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"About this Mac" Model and Year missing

Hi Everyone


Have just installed Yosemite on my 2013 MacBook Air 11".


Everything is fine, except the model and year is missing from the "About the Mac". It's not a big thing, but it's bugging me.


Anyone know why this information would be missing? I'm wondering if something is wrong with my MBA. it was recently purchased second hand.


I have tried deleting com.apple.SystemProfiler.plist and rebooting, but still missing.


Thanks


User uploaded file

MacBook Air, OS X Yosemite (10.10.3)

Posted on Jun 27, 2015 8:02 AM

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Posted on Jun 29, 2015 6:45 AM

Hi Everyone


Well, I have just called AppleCare. Very friendly and helpful.


The answer is – because my laptop was originally a build to order, the model/year does not show up in “About This Mac”. MBAs purchased direct from a store will show the model/year correctly.


So that’s how it works!


Thank you to everyone for your help 🙂

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Question marked as Best reply

Jun 29, 2015 6:45 AM in response to Alberto Ravasio

Hi Everyone


Well, I have just called AppleCare. Very friendly and helpful.


The answer is – because my laptop was originally a build to order, the model/year does not show up in “About This Mac”. MBAs purchased direct from a store will show the model/year correctly.


So that’s how it works!


Thank you to everyone for your help 🙂

Jun 27, 2015 9:25 AM in response to tyronehowe

I have a 13 inch, 2014 MBA and the model year information does appear as it should running Yosemite 10.10.3:

User uploaded file

No explanation why you do not have this information displayed.


The following dialog:

User uploaded file

Is produced by the following AppleScript. Copy/paste into Yosemite's Script Editor, compile and run.


-- Model Identifier

set hw_model to (do shell script "sysctl -n hw.model") as text


set curlProd to "curl -s http://support-sp.apple.com/sp/product?cc="

set sysPro to "system_profiler SPHardwareDataType "

set sn4 to " | awk '/Serial/ {print $4}' | cut -c 9-"

-- extra \ to appease AppleScript

set modYear to " | sed -En 's/.*(\\(.+\\)).*/\\1/p'"


-- returns (13-inch, Early 2014) by example. Data not locally available.

set hw_year to (do shell script curlProd & "$(" & sysPro & sn4 & ")" & modYear) as text


set hw_ram to (do shell script "sysctl -n hw.memsize")

set hw_ram to hw_ram / (1024 ^ 3) & " GB Installed"


display dialoghw_model & space & hw_year & tab & hw_ram

Jun 28, 2015 7:03 AM in response to tyronehowe

tyronehowe wrote:


It's not a big thing, but it's bugging me.


Anyone know why this information would be missing?

Maybe it is a bug in the OSX:


Bug Reporter https://bugreport.apple.com/


Apple Feedback http://www.apple.com/feedback/




MacBook Pro (15-inch Mid 2012), OS X Yosemite (10.10.3), i7 500GB 16GB RAM iPhone5 iOS8.3, Paralles10.0.2

Jun 29, 2015 2:24 AM in response to Alberto Ravasio

Interesting Alberto!


So there are some machines where neither the script nor the "About this Mac" works (like mine), some where only the script works (like yours), and others, presumably, that work for both.


Weird!


So I guess I don't need to worry that mine isn't showing either. It probably means the laptop is ok.


... still bothers me though 🙂

Jun 27, 2015 9:16 AM in response to Alberto Ravasio

Hi Alberto


Thanks for your reply. That’s very interesting.


The odd thing is that my wife’s 2012 13” MacBook Air (which also has OSX 10.10.3) correctly shows as “MacBook Air (13-inch Mid 2012)”


I think what worries me most is that I have only just bought this laptop, and am worried that it’s a sign the laptop has been tampered with in some way. Although I have repartitioned / reformatted the SSD and performed a fresh installation of Yosemite.


I have Mavericks on a memory stick – booted from that and it still does not show the model/year. So it’s nothing specific to Yosemite.

Jun 28, 2015 8:39 AM in response to tyronehowe

This was tested on Mavericks 10.9.5, and Yosemite 10.10.3 before it was posted. Hardware was 2011 Mac mini, and 2014 MacBook Air respectively.


I copied the posted script back to the respective AppleScript editors on both platforms and duplicated my original testing results.


If Yosemite 10.10.3 is not reporting that model/year information in About this Mac for your Air, then my script is simply asking Apple the same information based on the last four characters of your serial number. That would indicate a gap in Apple's database information for your model/year MBA. Nothing I can do about that programmatically.

"About this Mac" Model and Year missing

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