installing OS x for a newbie

[beecee]

i am new to mac and recieved a cheap imac g5 pre isight 1.8 ghz and 1Gb ram with a broken hard drive. I replaced it and borrowed some os x ' install discs' tiger 10.4.3, leopard 10.5.6, and panther 10.3.1 the tiger and leopard discs just get ejected and the panther one gets the apple logo then a no entry sign. What am i doing wrong? I have ended up installing linux yellow dog which was installed with no trouble whatsoever but it doesn't run smooth enough for my liking i would like os x . Someone suggested i had update discs but they are huge over 3 Gb thats alot of updates if thats what they are and if so what os x number do i need. Any info would be appreciated i do not want to buy an os x if i get the same problems as my borrowed ones.

 

[r.j.s]

You have to get a retail disc, or an install disc for that exact model of iMac.

Borrowing install discs won't work.

 

[MatthewAMEL]

You mentioned it is a G5 iMac but not size or if it is an ALS (Ambient Light Sensor) model.

If it's a G5, non-ALS, then it came installed with 10.3.5 (Panther) and the maximum OS X version it can run is 10.5.8 (Leopard).

If it's an ALS model, it came with 10.4 (Tiger) and is also limited to Leopard.

Thanks, MacTracker! (http://http://mactracker.ca/)

Generally speaking, you can use any retail OS X installer after the one that was originally installed on your Mac. Since both models will support Leopard, I suggest tracking down a copy of a Leopard retail install DVD.

Good luck!

 

[itsamacthing]

You will need a retail copy of the OS like said earlier... Good luck with your project!

Miss those days when the CDs had circles to show you which one you needed in which order.