[dallenmarket]

Hi all. I'm new here, but have been an Apple user since the Apple C/E days. (My first Mac was a Plus)

Apple went back to bundling Mac specific OS installation disks some time back and messed me up. I have numerous models of Macs, with a dozen PPC 604s (some upgraded to G3/G4) some G4 PowerBooks, G5 PowerMacs and G5 Imacs. The problem arises that I want to standardize the OS used in the Power Books, G5s and Imacs. My PBs and Imacs are at 10.4.11, but the Towers are at 10.3.9.

The install disks for the PBs and Imacs won't install to the towers and finding good OS 10.4 disks is difficult/expensive. I've gotten a half dozen disks on eBay that were either bad (I will never buy used disks on eBay again.) or advertised as retail (disks for all models) when actually OEM that came with someone's Mac. (Many sellers on eBay assume that all Macs use the same disks.)

I plan to move to 10.5 eventually, but I have to wait utill 10.5 compatible versions of some of my most used apps are brought out.

My questions are:
1. Is there a way to use model specific disks in a different model? A hack/modified install/or? I was able to install 10.3.9 on my G-3/G-4 upgraded 76/8600 Powermacs using OWC's XPostFacto. Is there something like that to fool a Mac into accepting a different model's disk?

2. Is there an online reference that shows the Apple part number for their disks? (That way I can at least ask the eBay sellers what the part number on the lower edge of their disks reads to know if I'm getting the ones I need.)

Thanks in Advance
D. Allen.

[bballe336]

I don't think there is anyway to use model specific discs on another model. Your best bet is to just buy the actual 10.4 retail discs, they are expensive but probably cheaper than trying to buy model specific discs for all your machines, especially since some of your machines (if not al of them?) were probably released before 10.4 came out.

I PM'ed you by the way.

[Cold Warrior]

Sometimes a clone of one type (e.g., MacBook) will take on another (e.g., iMac). One way of doing this is putting it in firewire target disk mode (the target Mac) and using carbon copy cloner to clone from source to target Mac.

If you decide to buy discs again, just demand pictures of the front and back (at an angle, to check for scratches) of the discs. The front side will tell you whether it's a model-specific one or retail.