I want to wipe my drive on an old macbook pro, but I cannot get it to restart using command R so I can format the drive. Any suggestions?
thanks
DJH
Make sure you are doing this properly.
As soon as your screen turns black, you want to hold Command and R at the exact same time, and when the Apple logo appears, let go. It may take some time to boot up.
That is correct.
You can use the Restore function in Disk Utility will will create bootable copy of the system drive. You can also use Carbon Copy Cloner or SuperDuper to create a bootable clone of the system drive.
When was your MBP manufactured?
If is too old, it will not be capable being booted from the recovery partition.
early 2008
That Mac must be booted from the install DVD issued with it in order to format the drive.
could I reboot from an external drive with my current operating system saved on it? I don't know where the original disks are...
Yes. Provided the external disk drive has a bootable copy of the operating system on it.
I suppose it is not as easy as merely copying my current system folder?
Ok I have the copy made so do I now hit command r and restart?
No. Hold down the option key after power on to bring up the bootable device that select the clone backup as the device to use for boot.
You Mac is too old to recognize Command + R
I cannot get my old macbook pro to restart in order for me to format the drive
