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mid-2007 iMac Help Needed

wilef

wilef

macrumors member
Original poster
Aug 23, 2016
30
59
I have a mid-2007 24" iMac that I got from someone who didn't have the installation disc. I upgraded the cpu and wifi and RAM awhile back to get the system to run High Sierra, which it does, but not well. I was not impressed with the performance (I still had an old HD in it and not willing to spend on an SSD for an old machine). I want to go back to Tiger and upgrade to a reasonable OSX version that will still perform okay, but I'm stuck since I don't have the installation disc. I've read mixed things.

1. Without the disc, is there any version of OS X retail that will install on this machine? I have an installation disc that is apparently not the right one for this machine, and trying to install just gives a 'can't install on this machine' error when trying to install.

2. I called Apple and they wouldn't sell me the original disc. They said to take it in to a repair place which there's no way I'm going to do. Any other easy way to get an original disc? I haven't seen any on ebay that I'm sure are the right ones...

3. I've read that if you remove the hard drive, hook it up to another mac as an external, install OSX on the external and then install it back in the original machine, it should work. This is a lot of work and I don't want to try it if I'm not going to be successful. Anyone recommend this path?
 
Apple never released a retail version of Tiger that will install on an intel Mac. The only Tiger installer is the grey DVD that originally came with your iMac. So, unless you are a collector, and want that original system, then your only reasonable choice is something newer. Your mid-2007 24-inch iMac supports up to 10.11.6.
If you are trying a grey restore DVD, and it is not one that came with your iMac model, then it won't work.
So, 10.5 (Leopard) and up to 10.11 give you a wide range of possible systems that you can use. The biggest issue, on El Capitan and later, is the old graphics card that your iMac would have. And, in my opinion, a spinning hard drive is not very well optimized with any system newer than Mavericks.

Even if you go back to something older, like Snow Leopard, replacing your hard drive with an SSD will always make a worth-the-effort difference.
If you upgraded to the maximum RAM of 6GB, that's about all you can do on that end, too.

I mentioned Snow Leopard, because Apple still offers Snow Leopard at the Apple online store.(and Snow Leopard is still only $20!)
That will allow you to erase the drive, and install the complete Snow Leopard system. If you can do that, it makes very little sense to search for a "correct" installer/restore disk to install Tiger first (unless you want the original system, just because it's the original, or just because), and then the additional aggravation when the old Tiger DVD that you bought somewhere still won't install because it's from a different iMac model.
 
Thanks DeltaMac! I'll try the retail Snow Leopard then, sounds like the right way to go.
[doublepost=1520794645][/doublepost]
DeltaMac said:
Apple never released a retail version of Tiger that will install on an intel Mac. The only Tiger installer is the grey DVD that originally came with your iMac. So, unless you are a collector, and want that original system, then your only reasonable choice is something newer. Your mid-2007 24-inch iMac supports up to 10.11.6.
If you are trying a grey restore DVD, and it is not one that came with your iMac model, then it won't work.
So, 10.5 (Leopard) and up to 10.11 give you a wide range of possible systems that you can use. The biggest issue, on El Capitan and later, is the old graphics card that your iMac would have. And, in my opinion, a spinning hard drive is not very well optimized with any system newer than Mavericks.

Even if you go back to something older, like Snow Leopard, replacing your hard drive with an SSD will always make a worth-the-effort difference.
If you upgraded to the maximum RAM of 6GB, that's about all you can do on that end, too.

I mentioned Snow Leopard, because Apple still offers Snow Leopard at the Apple online store.(and Snow Leopard is still only $20!)
That will allow you to erase the drive, and install the complete Snow Leopard system. If you can do that, it makes very little sense to search for a "correct" installer/restore disk to install Tiger first (unless you want the original system, just because it's the original, or just because), and then the additional aggravation when the old Tiger DVD that you bought somewhere still won't install because it's from a different iMac model.
Click to expand...

Okay, so this didn't work, retail Snow Leopard disc still shows the same 'can't be installed on this mac' message. I'm at a loss as to why Apple won't allow a retail OS from being installed on their own machine that can support this version, but that's where I'm at...any other ideas?
 
I didn't know that Apple could ship a DVD out to you in 30 minutes :D

I'm guessing that your Snow Leopard DVD is also one that shipped with another Mac, and NOT the retail Snow Leopard DVD. I am pretty sure that's why you are running into that limitation.
But, when do you see that message? Is it after you boot to that DVD?
Is that the exact text of the error message that appears, or is the quote slightly different on the actual error window?

@nambuccaheadsau: that article you referenced is about an updater to the Tiger system. All updates to Tiger were released for both PPC and Intel versions. There were separate updates for both PPC or Intel Macs. That update does NOT merge the two separate system install paths, unfortunately. In fact, I think the 10.4.5 update was the first update released after the Intel Macs were first introduced, when Apple needed to provide updates to both CPU lines. The two remained separate releases until the release of Leopard, which was always a universal install.

The full Tiger installer for intel was never offered to the public. Although there was a universal install of OS X Server, a universal OS X Tiger client version was never made public. I still have a folder full of Intel point and security updates for Tiger on Intel, but I have never found a way to install the Intel version of the full system, if the original Intel version 10.4 restore DVD is lost.
 
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