17" uMBP w/ Snow Leopard inquiry

I had an offer for $2600 to buy my early 2009 17" uMBP with 10.5.8 and can get a new 17" 2.8 uMBP w/ Snow leopard for 2300$
i was wondering if it is worth it and would the transition to Snow Leopard be worth it.
Ive had issues with CS4 on Snow Leopard however it seems Cs2 works fine on Leopard and Snow.
which is my main concern at this point, including some software that seems iffy even though the software isnt more than a year or two old.
would it be a wise upgrade?
thanks

Something i have noticed with refurbs and any of the mid 2009 MacBook pros can still run Leopard if you have a back up or Mac with i believe 10.5.7 or 10.5.8.
I tested running Leopard on a week old 13" MBP that had SL preinstalled.
Even with a 17" 2.8 picked up a few weeks ago for client who was also concerned about running SL, could run Leopard on it flawlessly.
Not sure about the iMac's, i doubt it.
my recommendation would be this.
grab either the 2.26 MBP 13" and upgrade the memory & hdd or pick up the 2.53 and upgrade later and pick up the i7 if speed is an issue and you want to keep it for a couple years.
and you should be able save a few bucks towards upgrades.
goodluck.

Similar Messages

Upgrading from OS 10.4.11 to Snow Leopard

Hello, I've heard mixed reviews from people at the Apple store to people on the street whether it's possible to upgrade directly from 10.4.11 to Snow Leopard. Below are my specs, and I'd love to hear a second opinion from someone!
Model Name: Mac Pro
Model Identifier: MacPro1,1
Processor Name: Dual-Core Intel Xeon
Processor Speed: 3 GHz
Number Of Processors: 2
Total Number Of Cores: 4
L2 Cache (per processor): 4 MB
Memory: 2 GB
Bus Speed: 1.33 GHz
Boot ROM Version: MP11.005C.B08
SMC Version: 1.7f10

You should be able to upgrade the OS X to Snow Leopard with the less costly upgrade DVD
from Apple; that won't give you the newer iLife, or iWorks, but it would be a full install disc.
The computer should see an upgrade in RAM, too; 2GB probably is minimal, and this can be
a concern if you also have a jam-packed hard disk drive and no working free space for the
system or applications to use the OS X's automatic Virtual Memory, based on available space.
An upgrade from Tiger 10.4.11 to Snow Leopard will invite issues and problems from third-party
applications not written to run in the later OS X version; you may have to buy/upgrade them, too.
• Mac OS X 10.6 Snow Leopard compatibility table = +Which apps work with Mac OS X 10.6?+
http://snowleopard.wikidot.com/
similar forum inquiry/reply:
http://discussions.apple.com/message.jspa?messageID=13223595#13223595
Anyway, the upgrade by itself on a new or 'secure erased' HDD may work just fine.
The hardware upgrade suggested (RAM, larger hard disk drive) would help. Also,
if there are any pending Firmware updates available, be sure to install them, too.
Good luck & happy computing!

Can OS X Snow Leopard be installed on a MacBook Pro5, 5 with an Intel Core 2 Duo?

This question may already exist somewhere in the support community, but if it is there I have missed it. If not, then here it is for myself and those of this specific inquiry.
I have a MacBook Pro bought in mid-2009, Model MacBookPro5, 5, with an Intel Core 2 Duo, 4 GB RAM, and approximately 140 GB of HD space, which meets the stated requirements for Snow Leopard, Lion, Mountain Lion, and Mavericks. It is currently running OS X 10.5.8 Leopard, and I am trying to upgrade to Snow Leopard, or, if possible, Mavericks. I have the Snow Leopard CD, and have tried to install it. However, I get the error message "OS X Can't be installed on this computer". I have tried it from my current OS and by booting directly from the CD. I do not have any partitions, and have backed up and erased the existing Macintosh HD volume, but the error message continues.
Can anyone shed some light into what is the issue? If so, much appreciated in advance.

Remousamavi,
yes, the MacBookPro5,5 (13-inch Mid 2009 MacBook Pro) can run Snow Leopard. In fact, there were two varieties of model-specific grey installation DVDs for that model MacBook Pro: one had Leopard 10.5.7, and the other had Snow Leopard 10.6. (The “Apple disc ID” of the latter is 2Z691-6533-A.)
Do you have the white “upgrade” 10.6 Snow Leopard DVD, or the white “install” 10.6.3 Snow Leopard DVD? If you have the “upgrade” DVD, then it won’t let you install onto an empty partition; you’ll need to have Snow Leopard installed on your boot disk before it will install the upgrade.
Once you’ve got Snow Leopard installed and updated via Software Update to 10.6.8, you’ll be able to install Mavericks.

Are Adobe, Epson, & Apple all in step with Snow Leopard?

In light of the Lightroom printing debacle when Leopard came on the scene, it would be really interesting to hear from others once they have experience of printing out of Lr onto Epson Stylus Photo printers under the new Snow Leopard OS; due out I believe on Friday.

FWIW, in response to the OPs inquiry-
I have updated from 10.5.8 on a MacBook Pro to 10.6. I have an Epson R2880 (previously an R2400) with the latest 6.57 driver. I am using LR 2.4 (64bit) and CS4. I have been afflicted with the dreaded "dark prints" since the R2400 and LR 1.0. Immediately after the update, I opened LR and proceeded to print a sample photo from a preset used with Red River Arctic Polar Satin with the supplied RR icc profile. The printer dialog was NOT as expansive, "Printer Setup" was missing. I printed anyway, with the limited options, not being able to verify the options. The print left me awestruck. I have kept various samples from past experiments. This last photo was...stunning. It is a dawn landscape of the summer Maine coast. For the first time in my experience with LR and Epson, the print was accurate to the display. The colors are accurate and vivid. The detail in the foliage, flowers and rocks is much superior to the past samples. The ONLY difference in my process was the upgrade to 10.6! I was concerned with the difference in the print dialog. Reading this thread and others (including the Epson website), it was recommended to install Rosetta as part of the optional post installation. I did the install. The options (and previous selections) for the printer dialog REAPPEARED as with 10.5.8! I printed another sample of the same photo. It was happily identical. I then printer the photo in CS4 with the "same" setting. The print was identical to the LR print.
I am one happy camper.
finally

Leopard/Snow Leopard disengages program-why?

Any idea on what makes Leopard & Snow Leopard randomly "disengage" whatever program I'm on, as if I had clicked on the desktop? The program kind of grays-out, and any keyboard strokes stop doing anything and I get the "beep" denoting "error" and I have to click on the program window to re-engage the program (whatever program; makes no difference which one) and make keystrokes active again. If I'm typing-in some text, it stops entering text (even though I'm still typing) and I get the error "beep." This is sooooo annoying!!! I have been running Mac's since system 6, and this never ever happened until I got to Leopard (10.5). I was SO hoping that Snow Leopard would be the fix for this, but it wasn't. Anyone know what causes this, and how to stop it? My only hunch is maybe something to do with the Java debacle, and the OS kicking it off for security reasons. Seems like this wasn't happening to my clean-installed Snow Leopard until I re-installed Java. I'm tempted to yank Java altogether, but there are some websites I visit daily that require it . . arrrgh!!! Any idea what it might be, besides Java?

Have you gotten your disc? I have had endless problems getting my new (8/12) MacBook Pro qualified for Snow Leopard. First, the online tool will not take my serial. I called Apple, they said they acknowledge this problem, and please fax my info in. I did so 2 weeks ago. Never showed up in the inquiry tool, never charged my CC. I re-faxed it on their advice last week. Still not showing up. I went to the Apple store. They called support for me, and said that while my computer is totally eligible they are simply overwhelmed, and I should wait until today (Friday 9/4) to see if they process my fax. Friday comes. Using the inquiry tool I still get "no order found".
This is only $20 off! Why is this so hard?! I bought this computer from Apple three weeks ago, why can they not just find it in the system and sell me the upgrade disc?
I am very frustrated. The people I have spoken to (on phone and at Apple store) have been very nice, but the complete inability of anyone to actually help me with what is an incredibly basic situation (buying a computer from their online store, qualifying for up-to-date program, and purchasing it) is absurd.
Any help/ideas?

When I sync my iPod to my MacBook through iTunes new events do not show up and old events are not deleted. I am using Snow Leopard and not iSync.

I am using Snow Leopard on a MacBook. I have an iPod touch 3G. I do not use iSync it Mobile Me. When I sync my iPod through iTunes new events on my iPod do not show up on my Mac and old events do not delete. I have read help instructions that include deleting the data on the iPod. The iPod has the correct data and the Mac does not so I have not followed those instructions. I need help as the only reason I bought the Mac was to be able to sync, back up, view and print my calendar. Currently it is useless. If only Apple could have learned from the elegance of the Palm software.

Start here:
iPhone, iPad, or iPod touch: Device not recognized in iTunes for Windows

Previewing videos in Quick Look isn't the same in Snow Leopard.

Does previewing videos on Quick Look in Mac OS 10.6 Snow Leopard no longer allows you to use the two finger gesture to move forward or backwards in the video, or is it just me?

I can not do that either, then again, I never tried it in Leopard so... hope that helps

When i login to my banks online access point a new browser is opened and it takes up the full 27" display. ca i restrict the size of web browser screen used by tme online banking service? imac 27" OSX snow leopard 10.6.8

Intel iMac OSX Snow Leopard 10.6.8
I logon to bank via its internet portal and next screen takes up all 27" display.
Can this be controlled in any way or do I just put up with it, it is really annoying.

Thank you for your response. Whew...i omitted to say I use Firefox... tried to logon using Safari... same
result Installed Chrome ...same thing Installed Opera... this browser actually has in its Preferences menu
the capacity to set JavaScript Options under the Conent submenu... DISALLOWED all of resizing of windows,
moving of windows and ability of script to hide menu bar ... this fixes the screen to available browser size...
so my issue has at least this resolution. Thank you Flet Cheryl

Firefox hangs on opening requiring force quit I have snow leopard mac It hangs when I try safe mode. I need to know how to remove all traces of firefox on my mac so I can reinstall. I have tried terminal as advised on firefox webpage. Please advise m

Firefox hangs on opening requiring force quit I have snow leopard Mac It even hangs when I try safe mode. I need to know how to remove all traces of firefox on my mac so I can reinstall. I have tried terminal as advised on firefox webpage. Please advise me
== This happened ==
Every time Firefox opened
== I tried to update firefox add-ons ==
== User Agent ==
Mozilla/5.0 (Macintosh; U; Intel Mac OS X 10_6_3; en-us) AppleWebKit/531.22.7 (KHTML, like Gecko) Version/4.0.5 Safari/531.22.7

Try a new profile. See [[Recovering important data from an old profile]]

I have a 27 in. iMac with the latest version of Snow Leopard. When Lion comes out, will it be software I purchase and download online? I am trying to prepare for cost and don't have a point of reference, having been a Windows guy until last summer.

I want to know what to expect in terms of moving from one OS to another. Having been a Windows guy until last summer, my only experience is going from one version of Windows to another, which is usually a fairly costly purchase. I will want to go to Lion, but as a retired teacher, my income is fixed. I am not looking for a specific price, I am sure that is unknown, but I would just like to know help Apple does these things so I won't be sadly surprised.

Historically Apple has sold OS X upgrades via DVD media however with the advent of the Mac Apple Store that throws another possibility into the mix. That's about as much as I can say as these forums don't allow us to speculate about future products. As for the cost historically Apple has priced OS X upgrades between $29-$129, the last upgrade (Snow Leopard) was only $29 but that was an exception. Again we cannot speculate on these forums about that. The good news is that Apple is unlike Microsoft which makes OS upgrades expensive and complicated. The choice with OS X is do you want a server version (most users don't need one) or a single computer license. The users that buy server versions tend to have a number of Macs they manage from a server, most consumers don't have this issue.
Keep reading the news, as you know Apple has announced a Summer release for Lion.
Upgrades on OS X are usually very simple. I've upgraded from Tiger to Leopard to Snow Leopard and each transition has been very easy. With any major OS upgrade there are some basic rules to follow, for example always, always, always backup prior to any update. When Lion is released to the general public post again for what to do to prepare or even do a Google search on "How to prepare for OS X upgrade" and you will find a number of articles that will provide some suggestions and valuable insight. You can also re-post here and users will be happy to assist.

Time Machine on Snow Leopard just doesn't work.

So I've had huge nightmares over the past few days over Time Machine.
So I've always been a big proponent of Time Machine. I always tell everyone that you NEED a backup solution, and while Time Machine may not be the be all and end all, it's a great starter solution for those that don't want any fuss.
But perhaps not anymore.
It just works, right? Well apparently not.
So a little while ago I performed a Time Machine-assisted hard drive swap for a MacBook (not mine). That is, I install a new drive, boot from SL DVD, perform a HD wipe, then restore from Time Machine. It seemed to go well.
Fast forward to more recently, I went on a trip overseas (Taiwan). While there, I obviously took a lot of photos, and it became that time again - purchase a new hard drive with more capacity for my MacBook Pro! HD were a little cheaper where I visited, so I not only bought a new drive for my MBP, but also a new drive for my wife's MB, as well as new external drives to upgrade our Time Machine drives.
While I was there, I decided to update my own Time Machine first - following the instructions from Apple's own knowledge base on the matter:
http://support.apple.com/kb/HT1427
I transferred my existing backups to the new drive to continue my Time Machine. I didn't notice any problem at the time.
Then I returned to my home country (New Zealand). First thing I did when I got back was to perform the Time Machine-assisted HD swap after making sure the OS were up-to-date as were their respective backups, on both my own MBP and my wife's MacBook.
That's when the troubles started.
First off, I noticed that a few images from my Aperture Library were missing. The album data and everything were there, but the actual files were not. They also did not exist anywhere on the Time Machine drive and as such never made it over to the new HD. Weird, I thought. They were there, clear as day on my original drive. They simply weren't backed up.
Now I'm aware of a few TM niggles, such as the false backups after verifying a disk, but I hadn't done that.
The second issue was much more major. My Wife's MB would be endlessly stuck on the white boot screen with the grey Apple logo. As it turns out, it's exactly this issue here:
https://discussions.apple.com/thread/2738620?threadID=2738620&tstart=74
In short, the fresh Time Machine backups I made before transferring to the new HD showed no sign of updating the /System/Library/Framework/Security.framework/Versions/A/Security package, which is REQUIRED for the Mac to boot into 10.6.7 (it had an old one from before).
Great, I thought, but maybe I can fix that by installing a fresh 10.6.7 combo update on the MB via target disk mode.
No dice. On trying, it goes all the way to the end, and then fails installation. I had to resort to copying over the correct, more recent security package just to get it to boot.
After booting, what to do? Who knows what other files Time Machine failed to update, and what consequences they would have. After putting back the original security package, I tried updating 10.6.7 again. Nope, no dmgs would open - i HAD to use the new Security package for anything to open. Fair enough, but even with that, the installation would inevitably fail.
Problem with the package? Nope. Tried a fresh download, and checked the SHA and everything.
Time to do some blitzing. I pulled out my trusty Snow Leopard DVD and did a reinstall on top. That's gotta get my problem, right? Well, nope. After resetting to 10.6.0, the 10.6.7 combo updater STILL failed on installation. Furthermore, the updater no longer worked on MY MBP either.
What gives?
As it turns out, it was related to this:
https://discussions.apple.com/message/11317470?messageID=11317470
In short, some files had the user immutable flag switched on, preventing changes from being made to those files (manifests as a little lock icon on the file icon). They included (and I'm sure not limited to) the Acknowledgement.rtfs in /Library/Documentation/, as well as a majority of the fonts in /Library/Fonts.
Checking back in the backup drives, it was clear that Time Machine was the culprit - instances of those files in the backups were also locked. When did that happen? Looking back, it looks like it happened when I transferred the backups from one Time Machine drive to another. But it wasn't all at once - in the first backup on one drive, one of the Acknowledgement.rtf files was locked, and the other one wasn't, but in the second onwards, both were. It was clear that Time Machine seemed to be doing it to those files. Which files and why? I have no idea.
So removing the uchg flag with "sudo chflags -R nouchg /" in terminal finally allowed me to apply the 10.6.7 combo update without failure.
So were the troubles over then?
Nope.
While checking if everything was fine, I noticed iPhoto on the MB had all the thumbs missing - after rebuilding, they weren't back, and only a .plist trashing fixed it (I consider this pretty normal - probably looking for the files on the old UUID drive or something).
But what gives? ALL the photos taken on the trip were gone! Not just the thumbs - the actual files were missing from the iPhoto Library! The data in the albums existed, just the actual files, just like my instance in Aperture on my own MBP.
Checked the Time Machine - again, it was clear Time Machine had completely stuffed up - the files were nowhere to be found on the Time Machine drive.
So currently, I've returned the original internal drive to the MacBook, performing a FRESH on new reformatted disk Time MAchine, and will use THAT to restore.
Nightmares, indeed. It's several days of work doing all the restores, considering I have limited drives to work with. And yes, rest-assured, I was doing enough permission repairs, and PRAM resets to ensure they weren't issues.
It occurs to me there are several faults with the most recent version of Time Machine (maybe 10.6.6 or something as that's when people had some of the issues above):
1) At some point in time, Time Machine may not update a necessary Security package (and probably other files too - I believe the files around it were also not updated), meaning that if you use that Time Machine to restore, the outdated package will cause your computer to fail to boot.
2) Transferring your backups to a new destination Time Machine drive may cause certain files to become user immutable or 'locked', with one consequence being you cannot update the OS.
3) Time Machine may fail to backup image files with the Aperture or iPhoto Library. Trying to remember back, I *think* this may be related to the fact that we changed time zones, as the unupdated image files were after the zones were changed. Strangely, every other file within the Library packages were updated, as album data was updated - just not the actual image files and folders.
Conclusion? I no longer trust Time Machine. The basic foundation of a backup service is that you trust it to do what it's supposed to do. After all this, how can I?
You might think they are isolated incidents, but they were occurring on two Macs that I have, and they same errors can be found in others.I think I have detailed some root causes, but who really knows.
At any rate you should keep an eye on at least these files I have detailed. Would love to hear Pondini on the matter, as I know he knows a lot about Time Machine.

Someone has suggested just installing Snow Leopard on the machine. Will that work?
If you can find a copy of the workstation version of Snow Leopard shipped with the same model of Mac mini, yes. Apple has not, to my knowledge, shipped a retail version of Snow Leopard new enough to boot your mini.
I've also heard there is a way to install SL while connected to my old Powerbook in order to suck the entire old drive onto the new machine in an operable manner. Is this accurate, and can this be done if my old machine is the Powerbook on the old apple chip when the new machine is intel based
No, it's not accurate. The OS on your PowerBook will not boot your mini.
what are the differences between the single pack and the family pack?
If you mean single and family pack of Mac OS X, the single pack is licensed for installation on one computer only, while the family pack is licensed for installation on up to five Macs.
Regards.
Message was edited by: Dave Sawyer

Can't install Snow Leopard on MacBook Pro - DVD won't mount

I am unable to install Snow Leopard on my MacBook Pro as the DVD won't mount. This is an early 2008 vintage MacBook Pro, intel core duo...
I'm using a OS X Snow Leopard install DVD (family licensed). This DVD has been used to install 3 other Macs in my house without a problem (about a year ago), but cannot be used to upgrade my MBP. Actually, this disk mounted on the MBP exactly once - inserted with system up, the disk mounted. Upon running the installed (a year ago), the computer restarted but hung in boot. After getting the disk ejected and the computer restarted, the disk would never mount again. I've defered upgrade for a year but at this point need to upgrade my MBP at least to Snow Leopard and possibly Lion.
The problem doesn't seem to be with the DVD, since it continues to mount fine in other computers, and in fact a borrowed Snow Leopard DVD also will not mount on the MBP.
BUT ... the problem also does not seem to be with the optical drive in my computer, as it can read & mount the install/restore disks that came with the computer as well as other CDs and DVD ROMs. Only the Snow Leopard install DVDs fail to mount.
I've also tried mounting the 10.6 install DVD on my Mac Pro desktop, making it available over the network (ethernet) with DVD/CD sharing. I can mount the remote disk from my MBP that way, but when I launch the installer, the application launches (its own menus are displayed, I can quit from menu, for example) but does nothing -- no windows open, nothing.
I've also tried "Remote Install" (again with the DVD made available with the Remote Install MacOS X application on my desktop), but when I boot the MBP with option held down, the remote disk is not available as a startup disk.
Zapping the PRAM did not help.
Am off to the store to get an optical drive cleaning kit and a blank DVD big enough to burn a new disk image, but would appreciate any further ideas at this point....

Solution that worked: Copy the Install DVD to a USB flash drive and boot from that.
http://www.maciverse.com/install-os-x-snow-leopard-from-usb-flash-drive.html
Up and running with Snow Leopard now and working on the updates.

Upgraded to snow leopard, now safari scrolls a page down when space bar is hit and sometimes crashes. Any ideas for a fix?

I just upgraded to the new snow leopard, now my Safari is acting loopy. At times, the page will scroll down when I hit the space bar. As I type this discussion the screen isn't paging down, but if I go to the tab where I have facebook loaded and hit the space bar, it acts as a page down key. I've had safari crash about 5 times tonight for no apparent reason. The delete key sometimes will act as a page back key. I really have no idea whats going on.
I've had keyboards go wacko on me before due to something being spilled on them or a wireless problem, but this keyboard is a wired keyboard and nothing was spilled on it. It's rather new and I'm quite certain it's not a keyboard issue.
No settings have been changed on the computer. The only thing different today from yesterday, is the fact that I upgraded to snow leopard.
Help would be pretty sweet.
Thanks,
Jason

I just upgraded to the new snow leopard, now my Safari is acting loopy. At times, the page will scroll down when I hit the space bar. As I type this discussion the screen isn't paging down, but if I go to the tab where I have facebook loaded and hit the space bar, it acts as a page down key. I've had safari crash about 5 times tonight for no apparent reason. The delete key sometimes will act as a page back key. I really have no idea whats going on.
I've had keyboards go wacko on me before due to something being spilled on them or a wireless problem, but this keyboard is a wired keyboard and nothing was spilled on it. It's rather new and I'm quite certain it's not a keyboard issue.
No settings have been changed on the computer. The only thing different today from yesterday, is the fact that I upgraded to snow leopard.
Help would be pretty sweet.
Thanks,
Jason

I have an old Imac G4 from 2003. I haven't used it in years, but I would like to start. What are my options for getting it up to date? Is it even worth the trouble/cost? I was hoping to at least get it running Snow leopard, if not Lion. Options?

I have an old Imac G4 from 2003. I would like to start using it again, however it is so out of date and runs too slowly. What are my options to update it? I really don't want to invest a ton of money - I might as well get a new one, so if there are any reasonable ways to get it to run Snow Leopard or even Lion, please help. I've also considered using a mac mini? Is that worth it either? I'm not sure which way to go here. I don't want to trash it, I feel like it can be a great computer if updated.

Presumably it is running tiger 10.4.11?
It may be able to run Leopard 10.5:
Leopard system requirements:
http://support.apple.com/kb/SP517
But that is as far as the old PPC Macs can go, and Leopard can cost up to $200 on Amazon.

Since i upgraded to iOS5 my phone is no longer recognized by my MacBook, so I cannot sync. What do I do? MacBook was recently updated to OSX Snow Leopard.

Since i upgraded to iOS5 my phone is no longer recognized by my MacBook, so I cannot sync. What do I do? MacBook was recently updated to OSX Snow Leopard.

Start by downloading the latest version of iTunes and reinstalling it.

17" uMBP w/ Snow Leopard inquiry

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