

6. Navigate to Library > Application Support > iCloud and drag the iCloud folder to your desktop. (This action only copies the folder and will provide you with a back up)

7. Select the iCloud folder again in Library > Application Support and drag it to the trash, enter your administrators password when prompted.

8. Restart your computer.

9. You should now be able to enter your ID and Password in system Preferences > iCloud and log into your account. Check the services you wish to use and once you are satisfied it's working as it should, trash the iCloud folder you copied to your desktop earlier.

Me too!! anyone find a solution?

Thank you. This worked for me.

Kate

Thank You!