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If Macbook has been wiped, will “find my iPhone” still work?

I lost my Macbook Pro recently. I had activated iCloud on the computer, so Find My Mac is operable.

If the thief wipes the hard drive, and installs a fresh operating system, OSX Lion or Leopard, for example, then will I still be able to locate my device? In particular if the thief installs Leopard (which obviously doesn't support Find my Mac) will Find My Mac still work?

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marked as duplicate by bmike♦ Jan 30 at 23:00

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If the thief just wipes the harddrive, there is a slight chance that your device will still show up in Find My Mac as the association is saved in the NVRAM which persists even after a drive format.

However, if the thief or new owner clears the NVRAM in any way, or reconfigures iCloud with another account and enables Find My Mac for it, the association will be deleted or overwritten, and you will no longer be able to track your device.

See this question for more on the subject.

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The answer is no. iCLoud will be deleted along with everything else.

Keep iCloud open on your current computer to make sure you get each location the device is located at.

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Thanks for your reply,Do you mean that if he delets all data and install fresh OS, i will not be able to locate my device via Icloud? – hiukiy Jan 30 at 19:58
@hiukiy It depends. Did you enable file vault? Does your user log in automatically? The more details you can put in an edit in your question (what OS and whether you encrypted the drive) will allow someone to best answer the question. Bummer about the loss, but if you search on the site here, most of the questions how Find My Mac works are already answered. – bmike♦ Jan 30 at 22:59
This is not entirely true Tony, the Find My Mac association is actually stored in the NVRAM. – Gerry Jan 30 at 23:01
And the guest account can connect to WiFi, or the system could boot to a user account and either show the screen or be locked at the passcode. Whether the system first boots to recovery HD to unlock a File Vault can also mean that your settings are preserved after a basic wipe and "reinstall". – bmike♦ Jan 30 at 23:06
Gerry, if the OS is wiped, and there is no sign in or association to iCloud, then YES it is true. This was the question asked. – Tony Tellez Jan 31 at 16:33
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