Can't install/update iMac Early 2006 to Snow Leopard 10.6.x

[Stephen88]

Hello everyone, I have recover an iMac Early 2006 4,1 A1174 from a friend, works perfectly but I can't install in any method Snow Leopard 10.6.x only 10.5.x work. I have downloaded and tried several ISO of MAC OS X but this iMac don't allow me to install snow leopard, I have also tried with 10.6 Beta for PowerPC and work but obviously is not more supported and there aren't update. This Mac come with an Intel Core Duo T2500 that I have upgraded to Core 2 Duo T7400, and installed 1 module of 2GB Ram, updated 10.5.8 and also firmware to 1.1 with Apple Updates.
I have read hundreds of pages/video on youtube but can't find a solution, also tried iMac4,1 and iMac5,1 Firmware Tool but the app doesn't start.
Please someone can help me on how to do?

 

[Amethyst1]

You should be able to install the retail Snow Leopard without any tricks, since the machine is fully supported.

What problem are you having?

Maybe the ISOs you used are bad or are grey discs keyed for a specific Mac model. I'd give the one on Macintosh Garden a try - it's the first download on the page. This is a retail disc that works on any Mac which shipped with 10.6.3 or an older version of Mac OS X. Burn it onto a dual-layer DVD at slow speed and verify if it's been burned correctly afterwards.

 

[DeltaMac]

You say that Snow Leopard won't install. Do you get an error message at some point?
Maybe your CPU upgrade is causing the problem...?

Have you tried making a bootable USB from any Snow Leopard ISO or DMG?
That may work better (and may be more reliable than a 15 year-old optical drive, for example)

 

[Stephen88]

You should be able to install the retail Snow Leopard without any tricks, since the machine is fully supported.

What problem are you having?

Maybe the ISOs you used are bad or are grey discs keyed for a specific Mac model. I'd give the one on Macintosh Garden a try - it's the first download on the page. This is a retail disc that works on any Mac which shipped with 10.6.3 or an older version of Mac OS X. Burn it onto a dual-layer DVD at slow speed and verify if it's been burned correctly afterwards.

Hi @Amethyst1 I have download some majority of disk from archive.org (for exampple https://archive.org/details/osx-10.6.7-dvd) but nothing to do, tried with 10.6, 10.6.7 etc. I use TransMac trial from Windows 10 to write ISO or DMG on USB Stick.
I'll make a try with your link, but necessarily with in DVD? why not from USB?

You say that Snow Leopard won't install. Do you get an error message at some point?
Maybe your CPU upgrade is causing the problem...?

Have you tried making a bootable USB from any Snow Leopard ISO or DMG?
That may work better (and may be more reliable than a 15 year-old optical drive, for example)

Hi @DeltaMac I use TransMac for write image from a Windows PC I don't have other Mac at home

 

[Stephen88]

So this is the problem, every install of OS X 10.6 (about 4 different iso downloaded) don't work, this in attached is the link suggested by @Amethyst1

http://mirror.macintosharchive.org/macintoshgarden.org/files/apps/Snow_Leopard_Drop_In.dmg

I can only do fresh install of Mac OS X 10.5.4 😭

(<- osx 10.5.4)

 

[Amethyst1]

So this is the problem,

Try holding Command-V when the iMac starts booting from the DVD or USB drive. It should switch into verbose mode, displaying lots of text that scrolls by. Take a picture of the screen when it stalls. TransMac might be part of the problem... If you can install 10.5 though, you can then use Disk Utility to write the 10.6.x DMG to the USB drive from there.

 

[Stephen88]

Try holding Command-V when the iMac starts booting from the DVD or USB drive. It should switch into verbose mode, displaying lots of text that scrolls by. Take a picture of the screen when it stalls. TransMac might be part of the problem... If you can install 10.5 though, you can then use Disk Utility to write the 10.6.x DMG to the USB drive from there.

this is a valid method for create boot usb from mac os x 10.5?

 

[Stephen88]

@Amethyst1
this happen try to open dmg 10.6 download from macintoshgarden (but same for all others iso)

I have tried also method of the video but not work, can't drag Mac OS X Install in source. Now I repeat with Command-V from startup

 

[rampancy]

What I would first try to do is get a working 10.6.x installation from another Mac (first confirm that it came from a retail 10.6 install disk), and try to run the iMac on that using an external drive enclosure. That would confirm that Snow Leopard can actually run on your machine. If it can't, I wonder if there's some issue with the CPU upgrade that could be causing issues with the Snow Leopard installer.

Also, are you sure you're using a retail version of the Snow Leopard disk? Here's another place with a 10.6 .dmg which may work: http://macinstallers.tech/#downloads

 

[B S Magnet]

Hello everyone, I have recover an iMac Early 2006 4,1 A1174 from a friend, works perfectly but I can't install in any method Snow Leopard 10.6.x only 10.5.x work. I have downloaded and tried several ISO of MAC OS X but this iMac don't allow me to install snow leopard, I have also tried with 10.6 Beta for PowerPC and work but obviously is not more supported and there aren't update. This Mac come with an Intel Core Duo T2500 that I have upgraded to Core 2 Duo T7400, and installed 1 module of 2GB Ram, updated 10.5.8 and also firmware to 1.1 with Apple Updates.
I have read hundreds of pages/video on youtube but can't find a solution, also tried iMac4,1 and iMac5,1 Firmware Tool but the app doesn't start.
Please someone can help me on how to do?

What you want to do:

1. On the iMac running Leopard, open Disk Utility. Don’t run anything else.
   
   You’re going to do four things here:
   • First, run First Aid Verify Disk on the physical HDD itself, not on the partitions (i.e., run it on the level above “Macintosh HD” or whatever the Leopard drive is called). To be sure, when you run a Cmd-I on the physical HDD you’ll see the “disk identifier” is designated disk0.
   • Next, once Verify Disk is all clear and passes successfully, select the Partition tab. What you’re going to do here is “live-add” a partition to the end of that HDD. To do this, you’ll want to press the [+] button beneath the partition map. Here, you will be making a second partition for the HDD. Make this new partition 10GB, leaving alone the rest of the drive with the existing partition containing Leopard. It’ll be named something like “Untitled_1” as a default. This is fine. Make sure it will be formatted as “Mac OS Extended (Journaled)”. Once ready, press the “Apply” button. This may take a few moments to several minutes, so just let it run for however long it needs to. Once it’s complete, you should see two disks on the desktop — the Leopard-installed drive and a new drive with “Untitled_1” or whatever it was default-named.
   • Now, still in Disk Utility, go to “File > Open Disk Image”. Find and select that install .dmg of Snow Leopard Retail you downloaded online. This .dmg should now appear on the left column, beneath your HDD, its two partitions, and the SuperDrive icon. Select and highlight the .dmg, then select “Images > Scan Image for Restore”. This will open a progress window, and it will take a several minutes.
   • Lastly, once the progress window reports that the disk image was scanned for restore successfully, select the Restore tab. You’ll see two fields, one for “Source” and the other for “Destination”. For Source, drag and drop that .dmg you just scanned for restore onto the “Source” field. Next, drag that new partition (called “Untitled_1” or whatever) to the “Destination” field. Once these are in place, press the “Restore” button. It will ask if you want to delete the contents of “Untitled_1” (yes, you do). What Disk Utility is doing here is creating a block-by-block clone of the .dmg, but onto an actual disk (partition). [This clone is, in effect, telling OS X that it’s a “factory DVD installation disk”; to the system, this new partition with the .dmg cloned onto it is indistinguishable from a physical installation DVD.] This step will take several minutes. Once it’s done, you should see a new Finder window for “Install OS X” pop up and the second partition named something like “Install Mac OS X”. You now have an install disk you can use.
2. Now, under System Preferences, select Startup Disk and choose the newly created partition with the “install DVD” called “Install Mac OS X” (or whatever). Press Restart. Following restart, you should now be welcomed with the Snow Leopard installation screen, and you can install it onto the Leopard partition.
3. Once you’ve finished installation, viewed the intro movie, gone through the “setting up” wizard, and you’ve booted into the new installation of Snow Leopard on the first/big partition, you can then open Disk Utility again to run another Verify Disk on the physical HDD. After it is successful, select the Partition tab once more, then select that second partition with the install image on it (the one you created in step 1) and then press the [-] button to remove that partition and free up physical drive space so that the first/main partition can go back to using it. Just before pressing “Apply”, you can drag the main partition window to widen it into the area where the just-removed partition was, and this will let the first/main use all of the HDD. Now press “Apply” and wait a few minutes for it to finish.

 

[Stephen88]

• Now, still in Disk Utility, go to “File > Open Disk Image”. Find and select that install .dmg of Snow Leopard Retail you downloaded online. This .dmg should now appear on the left column, beneath your HDD, its two partitions, and the SuperDrive icon. Select and highlight the .dmg, then select “Images > Scan Image for Restore”. This will open a progress window, and it will take a several minutes.

Hi @B S Magnet thanks for your support, I get an error at this point (image) scanning ISO downloaded from previous post, but no matter what ISO I use, I hav always error trying to use snow leopard.
Yesterday I have tried all the night, seems impossible read any snow leapord images, I don't know why.
The funny things is originary this iMac have 10.6.8 than I formatted for a clean system, but after during usb installation progress blue bar remain stuck with previous cpu T2500 and with T7400, now instead appear grey image and ban symbol.

 

[B S Magnet]

Hi @B S Magnet thanks for your support, I get an error at this point (image) scanning ISO downloaded from previous post, but no matter what ISO I use, I hav always error trying to use snow leopard.
Yesterday I have tried all the night, seems impossible read any snow leapord images, I don't know why.
The funny things is originary this iMac have 10.6.8 than I formatted for a clean system, but after during usb installation progress blue bar remain stuck with previous cpu T2500 and with T7400, now instead appear grey image and ban symbol.
View attachment 1852355

No worries. Let’s try Plan B:

Instead of trying to restore the Snow Leopard .dmg to your new, second partition using Disk Utility, let’s try Carbon Copy Cloner instead. Grab version 3.4.7. Carbon Copy Cloner is a fantastic utility to have around for this purpose.

Just to be sure, I went through these steps myself on the Mac I’m using right now. (Like you, I was dealing with Disk Utility complaints about scanning the .dmg for restore.) [As a reference, I am using this disk image for Snow Leopard Retail 10.6.3 from archive-dot-org.]

After you have created your new partition, open Carbon Copy Cloner. In the left “Source” window, pull down to “Restore from disk image…”. Select your SL install image:

Next, once CCC opens that image, showing a list of its directory in a tree below, look to the right panel of CCC and select your new partition as the “Destination”.

[Note: If for some reason you don’t see the button labelled “Block copy” yet, open CCC’s preferences and make sure this option is selected]

Next, the “Block copy” button should now be selectable and not greyed out. “Block copy” does the same thing as a “Restore” in Disk Utility does. You’ll notice the directory tree on the left is collapsed and greyed out. That’s OK. It means CCC is not concerned with the files and directories. Instead, it is only interested in a literal, low-level clone of the disk image, to the destination you have chosen (i.e., the new partition).

Press the “Clone” button at bottom-right. It may ask for your admin password and warn you that the contents on the destination selected will be erased. This is OK. This clone should take a few minutes.

After it’s done, you should now see that your new partition has the Snow Leopard installation on it, not unlike this:

You may now quit Carbon Copy Cloner.

As with the earlier instructions, open System Preferences > Startup Disk, select the new partition containing the Snow Leopard install, and press the “Restart…” button.

Let us know how this goes!

 

[Stephen88]

@B S Magnet unfortunately not again, followed all your guide, selected second partition on SSD (10GB) restarted from target disk but again error.
I don't know why OS X 10.5 work and any 10.6 not

 

[B S Magnet]

@B S Magnet unfortunately not again, followed all your guide, selected second partition on SSD (10GB) restarted from target disk but again error.
I don't know why OS X 10.5 work and any 10.6 not
View attachment 1853025

If I may ask, which Snow Leopard .dmg (and the link from which source online) have you been trying to use for your installation?

 

[Stephen88]

If I may ask, which Snow Leopard .dmg (and the link from which source online) have you been trying to use for your installation?

I have used this last link http://macinstallers.tech/#downloads

 

[B S Magnet]

I have used this last link http://macinstallers.tech/#downloads

Ah.

I realize you will have to download another dmg, but would you mind trying the download link I used? That way, I can be sure we’re trying this from the same source. It’s located on archive-dot-org, and it’s a known working installation.

 

[Stephen88]

Ah.

I realize you will have to download another dmg, but would you mind trying the download link I used? That way, I can be sure we’re trying this from the same source. It’s located on archive-dot-org, and it’s a known working installation.

Finally is installed!!! 😭
downloaded from your link put in second partition with carbon copy and is done! Incredible how many iso "corrupted"? never never seen something like this.
Thanks a lot man! 🙏🏻

P.S. is possible now update this mac for support 64bit and 4GB ram?

 

[DeltaMac]

The problem that I have seen with several Snow Leopard installers - some are images made from individual builds from installer DVDs that whipped with a few Mac models. There's actually version 10.6.3, but a build made for a new Mac, and won't install on any other Mac, only the model that it shipped with. I had a number of USB installers that I created from one of those builds, and did not realize until I tried installing from one a few months ago, and could not understand why it continued to report that it could not be installed - in that case, just a wrong build of 10.6.3

 

[Stephen88]

@DeltaMac I didn't think there were specific images for a particular device, now I know 😰
I have lost half of my sanity in these days 😂

 

[DeltaMac]

Snow Leopard is particularly troublesome that way, because Apple never released a commercial version higher than 10.6.3, and there were several "specific" with higher versions, and one or two "specific" versions with the version number being 10.6.3. The only way to find out you have the "wrong" version for your Mac (unless you know how to dig into the "guts" of the system files) is to try it out, and see if it works.
Your upgrade to a Core2Duo, which is a 64-bit CPU, likely makes your iMac 64-bit. Don't know for sure if that affects the whole system, but the Core2Duo is 64-bit.
The RAM is another issue. You said in your OP that you installed one 2GB module. Did you try adding another 2GB in the other slot? If it recognizes both sticks, and reports 4GB in About this Mac/System Information, then there you go. The chipset should only support the original 2GB max, but you have upgraded the CPU to one that should support either 3GB or 4GB.
There's one way to find out for sure! Test it!

 

[B S Magnet]

The problem that I have seen with several Snow Leopard installers - some are images made from individual builds from installer DVDs that whipped with a few Mac models. There's actually version 10.6.3, but a build made for a new Mac, and won't install on any other Mac, only the model that it shipped with. I had a number of USB installers that I created from one of those builds, and did not realize until I tried installing from one a few months ago, and could not understand why it continued to report that it could not be installed - in that case, just a wrong build of 10.6.3

This is what I was trying to ascertain by getting @Stephen88 to use the same retail SL image source I used for testing.

I tend to recommend sources like archive-dot-org or macintoshgarden-dot-org as good places to find collections of reasonably vetted abandonware (such as Snow Leopard Retail edition).

Finally is installed!!! 😭
downloaded from your link put in second partition with carbon copy and is done! Incredible how many iso "corrupted"? never never seen something like this.
Thanks a lot man! 🙏🏻

Not a man, but you’re very welcome. I’m very glad it worked out!

P.S. is possible now update this mac for support 64bit and 4GB ram?

The early 2006 Macs (with exception to Mac Pros and Xserves) were all 32-bit systems, which unfortunately means only being able to upgrade to 10.6.8.

It wasn’t until the C2D Macs that 64-bit processors were being used across all Intel Macs, although many of the earlier ones (late 2006 to 2008, with some notable exceptions) were still matched to 32-bit EFI firmware and Intel GPUs with 32-bit drivers.

 

[Stephen88]

Not a man, but you’re very welcome. I’m very glad it worked out!

Sorry 🤣 usually fauna of these forums are all guys

Infact I have try to put 2+1GB ad 2+2GB but this iMac can't startup work only with 2GB or lower, pity I was hoping to be able to update it also on the RAM side.

Thanks again for you support!

 

[Amethyst1]

Infact I have try to put 2+1GB ad 2+2GB but this iMac can't startup work only with 2GB or lower, pity I was hoping to be able to update it also on the RAM side.

I’d try the unofficial firmware upgrade to iMac5,1.

 

[Stephen88]

I’d try the unofficial firmware upgrade to iMac5,1.

this procedure?

iMac4,1 and iMac5,1 Firmware Tool Released

iMac4,1 and iMac5,1 Firmware Tool Released

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