Old a1211 will not load OSX

Discussion in 'MacBook Pro' started by elf69, Oct 20, 2016.

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  1. elf69, Oct 20, 2016

    elf69 macrumors 68020

    elf69

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    Cornwall UK
    #1
    I bought 2 a1211 macbook pro laptops for just under £30 the pair.

    One turns on but no chime, nothing on screen nor does it light up.

    Second one turns on lights up and shows folder as no HDD.
    So fitted a HDD, free floating at moment as seller took old hdd out with fittings!

    anyway put the OSX 10.5 disc and hold alt + C.
    only shows HDD, so try my 10.4 disc again only HDD

    Both these discs work in my ibook G4 so I know they are good.

    Tried linux mint disc, it worked and installed.
    placed OSX disc in drive and it shows and can see the disc in mint.

    Tried two usb optical too but nope not work either.
    I was going to run the hack to get el cap on this machine but if cannot even get 10.4/10.5 to work then not sure if it work.

    I do not have a 10.6 or 10.7 disc to try.
    These machines do not support web recovery?

    Any suggestions guys?
     
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  2. Samuelsan2001, Oct 20, 2016

    Samuelsan2001 macrumors 604

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    #2
    Well ideally you can get 10.7 on there, then you will have the App Store for updates etc. Snow leopard also had it but only on later versions I think.
     
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  3. elf69, Oct 20, 2016

    elf69 thread starter macrumors 68020

    elf69

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    #3
    It should take 10.4 and up.

    but it will not load 10.4 or 10.5 or a copy of 10.6 I found at work.
    None of these discs are genuine apple but copies of genuine discs.

    10.4 and 10.5 disc works in my ibook g4 cant work out why in this machine it is not showing up as a boot option from alt+c.

    my other macbook has no firewire so cannot use target mode install.

    Can anyone offer suggestions as it will not boot from the disc that works in another mac?

    the mint install disc is same brand of disc as the osx install disc so do not think it type of disc issue as once in mint can red the osx 10.4/10.5 discs fine.
     
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  4. maflynn, Oct 20, 2016

    maflynn Moderator

    maflynn

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    #4
    You are possibly using system disks that were included with the macs. Back in the day, apple keyed their system disks, so an iMac install disk would not work for a MBP, or vice versa. You'll need a "retail" copy of OS X.
     
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  5. keysofanxiety, Oct 20, 2016

    keysofanxiety macrumors G3

    keysofanxiety

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    #5
    You can mount SL to a USB drive (as the Intel MacBooks supported USB boot) and try boot from that by holding Alt on startup. You can probably do the same with Tiger/Leopard too, as long as you have a disk image for that.

    The long way round is to plug the HDD into a USB enclosure and install 10.6 directly to that through a different Mac, then pop the HDD back into the MBP and see if it boots.
     
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  6. elf69, Oct 20, 2016

    elf69 thread starter macrumors 68020

    elf69

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    #6
    I do not think the 10.4 and 10.5 are system discs as they have been used with my ibook which came without discs as was 2nd hand.
    They have also been used on a friends A1181 macbook.
    I would therefore guess they are retail copies.

    I do not know about the 10.6 disc I located at work in our disc collection.
     
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  7. chrfr, Oct 20, 2016

    chrfr macrumors 604

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    #7
    10.4 was never released at retail for Intel computers, so it must be a model-specific disk, and may be too old for the MacBook Pro to boot. The retail version of Leopard shipped as a black DVD and Snow Leopard shipped on a white DVD. Model specific disks of both Leopard and Snow Leopard are grey.
    Also, to boot from an optical disc, it's just "C" not option/alt-C.
     
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  8. Mnowell69, Oct 20, 2016

    Mnowell69 macrumors regular

    Mnowell69

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    #8
    The iBook is a PPC computer and its disks will not work on a MacBook which is intel based. The disks you have may have been edited to work on PPC only to make a smaller download
     
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  9. elf69, Oct 22, 2016

    elf69 thread starter macrumors 68020

    elf69

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    #9
    the disc never came with the ibook.

    The disc also work on my friends a1811 which is intel.

    I gave the machine to a friend to reinstall as he has loads copies mac os as he repairs macs.
    He going change htc for arctic silver might help keep it cool.
     
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