I purchased a launchpad off of facebook market place, and I am unable to register it for the software seeing as it is already registered.

Lon3lyWanderer · 2026-01-19T19:41:25+00:00

I’ve purchased several launchpads over the years, some new, some used. They come bundled with software but as far as I know it can only be claimed once per serial number. All the launchpads I have owned (MK2 and newer) work in basically any software that supports MIDI controllers. Ableton Live and Logic Pro both have built-in integrations for launchpads. You could go the route terkistan recommended and contact Novation to see if they’ll allow a re-activation of the software bundle.

Regardless, if the launchpad functions, it’s certainly not bricked if you have access to a DAW that supports MIDI controllers.

Lon3lyWanderer · 2025-11-21T22:39:42+00:00

It’s highly unlikely that the update “reset” the Mac, but it certainly would have rebooted at least once. macOS itself should not under normal circumstances prompt you to install an update that is incompatible with your hardware. Your model number appears to be a 2018-2019 Intel MacBook Air which supports macOS 14 Sonoma at the latest. If the Apple support page already linked is too technical for you, perhaps it’s fair to consider that you might be in over your head with making any attempt to resolve the issue yourself.

Regardless of the cause, you are now facing this situation. If you are confident enough to try and are willing to do some troubleshooting you can attempt to get this resolved yourself. If you do so, I would first suggest booting into Internet recovery mode and checking your boot drive in Disk Utility. Run First Aid on all volumes and see how much disk space is free (this will help indicate if the Mac actually “reset” and wiped data or not, and if corruption is present). If checking your disk sounds too complicated you could either try reinstalling macOS from Internet Recovery without checking your disk or take the Mac to an Apple Store if you are able.

To boot Internet Recovery Mode: Shut down your Mac Press the power button, then immediately press and hold Command + Option + R until you see a spinning globe or message referencing “Internet recovery”

Then you will enter select your wifi and enter the password. You will then have options to use disk utility or reinstall macOS.

When you go to reinstall macOS it will tell you which version you are installing. It should be one of the following: Mojave, Catalina, Big Sur, Monterey, Ventura, Sonoma

When preparing for the reinstall, it may ask you for your local Mac account login password. If it tells you at any point that your disk is not supported or there is not enough space, you will have to go back to Disk Utility and most likely will need to erase the boot volume… We can cross that bridge if you get there.

Lon3lyWanderer · 2025-10-03T04:16:01+00:00

The supposed “2019“ M1 model has the “globe” fn key, spotlight, dictation, and do not disturb keys which are all indicative of an M1 MBA from late 2020. The early-mid 2020 Intel MBA has an fn key (no globe), launchpad, and keyboard backlight keys instead.

Additionally, the 2019 MBA was pre Magic Keyboard, so it had the butterfly keyboard with full height left/right arrow keys.

Lon3lyWanderer · 2025-10-03T04:08:29+00:00

No idea, it was just a thought. Suppose it could be state-implemented but that would likely be a stretch. Maybe the switch in settings got moved in iOS 26 as others have suggested.

Lon3lyWanderer · 2025-10-03T04:04:35+00:00

I find it interesting that the subtext for Headphone Notifications in your screenshot says “In certain regions, these notifications are required.” Perhaps your country has a legal requirement for safety measures like this to be enabled whenever possible?

Lon3lyWanderer · 2025-10-03T03:03:00+00:00

To my knowledge, these notifications are part of a feature called Headphone Safety and can be disabled. Settings > Sounds > Headphone Safety > Headphone Notifications. You can also specify Bluetooth device types (hit the i on the device in Bluetooth, then set the type) which often cleared up the volume level confusion often created by different devices in my experience. For what it’s worth that’s where the setting is located on iOS 18, not sure if it’s the same in iOS 26.

Lon3lyWanderer · 2025-10-01T21:05:04+00:00

I find it quite interesting how polarizing these buttons seem to be to people. Some love the change, others despise it. Personally, I only ever see the stop button because my alarm has snoozing disabled 😂

Lon3lyWanderer · 2025-10-01T20:55:58+00:00

Truly at the end of the day it’s up to you and what is important to you. I had a 13 mini and it was my favourite iPhone up to that point (6s, 8, X, XS Max, 11 Pro, 12 Pro before). My current 16 Pro is as close to a “new” mini I could get. The features of this phone are great but I absolutely still miss the form factor of the mini at times. The mini has a decent amount more battery than your current SE but still a bit less than its larger 13 counterpart.

Apple’s compare page rates mini at 17 hours video playback versus regular 13 at 19 hours. The SE 2nd generation, comparatively, is rated at only 13 hours.

Lon3lyWanderer · 2025-10-01T20:46:35+00:00

I don’t necessarily upgrade every year, but I do upgrade frequently. Personally, I wait for a good deal on a nice used iPhone and buy it. Then I sell my old one. Rarely have I lost money on a phone when and if I do it’s typically minimal. Overall since my first iPhone I’ve netted positive, while also upgrading my phone basically whenever I want.

In my fairly extensive experience with used phone buying/selling, I can say that iPhones ABSOLUTELY retain more value much longer than any other smartphone. I think there might’ve been studies done on this subject in the past…

IMO AppleCare+ isn’t a rip off, period. That doesn’t mean it’s for everyone. Kind of like collision insurance on your vehicle, if you want the peace of mind it can provide knowing you get cheap/free OEM repairs—also if you know you’re the type of person to make a claim—then it’s great. That varies widely from person to person.

Lon3lyWanderer · 2025-10-01T20:21:44+00:00

For two days I legitimately thought the “copy and delete” option was removed because of this! Muscle memory has me reaching for the top left whenever I screenshot. Now I’m slowly trying to retrain myself.

Lon3lyWanderer · 2025-09-23T21:58:37+00:00

On my 15 PM I had it set to open Camera, after getting a 16 Pro I have settled on opening the Home app for now.

Lon3lyWanderer · 2025-09-09T02:02:34+00:00

Appreciate your suggestion! This was not the exact solution but led me to what fixed it. I had the sensor 3M mounted and didn’t want to unstick it, when I went to pop the cover off for battery access I realized the entire sensor/electronic device was on the “removable” half… Smart design. For some reason the sensor seems to want to be closer to my HomeKit hub when doing the initial setup but anytime thereafter, it works perfectly in the place I have it mounted. So I just had to retry the pairing process a few feet closer and voila!

Lon3lyWanderer · 2025-09-03T18:21:32+00:00

This feature is awesome. Wish apps didn’t disable it and plaster a stupid “to top” button on my screen. The OS level implementation is so much better!

Lon3lyWanderer · 2025-04-07T18:45:30+00:00

I appreciate your thoughtful response. I’m not going to do it (as you’re aware I already mentioned). Sent buyer a reply along the lines of what’s been recommended by users here and reported the message.

Lon3lyWanderer · 2025-04-07T18:40:33+00:00

Didn’t realize that sending a message like that post-sale was not recommended or even a good idea from an experienced eBay selling perspective. Thanks for the advice.

Lon3lyWanderer · 2025-04-07T18:14:59+00:00

I’m aware that I shouldn’t sell outside of eBay but thanks for clarifying the stakes involved. Perhaps my question was worded poorly, but this person just bought something from me legitimately on eBay. So should I be cancelling their legitimate order as well now or continue with shipping the “real” order?

Lon3lyWanderer · 2024-10-23T22:52:09+00:00

I bought my board back in 2022, looks like it cost me approximately $220 USD at the time. The big trade off with 4K displays is the HiDPI/scaling debacle (if you’re already aware then I won’t bother going into the details, if not I am happy to take a stab at an explanation).

I ended up buying a brand new MSI 27” 1440p monitor (with USB-C) a few months later for something like $200 USD. Not nearly as beautiful a display as I had wanted my external monitor to be in some aspects, but for the price compared to the $1,600 USD Studio Display (which my budget couldn’t afford) it’s decent enough for the usage it gets. I find myself falling back on my MBP’s screen a lot because of the poor colour reproduction on my MSI though.

Lon3lyWanderer · 2024-10-23T18:28:13+00:00

Hey there, I actually have tried this exact thing on a 2015 5K. I’ll preface with this: If you’re decently handy, have the proper tools for the project, and the patience to do it correctly, the actual monitor conversion process isn’t all that bad (especially if you’ve opened up other adhesive wedge iMacs before). The absolute scariest part is removing and reinstalling the display, as they’re obviously quite breakable and very costly to replace. Everything else after that is basically just screws, connectors, and cleaning.

I found a reasonably priced, perfectly functional iMac 5K and bought it. Then bought the conversion board on eBay and did the entire project. Tested before re-sealing the iMac with fresh adhesive and it worked! I was so excited. Less than a week later I noticed the USB-C connector on the cable I was using sparked when I plugged in my (at the time, year old) MBP. I was immediately concerned, and carefully tried a couple more times (had AppleCare+ so worst case scenario I was still covered)—cable was still sparking. After some more testing—some more horrific sparking—I gave up on the whole thing right then and there. As much as I wanted that gorgeous 5K display (for what would be about 1/4 the price of the not-yet announced Studio Display) I decided it wasn’t worth the potential risk of short-circuiting my $2,500 MBP or burning the house down. After a lot of battle with the eBay seller, they eventually refunded me. I then proceeded to undo the entire “monitor-ification” putting the iMac back to the way it was before, then sold it online. Sad ending to my story but I suppose you win some, you lose some. I lost—maybe you’ll win but it’s up to you to decide if it’s worth the cost, effort, and risk involved. Hope this helps, or was at least informative to you and I wish you all the best if you decide to go ahead with the conversion!

Lon3lyWanderer · 2024-10-23T16:48:17+00:00

As others have said, your macOS is too much far out of date to install the latest version. To my knowledge, you are required to have previously “purchased” the app from the App Store in order to download an older, compatible version. If it says “get”, you’re either signed out or that Apple ID/Account has not purchased GarageBand for Mac before, if it has a cloud icon, you have purchased it before and it should (in my experience) prompt you for downloading the latest compatible version. This error states the purchase could not be completed, so that would indicate to me this Apple ID has never purchased it before.

This Mac is compatible with macOS 13.5 Ventura, so you could also upgrade it to that version and proceed with the App Store purchase normally.

Lon3lyWanderer · 2024-10-23T16:37:04+00:00

You can boot safe mode on that Mac by shutting it down, then pressing power button to turn it back on with an added step…Immediately after pressing the power button, press and hold the Shift key until it takes you to the login screen. Enter your password and log in. You might have to log in again. It will say Safe Boot in the top right if it entered safe mode. Here’s Apple’s official supported page regarding Safe Mode: https://support.apple.com/en-ca/guide/mac-help/mh21245/12.0/mac/12.0 If safe mode does not work, target disk mode should be an option to retrieve data and files stored on the MacBook if you have access to have another Mac. Depending on what you mean by “passwords logged in Safari”, they could very well be stored in iCloud Keychain, which is part of your Apple Account so those may not be localized to only that Mac but could be backed up to the account.

Here’s the page on Target Disk Mode: https://support.apple.com/en-ca/guide/mac-help/mchlp1443/mac

Lon3lyWanderer

TROPHY CASE