MacBook Mid2007 NEW hard drive not formattable (?)

[reeseoroni]

My daughter's MacBook got the dreaded blinking folder/question mark. Took it to the Genius Bar and was tested & told the HD was dead. They'd replace it for $170 with a 160Gig drive. I brought it home, ordered a 500Gig Seagate drive for $65 (after much research). Installed it easily enough, turned on MacBook and got the dreaded blinking folder/question mark yet again. Tried the following:
1) Starting with orig OSX disk holding down C - blinking ? and kick out of CD after a few minutes;
2) Zapping PRAM;
3) Starting with Diskwarrior & holding C (also tried holding down OPT)
4) Tried holding down OPT/CMD/O/F
5) Used TechTools - holding down OPT

All results the same - the blinking ? The CD

This is pretty upsetting to me since I cannot afford a laptop for my daughter who uses it extensively for college. Any ideas, recommendations or suggestions? I'm really desperate now. And terribly sad.

 

[iThinkergoiMac]

Sounds like either the install disc is bad or you've got a different hardware problem. Have you tried using an external optical drive if you have one available?

 

[DewGuy1999]

Any possibility that she had an Open Firmware password set?

 

[eman]

When you put the OS X disk 1 in the macbook and hold down the option key, does the OS X install disk show up on the boot loader menu?
You can also put your new 500Gb HD in another macbook and use their install disk (or any Snow Leopard disk) to install the OS; once done put the new HD back in your daughters macbook.