Welcome to the MacNN Forums.

WOPR · Feb 18, 2005, 03:07 PM

I have a PB 12" with internal combo drive and an external LaCie DVD+-RW drive. I know I can use the burn projects with the external drive by creating a disk image, but the question is, can I actually install iDVD without a SuperDrive? The Apple site is a little vague:

DVD drive required to install GarageBand and iDVD
Apple SuperDrive (or 733MHz G4 processor) required for iDVD

Anyone bought iLife 05 and installed iDVD on a combo drive? Sorry if this has been asked before.

zeebe · Feb 18, 2005, 03:45 PM

Originally posted by WOPR:
I have a PB 12" with internal combo drive and an external LaCie DVD+-RW drive. I know I can use the burn projects with the external drive by creating a disk image, but the question is, can I actually install iDVD without a SuperDrive? The Apple site is a little vague:

DVD drive required to install GarageBand and iDVD
Apple SuperDrive (or 733MHz G4 processor) required for iDVD

Anyone bought iLife 05 and installed iDVD on a combo drive? Sorry if this has been asked before.

Yes you can install it on a computer WITHOUT a superdrive as long as it has a DVD drive to read the DVD disc. You can also install it over a network if you have one to a computer without a DVD Drive (at least I have).

A direct quote from Apple's website (http://www.apple.com/ilife/idvd/featureoverview.html) (4th paragraph under burning news):

iDVD even has a new option for those occasions when you�re between media (i.e., you haven�t made it to the store) or you�re authoring a DVD on a system without a SuperDrive. The solution? Save your project as a fully-encoded Disk Image. Not only can you burn finished projects to disc more quickly once you�re back at your SuperDrive-equipped system (after all, they�ve already been encoded, so you just have to drag the Image to a blank DVD), but Disk Images make great read-only archives.

Hope this helps!

WOPR · Feb 18, 2005, 05:13 PM

Excellent, thanks for the help. I'd better head off to the Apple Store site...

WOPR · Feb 18, 2005, 05:51 PM

Actually, was this possible with iLife 04? I've not tried doing it as I assumed you couldn't.

zeebe · Feb 18, 2005, 09:29 PM

Not sure about iDVD 04, you could try it. I think so as I remember Steve talking about students in a lab working on non superdrive emacs could make DVDs and send the image file to the superdrive computer for burning.

The Oracle · Feb 18, 2005, 10:16 PM

Does the pfurz / hurz trick still work to burn to external drives?

Old Toad · Feb 19, 2005, 01:52 PM

Originally posted by The Oracle:
Does the pfurz / hurz trick still work to burn to external drives?

You don't need it. iDVD 5 will recognize and burn to disk image or external drives.

And for WOPR and zebee - you can use Pacifist to extract the iDVD 4 installers from the iLife disks to install on a Combo only Mac.

eatinwokout · Feb 20, 2005, 03:55 AM

you don't need it. i installed idvd with a dmg off my other computer.

Rev-O · Feb 20, 2005, 02:36 PM

Originally posted by WOPR:
Actually, was this possible with iLife 04? I've not tried doing it as I assumed you couldn't.

I believe you can install iDvd 4 on any Mac that can read a dvd, just like iDvd 5.

WOPR · Feb 20, 2005, 02:58 PM

Many thanks to everyone who answered my question. I'll try iDVD 04 on my PowerBook to see how sluggish it runs before ordering the new one.

papplegate · Feb 20, 2005, 07:07 PM

Originally posted by WOPR:
Many thanks to everyone who answered my question. I'll try iDVD 04 on my PowerBook to see how sluggish it runs before ordering the new one.

My copy of iLife '05 came with an install CD, so I would assume you could install that way, and save the DVD as an image and burn it from an external drive.

chabig · Feb 20, 2005, 08:33 PM

The install CD doesn't contain all of the iLife apps. I don't think Garageband is on there. iDVD may not be either.

Chris

DavidHossack · Feb 21, 2005, 03:52 PM

The way to do it is to use the iLife DVD.

Control-click on the file called "Install iLife '05" and select "Show original"

From there you will be able to install each part of iLife individually

WOPR · Feb 21, 2005, 06:13 PM

Damn it. Took the disks I got with my G5 and on there I have the option to just install iDVD, that's fine. When I put the disk in my PowerBook it says 'Bundled apps cannot be installed'. When I look for the installer .pkg file everything is there except iDVD. So despite having effectively bought iLife 04 when I bought my G5, I can't install it on my PowerBook. Thanks Apple.

I tried Pacifist and it just quits out.

Grrr.

WOPR · 07:06 PM

Hmmm OK I did a search for invisible files on the second system disk and it found:

iDVDTutorial.pkg
iDVD.pkg
iDVD.mpkg

I'll try them and see what happens.

Edit: OK so it runs albeit very slowly. I can author but I can't save as a disk image so I'd have to move the whole project to my G5 to burn the disk. Undecided as to whether to get iLife 05 or wait until I buy my mini later in the year.

Anyone know if iDVD 05 runs quicker or slower than 04?