I ordered the Mac OS X Snow Leopard disc for my 2006 Macbook that is running Ubuntu 10.10 and the (snow leopard) disc won't work. Help!

The way I see it, the previous owner erased OS X before installing Ubuntu, and that version of OS X was either Tiger or Leopard.

Your only way forward would seem to be to find out what it was and reinstall that version before trying to install Snow Leopard.

It was a bad move buying that Mac without getting the original install disks.

Klaus1 wrote:

The way I see it, the previous owner erased OS X before installing Ubuntu, and that version of OS X was either Tiger or Leopard...

Since it sounds like the previous owner wiped the HD clean and then reformatted it and installed Ubuntu fresh, I've been researching what a complete replacement of Mac OS X with Linux would do to the Mac HD but can't find anything definitive. In any case, the Snow Leopard install DVD can be booted from (she's done that) and Disk Utility should be accessible to load and format the HD (it is on my retail 10.6.3 disk).

Apple brought Snow Leopard back specifically to provide access to the App Store for purchase and installation of Lion or Mountain Lion for those running 10.5, and that requires 10.6.8 (I don't know if the current installers just install 10.6.8 or if the user has to then go through the upgrade process). I wonder if the installation routine was subtly changed so that a pre-existing Leopard installation is now tested for, which it won't find on a HD formatted for Linux?

britny.pryor wrote:

I think I figured out the problem.

They sent me a drop in DVD of snow leopard instead of the full version.

I think there is a 10.5 to 10.6 dumbed down upgrade disk, you need the full verison w/access to the Utilities to format the drive.

Tell them that your erasing Linux off the drive, thus need to be able to Erase and Format it GUID: OS X Extended Journaled.