PLEASE HELP! My Macbook Pro has XP only now...NO OS X!!!!

I came home this weekend to find my new Intel Macbook Pro is bad shape. My teenager heard you could put XP on Macs so he decided to reformat MY laptop with a Windows XP CD and now it won't so much as recognize any OS X software period. None of my Install CD's will even pull up and no key sequences work either! Please help me...and my son...he wants to live! Thanks in advance.

My son formatted my Macbook Pro with XP!

I now know why some animals consume their young! My son has killed my laptop by installing XP over Tiger by way of reformat and now I can't find a way to reverse this. It won't even recognize any OS X anything! Thanks

that shouldn't even be possible.

are you sure he didn't figure out how to use bootcamp?

Outrageous!!

You will have to start up off the restore DVD and reinstall (press C on start-up)

Unless you have a back-up of your files, they are gone forever - sadly

^^ try erics suggestion first (but I think Bootcamp no longer works in Tiger)

have you tried the suggestions here

http://docs.info.apple.com/article.html?artnum=106693

No boot camp. He somehow put in the XP disk and reformatted it. I am at a loss myself!

does it actually boot up and work?

have you tried holding down the "option" key at boot up? if there is a os X cd in the drive it should show up as a bootable option. Are you sure your mac partition is actually gone? maybe the windows partition is what is selected as the startup disc. If this is the case all you have to do is set os X as the start up disc.

You could just use xp. ;P

Wintermoon said:

You could just use xp. ;P

Click to expand...

[/me eyeballs post count and comment...]

so are you the young who's about to be eaten? ;P

It works, but not really well. I went ahead and tried to reformat again with XP but I created a extra partition with nothing on it. I am going to try and locate some dmg files that I can place inside it even though XP won't open them then go back in and erase the xp partition. Anyone know what I should place in that extra partition that would allow my OS X disk to load? Thanks again everyone!

i believe if you just put your install disks in and do what the link louishen provided says, you should be in good shape.

I'm sure. As soon as I put in the OS X it won't even recognize it. Option key only works on my original gray cd's but when I double click on it nothing happens.

Have you tried booting with the OSX DVD in the drive by holding down the C key right after the startup sound? Keep the key down and see if the boot from the OSX DVD starts. Give it a few.

ah ha - I see!!

you need to boot up with the install cd in then power down and restart pressing the C key (or alt key - see what works) as soon as the power comes on

You have to start up the installer before XP has a chance to load

Sure have...I'll keep trying though..actually my son will...he has nothing else to do until this is fixed!

louishen said:

ah ha - I see!!

you need to boot up with the install cd in then power down and restart pressing the C key (or alt key - see what works) as soon as the power comes on

You have to start up the installer before XP has a chance to load

Click to expand...

I will give that another try. So far no luck but I am sure there is a way. Thank you for all your help!

*Merged same topic threads*

Just to be sure it's being understood, don't tap the C key. Right after the Start Up sound Hold C and KEEP IT DOWN. Just being sure as some have taken it you tap C once and let it go.