On Sep 12, 2011, at 9:02 AM, Michael Winter wrote: > My oldest is heading off for her freshman year of college with her first > MacBook Pro (we've been a Mac family since before she was born, but this is > the first one that's all hers).
Is this a new modern Mac? Running Lion? I don't know why all this blather about firmware password; run Lion and enable File Vault (2). It will prevent anyone from seeing her data, even if they have physical access to her machine or the drive. With File Vault 2 enabled, the General tab of the Security & Privacy preference pane's "Require password … after sleep or screen saver begins" cannot be turned off, with the only options being how long before the password kicks in. So user error is unlikely to allow an exploit should someone run off with it. Even the recovery partition can't be booted without the machine password. As for the LoJack stuff remember that iCloud is slated to include a "Find My Mac" feature that works the way the "Find My iPhone" iApp and web app work today. I don't know if it will be as full featured as some of the commercial software, but it might be all you need. And lastly, speaking as someone who is also sending his only son to UC with a brand new (and easy to steal) Macbook Air, purchasing theft insurance is worth consideration. A policy that will more then cover his computer is only about sixty dollars (he can pay the $100 deductible if he drops his guard), and with the data secured all he'll loose is the skateboard stickers on the case. These policies can even include accidental damage, which seems even more likely an occurrence then library or room-mate theft (late night, paper due and Jolt Cola, anyone?). We're looking at this place, but it might be worth calling your homeowners underwriter and see if they can offer a better deal: http://www.worthavegroup.com/college-plus-chart David_______________________________________________ MacOSX-talk mailing list MacOSX-talk@omnigroup.com http://www.omnigroup.com/mailman/listinfo/macosx-talk
