The IT Nerd

I was recently asked by a friend what he should look out for when buying a used Mac. His main concern was that the Mac would be stolen as there are a lot of cases that have popped up online where someone buys a used Mac and it turns out that it was stolen. I had to think about that for a second because I have never been asked that question before, nor have I bought a used Mac. But I did come up with two things that anyone wanting to buy a used Mac should watch out for:

1. Is it Activation Locked?: Activation Lock is a feature that Apple introduced with the iPhone, but has since expanded to pretty much every Apple device, where the device is “locked” to an owner via their iCloud or Apple Account. As a result, if you wanted to factory reset it for example, you’d need the password of that account. Here’s how you tell if the Mac that you want to buy is still Activation Locked:
   • If the Mac boots and you see the “Hello” screen, that usually indicates that macOS has been reinstalled. You should go through the setup to get to the point where you are able to enter an iCloud/Apple Account to make sure it isn’t activation locked to ensure that it isn’t Activation Locked
   • If you see a login window, be aware that the Mac is still likely linked to the old owner. This means that macOS Activation Lock is likely still enabled. If the owner of the Mac can’t or won’t deactivate Activation Lock on the spot, you should run in the other direction.
2. Is it MDM or ADE locked?: MDM stands for Mobile Device Management and corporations, schools among others use MDM software to not only manage the Mac, but remotely access as well in some cases. Finding out if MDM software is installed can be difficult, but this Reddit thread has some really good advice on that front. There’s another version of this called ADE or Automated Device Enrolment. This used to be called the Device Enrolment Program but in either case, this was a program run by Apple themselves to allow companies to manage their Macs in a variety of ways. And this can be really problematic as this will be present even if you erase and reinstall macOS. If you want to check this for yourself, this Reddit thread can help you with seeing if the Mac that you want to buy is ADE locked. Why this matters is that if you come across a Mac with either of these installed, the Mac has likely been stolen. And if you buy it, you might not only be completely out of luck as it might be locked down in whole or in part. There’s also the possibility that some forms of MDM do location services, meaning that someone may end up knocking on your door looking for their stolen Mac as they could hunt you down.

There’s some other things to consider beyond the question of if it is stolen or not, like is the Mac in perfect working order for example. For that I will point you towards the Rocket Yard blog as that blog post has a lot of good tips in it. Another thing that you might want to consider is that you might want to go the refurbished route from Apple. I spoke about that here and I have personally used that route to save a few bucks. Not as much as you might save by going used, but any cash saved is a good thing.

Do you have any additional tips that I might have missed? Please leave a comment and share your thoughts.

This entry was posted on November 9, 2024 at 8:06 am and is filed under Commentary with tags Apple. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.