Macbook 2008 Aluminum OSX Install Errors

Did you get it from the Internet Archive? El Capitan should still be available from Apple: https://support.apple.com/en-gb/102662, the link is about halfway down the page under "Use a web browser for older versions".

I just tried the link and it triggered a download request dialog in Firefox, so it still seems to be working.

Then you can create a bootable installer from a Terminal command line as per: https://support.apple.com/en-gb/101578. Etcher will work, mind you, but I seem to recall extra steps to extract the installer first, which the command line will do for you.

How are you installing it exactly? Been many months since I retired my last El Capitan machine - given that almost nothing works on it anymore, even Firefox no longer has a supported ESR version and updating the ISRG-X1 certs to make it half-usable became a pain...but I was still able to do an erase and install from a USB installer.

Trying to update from recovery was impossible, though (or rather, waaaay to difficult to be worthwhile even touching that - since you were basically creating an installer on the fly on a blank USB anyway).

Puppies_are_the_best wrote:

It booted, I just don’t know how to close a discussion ._.

You cannot. It will be locked by the hosts once it has had no replies for several weeks. It will, however remain visible for the foreseeable future.