10810 may have me licked on my first year, first Mac

I'll look for a tutorial on rebooting from backup?

Yea, if all the factory can do is reinstall Mac OS X, I can do that.

Isn't this what backups are for? Before trying to reinstall the operating system, or after, should I try plugging in the external hard drive that has the most recent backups?

Should I go back to the first backup that I made? It's on a USB flash drive. It is the backup only, not the install software.

I'll see if I have time this weekend to look at a tutorial. I have an idea what to look for, at this point. Too bad Monday will be so busy, but I'll have to decide if I want to spend another day of vacation on this. Last two days wrestling with a computer was not my original plan. LOL. I may give it one more go tomorrow, and stop wherever things are by 9 a.m.

Again, thanks. I'll look over a tutorial on how to reinstall OS X and how to restore from a backed up copy.

If you still have Apple Care, the warranty that comes with EVERY Mac, you could take it to an apple store and they will do everything to it that needs done (unless you voided the warranty...did un-authorized repair/changes, spilled something on it, dropped it).

I live 2 hours from the closest store. So hopefully you have one close, you can check here. Apple Retail Store

You can make appointments at the stores to stream line the process. People recommend that often on here.

EDIT;;
you can check here if you have AppleCare.
https://selfsolve.apple.com/GetWarranty.do
If it's past 90 days of owning it they will not help solve it over the Phone. They will schedule you an appointment to get it looked at or tell you if there is anywhere else to get it worked on.

If you don't have apple care, do what people recommend on here. A lot of knowledgeable people around these parts.
Good luck.

I will likely have to travel to get to an apple store, I hope half an hour, not two. I can always mail it in, I suppose, too. The installer will not install. I'd honestly junk it at this point, but I've invest over $2000 in this (the cost plus office for Mac plus Math Type were the software basic purchases I needed).

This thread can be closed out, now. Thank you all for trying to help.

Barbara Krueger said:

I will likely have to travel to get to an apple store, I hope half an hour, not two. I can always mail it in, I suppose, too. The installer will not install. I'd honestly junk it at this point, but I've invest over $2000 in this (the cost plus office for Mac plus Math Type were the software basic purchases I needed).

This thread can be closed out, now. Thank you all for trying to help.

Click to expand...

We will keep it open so you can report back. Please do. Don't junk the machine. I bet it's something quite simple that Apple can easily fix. Do let us know.