Messed up start up and upgrade issue.

[StevenMacintosh]

My MacBook starts up to a black screen, and continues to fill with text (things turning on). It came installed with Snow Leopard. I upgraded the RAM (while on Snow Leopard.) I some how broke the HDD and replaced it with a HDD from my brother's old and useless Mac. The OS was downgraded to Leopard. I finally got a (torrented version, I am not paying for another disc that they should have given me!). Anyways, when I try to upgrade the OS this is how it goes.

-- Click here to install OS.
-- Enter password.
-- Click okay to restart.
-- Goes to black screen (shuts everything off.)
-- Turns to white screen.
-- Goes to black screen very quickly. (I don't see the rotating icon or apple image anymore on the white screen)
-- Turns on.
-- Asks me to login.
-- No changes to the OS.

Please help!

 

[JediMeister]

It's very possible that your torrented version of 10.6 was made from a system-specific gray install DVD, and not from a retail version which you could use to upgrade from 10.5 to 10.6; another possibility is that you somehow burned the downloaded disk image wrong and the computer is not able to start up to the disc you created.
I am curious though, who is it that you feel should have given you the install DVD? Apple? a reseller or individual who sold you the MacBook? If you bought the computer brand new, absolutely Apple should have provided you the discs; if they weren't in the box you should have called AppleCare and asked for a complimentary replacement set. If from a reseller or individual it's on them to include the DVDs at time of sale, and if they didn't, they should have accordingly reduced the price because it's technically not a whole system without a set of discs that you would potentially need to correct a software issue down the line.