Chosen Solution
I picked up this system (2008 macbook air) on ebay in hopes it would be a quick fix. It was shown to be displaying the folder with question mark which seems to be missing OS / hard drive related. I’m an experienced IT professional but never got in to macs. I followed a guide at : https://superuser.com/questions/383235/c… and with an OS image downloaded from apple created a bootable USB. However, actually booting to it seems impossible. If I boot holding option, it gives a wifi selection. No apple or globe icon.. just wifi selection and I can connect to my wifi. But then there’s no progress bar and it appears to be doing nothing. If I just power on with no buttons pressed it gets a white screen and then the folder with the question mark after a bit. Could anybody help me figure this out?
I have this issue also, there seems to be no good answer. I’ve been to forums and others seem to have this problem also. Seems to be older units more than newer. I have a dvd drive so I can load from disc. Go to mac rumors forum and see if anyone has found abwork around. Also you can use target disc mode if you have another mac. You may also be able to use an external hdd dock as mine will recognize that, it just seems to be the flash drives.
