<p>Fabulous advice above. CC at its best!</p>
<p>We’re a long-time Apple family. RacnBeaver is right that occasionally a computer in for repair get pithed. But Apple repair instructions are pretty clear. And on more than one occasion the repair site called to confirm that they could reformat the hard disk “if necessary.”</p>
<p>Still, I agree with posters who say “so what?” The dog ate it, the hard disk crashed, the computer was stolen, coffee poured on the keyboard, electric surge, boot sector corrupted, accidental deletion, key reference disappeared, spell-check program froze the underlying document, blah, blah, blah. The kid needs to get his part done. Don’t feel guilty telling him/her that!</p>