Partition a Drive, then run two OS's?

[Christopher]

Question: I'm buying a new Macbook (older, white style) with a 160GB HD. I'm wondering, would it be possible to partition that drive, run one with the newest OS the machine ships with, and run the other with an older one, 10.4.7, with the ability to choose either as the startup drive? I have some older apps that work best with 10.4.7.


Thanks so much for any replies.

 

[PowerBookG4]

In theory it is possible, I am not sure if Tiger will work on the the macbook however.

 

[harryb2448]

Would be safer I think to use an external HDD connected by Firewire, format and install Tiger on that. System Preferences>Startup Dsk will give you the option of booting from the internal drive with Leopard or external with Tiger./

 

[Christopher]

Thanks to both of you guys for responding. If i could install 10.4.7 on a partitioned drive using the original 160 GB HD, what would be the danger? Is there some risk associated with this? Thanks again.

 

[ADKhikerVW]

There is always risk when partitioning a drive. If something did go wrong, you could potentially lose all your data. Therefore it is essential to have a complete backup before proceeding with the partitioning.

That being said, yes you could partition your drive in Leopard so it has a second partition, then install Tiger on it. After doing this, you could hold down Option at startup and select which OS to boot to. However it is not possible to run Tiger on all MacBooks. I am not sure which ones aren't compatible, but I know the newer models after Leopard was released may not run Tiger.

Good luck.