Clean install of OS on erased HDD

[px3l]

Okay so i bought my Macbook in late 2007 around november, i have had no problems until recently i got the flashing folder with the '?', i take it couldn't find the correct boot disk and the HDD was not mounted, i have repaired and verified my hard drive through the use of the utilities on my leopard upgrade disk.

I know i had two grey disks come with my laptop which i cannot find, i know that the install disks that come with the apple product are specific to your line of model. I have seen an install disk for 'Leopard' for MacBook on a website and was wondering if i purchased this would it definitely work or would i have to have the tiger 10.4 disk original that came with my laptop? i cannot use the current leopard disk i have because it is only an upgrade disk.

any ideas?

thanks

*edit*

spec

2.0ghz core 2 duo
1gb ram
80gb HDD

 

[spinnerlys]

Use the Snow Leopard Upgrade DVD for 29 USD.

The grey restore DVDs are model specific, thus no even a DVD for the MacBook 4,1 works with a MacBook 4,2, even though they look alike and have not that much different hardware.

The SL Upgrade DVD is a Retail version of Mac OS X, thus works with all Intel Macs.

 

[GfulDedFan]

i cannot use the current leopard disk i have because it is only an upgrade disk.

I don't think that it is. Every retail version of Mac OS is a full system disk and should be able to install Leopard from it. Have you tried?

 

[px3l]

I don't think that it is. Every retail version of Mac OS is a full system disk and should be able to install Leopard from it. Have you tried?

i got the full tiger install disk i have lost
i also have the upgrade disk for leopard, this disk is used only for upgrade purposes once there is an OS installed on the system so i cannot use it as a full OS

thanks for replies

 

[GfulDedFan]

i got the full tiger install disk i have lost
i also have the upgrade disk for leopard, this disk is used only for upgrade purposes once there is an OS installed on the system so i cannot use it as a full OS

thanks for replies

Sounds like you have the "drop-in" disk that was packaged during recent releases of the OS, right? You may find This Article interesting.

 

[Abscissa]

You can use the $29 Snow Leopard Upgrade 10.6.3 disk. I asked about this recently. I installed it on a MacBook Pro 2.1 with a blank HD with no issue. Don't let Apple tell you otherwise. No where on the box does it say that any version of OS X is required on a drive. You can install it on a blank HD and you'll have the full Snow Leopard version.