Reinstall macos monterey
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Cory Cooper
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Hello and welcome.
Hope that helps!
C
- Is your Mac compatible?
- Is Monterey already installed and is the Mac working normally?
Hope that helps!
C
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Please clarify, do you have macOS Monterey already installed on your Mac? What model Mac is it? If you already have it installed, and maybe just hoping to update, you can do the software update from Systems Settings.The most up-to-date version of Monterey is 12.7.6 (21H1320), as far as I can tell. You can also boot into Recovery which will offer to install the most current version based on your Mac hardware. No need to delete the old version. Just install on top of it. Finally, make sure you have backups of your data.
Believe me, I just recently had to erase my internal SSD and reinstall macOS Sequoia. It’ can be a most harrowing experience if you’re not used to doing it. But sometimes we have to do what we have to.
Hi, I have an iMac (Retina 5K, 27-inch, Late 2015, can't remember what iOS was on it when I bought it but it has been upgraded to macOS Monterey
I would like to format the HD and reinstall but I am unsure how to do it,
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I recommend first trying to reinstall macOS over your existing system. The safest way to do this would be through Recovery. Depending on the model of your Mac, if it is an older model, simply rebooting and immediately pressing command-R will bring up Recovery. For newer (Silicon) Macs, shut down and then press and hold the power button until it gets to the list of volumes plus Options. Options will bring up Recovery, where you can elect to reinstall macOS, or open Disk Utility (if you really want to erase your drive).
I would only do a reformat if I’m confident with my backups. I presently have three Time Machine backup drives in addition to redundant clones of the system using Carbon Copy Cloner, in addition to having an external USB thumb drive to install macOS, in case everything else fails. So I strongly suggest doing it first with Recovery. The main reason for opting to reformat your system drive first is if there is insufficient free space on it to perform the reinstallation or update.
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Startup the device from Off holding the Command-R keys until you see the Apple Icon. This will bring you to the Recovery Partition. There should be no need to Reformat your Mac but if you wish to be sure all is in order you will see on the Recovery widow an app called Disk Utility.
Click on that, select Macintosh HD in the sidebar (You may need to choose Show All devices) then run First Aid.
If all is well, and it usually is, quit Disk Utility from the Menu bar which will return you to the previous window. In that window choose Reinstall MacOS Monterey. This will take some time.
The procedure will not damage or erase any of your personal data.
Just to cover your other suggestion/question. You cannot reformat your HD from the device itself. Reformatting requires erasing the internal HD completely and obviously a computer cannot erase itself. To do that you need another "computer" on an external drive capable of running your device independently. eg. A custom made Bootable macOS Installer on a flash drive or similar.
Click on that, select Macintosh HD in the sidebar (You may need to choose Show All devices) then run First Aid.
If all is well, and it usually is, quit Disk Utility from the Menu bar which will return you to the previous window. In that window choose Reinstall MacOS Monterey. This will take some time.
The procedure will not damage or erase any of your personal data.
Just to cover your other suggestion/question. You cannot reformat your HD from the device itself. Reformatting requires erasing the internal HD completely and obviously a computer cannot erase itself. To do that you need another "computer" on an external drive capable of running your device independently. eg. A custom made Bootable macOS Installer on a flash drive or similar.