Ever since i bought my new Macbook from the states, it has been tainted with American, right-wing, liberal media, lesbian feminists, totalitarian freedom fighters, starbucks, dennis rodman, twin towers and a upturned cop car on fire… Or in other words, the Date and Time preference pane had AM/PM grayed out. Using OS X.4, Tiger.

Hmph… Okay, so i’ll just uncheck 24 Hours right? No dice… But… i want AM/PM??

So after many google, i found that deleting the GlobalPreferences.plist restores the 24 hour “glitch”… yeh, worked temporarily.. but kills any customised features, such as mouse and keyboard prefs. Also, if you tried to customise the International or Date and Time panes.. It reverts to 24 Hour.

So today i thought i would solve this once and for all. Googled more, but with limited results.

So friends of the internets, here is how you solve the stupid 24 hour fillick, once and for all.

1. Open up International, under System Preferences.
2. Go to Formats, and under Times, click Customize.
3. you’ll see there is a drop down at the top for “show”. for each of these, add PM to the field. Then click ok.
4. Go to Date and Time, under System Preferences.
5. AM/PM should be restored.

thanks scott