Can 10.6.3 retail DVD substitute for gray 10.6 & Apps DVDs that ship with a Mac Pro?

[Diamond Dave]

I'll be buying a used 4,1 or 5,1 Mac Pro soon, probably on eBay. I'll make sure the Mac originally shipped prior to June 2011 so that it can run Snow Leopard, as I need to run PowerPC software.

Most of these Macs unfortunately don't come with the original gray Mac OS X & Applications installer DVDs that they originally shipped with.

Assuming I buy a Mac without these discs, my plan was to buy a retail 10.6 DVD and use that to format the hard drive & install Snow Leopard before updating to 10.6.8.

2 things occurred to me. Firstly, presumably if I do this, I'll be without whatever is installed from the gray "Applications" DVD.

I'm guessing that iLife is what's on the "Applications" DVD, and everything else (e.g. Safari, Preview, TextEdit, etc.) is on the "OS X" DVD. If this is the case, then fine, as I don't need iLife.

Or is it more complex than that? Can anyone tell me what precisely is & isn't on the "Applications" DVD as opposed to the "OS X" one?

Secondly, the vast majority of the retail Snow Leopard DVDs for sale on eBay seem to be for 10.6.3. However, according to a sentence about a third of the way into this post:

https://forums.macrumors.com/posts/16164287/

"you need 10.6.4 to install on 2010 Mac Pros. 10.6.3 and lower (check your DVD) won't install."

If this is correct, and I buy a 5,1 then a 10.6.3 retail DVD will be no use to me, and I'll have to find a 10.6.4 or newer retail DVD.

The problem is, I'm not sure such a thing ever existed. Can anyone verify this? Has anyone bought a retail Snow Leopard DVD which came with 10.6.4 or newer?

Many thanks.

 

[simsaladimbamba]

If you have another Mac with Firewire and Snow Leopard (not necessarily, but it should be able to install Mac OS X 10.6 Snow Leopard onto it), you could use the steps outlined here:
[SUCCESS!]Late 2011 Macbook Pro with Snow Leopard

You simply start the Mac Pro in Target Disk Mode, use the other Mac with Mac OS X 10.6 Snow Leopard and either use its Restore DVDs or the Mac OS X 10.6 Snow Leopard Upgrade DVD (the same as the Retail DVD), boot from such DVD and install onto the Mac Pro's HDD and then update the drivers after that via Software Update, while the Mac Pro is still in TDM of course, and after that, a 2010 Mac Pro can run Mac OS X 10.6 Snow Leopard without problems.

 

[Diamond Dave]

If you have another Mac with Firewire and Snow Leopard (not necessarily, but it should be able to install Mac OS X 10.6 Snow Leopard onto it), you could use the steps outlined here:
[SUCCESS!]Late 2011 Macbook Pro with Snow Leopard

You simply start the Mac Pro in Target Disk Mode, use the other Mac with Mac OS X 10.6 Snow Leopard and either use its Restore DVDs or the Mac OS X 10.6 Snow Leopard Upgrade DVD (the same as the Retail DVD), boot from such DVD and install onto the Mac Pro's HDD and then update the drivers after that via Software Update, while the Mac Pro is still in TDM of course, and after that, a 2010 Mac Pro can run Mac OS X 10.6 Snow Leopard without problems.

Thanks for the info.

I don't think that's an option for me though. My only other Mac is my current one - a G4 running 10.4.11, which obviously can't run Snow Leopard.

 

[Mal]

You can only use it if the grey disks that shipped with the Mac Pro contained the same version or earlier than the 10.6.3 on the retail disks. You're right that no retail DVD ever existed with 10.6.4 or newer.

You do have another option, however. If you get a Mac Pro which does not come with the disks, you can call Apple with your serial number and order replacement original disks for the computer. Should cost $10-20 at most. Those will contain Snow Leopard (as Lion never shipped on a disk) and will definitely work for that machine as they are specific to that model.

jW

 

[Diamond Dave]

You can only use it if the grey disks that shipped with the Mac Pro contained the same version or earlier than the 10.6.3 on the retail disks. You're right that no retail DVD ever existed with 10.6.4 or newer.

You do have another option, however. If you get a Mac Pro which does not come with the disks, you can call Apple with your serial number and order replacement original disks for the computer. Should cost $10-20 at most. Those will contain Snow Leopard (as Lion never shipped on a disk) and will definitely work for that machine as they are specific to that model.

jW

Thanks for the info on ordering replacement disks. That's an option if I buy a 5,1 that doesn't come with disks. It'll probably be a 4,1 though due to my limited budget, in which case a retail 10.6.3 disc should be fine.

For anyone that's interested, the fact that 5,1s shipped with 10.6.4 or later is confirmed here, next to "Mac Pro (Mid 2010)":

http://support.apple.com/kb/HT1159

and the fact that no retail DVD ever existed with 10.6.4 or newer is implied in the "Retail installation disc build numbers" table at the bottom of this page which appears when you click on the "Mac OS X v10.6 and earlier builds" link:

http://support.apple.com/kb/HT1633

and in the "Notes" column of the table here:

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mac_OS_X_Snow_Leopard#Release_history

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So that's the main question in my thread solved.

I'm still curious though - for the 2 gray DVDs that ship with a Mac Pro, and are of Snow Leopard vintage, can anyone tell me what precisely is & isn't on the "Applications" DVD as opposed to the "OS X" one?

Thanks.

 

[Mal]

I'm still curious though - for the 2 gray DVDs that ship with a Mac Pro, and are of Snow Leopard vintage, can anyone tell me what precisely is & isn't on the "Applications" DVD as opposed to the "OS X" one?

Thanks.

The Applications DVD will contain iLife and Xcode, IIRC. Can't confirm 100% for you, though.

jW

 

[Diamond Dave]

The Applications DVD will contain iLife and Xcode, IIRC. Can't confirm 100% for you, though.

jW

Oh ok. That's fair enough. I don't imagine I'll need either of those at any point, so that's good news.

Thanks for your help.