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tony359

macrumors member
Original poster
Oct 23, 2018
95
23
Hi all,

Hopefully - if I fix some HW issues - I will be reinstalling OSX 10.7.5 on a Macbook A1181.

Having spent days on an old (more modern) Macbook dealing with expired certificates, the Store not allowing the mac to upgrades etc, I was hoping that someone might point me to the right direction this time - for my own sanity :)

I found this: https://forums.macrumors.com/thread...acos-installers-from-lion-to-ventura.2378889/

but I've also found threads of people saying it didn't work.

If I remember right the internet recovery - if available - will only install the version the macbook was shipped, correct?

In short: what is the simplest way to get this A1181 up to speed? I am a Windows guy but I happen to have a Mac mini M4 on my desk if that helps - I doubt!

Thank you!
 
Model Number A1181 describes a series of 13" MacBook models starting from MacBook1,1 introduced in May 2006 to MacBook5,2 (Mid 2009). AFAIK none of these models do have the ability for Internet Recovery, that got standard in 2012 Mac models and some 2010 and 2011 models could have it by firmware upgrades.

Your best bet is to make an USB installer from a macOS that works with your machine. Mac OS X Lion is available from Apple here. Keep in mind, that early A1181 models can only run Mac OS X Snow Leopard 10.6.x as maximum OS. To generate a USB-Installer, I used to use DiskMakerX, but I don't think it will work on a M4 Mac mini. Maybe, this procedure is going to work instead.

EDIT: Maybe better get the installer from here as the first mentioned source could just be an update and not a complete installer.
 
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