I have a tricky, interesting problem.

I inherited a Macbook with a broken screen. I'm not going to fix the screen, because that is insanely expensive, but it will make a very nice multimedia box for my HDTV.

The problem is, I had to buy a new hard drive for it and now I've got to install things like OSX and XP on it without the benefit of a primary screen. This is hard.

I hooked it up to my TV and booted to the Leopard CD. That worked, and I can see the Leopard background on my TV, but it's the secondary screen - meaning all the important stuff I need to see and click is on the (broken) laptop screen. Pressing the F7 button does nothing to change video modes.

So, I can't seem to switch things to a working monitor. And I don't have another macbook lying around, so I can't swap the HDDs and install it on a good one and then swap them back.

Ideas? Anyone have a step-by-step graphical Leopard installation guide so I can figure out which keyboard shortcuts I need to press?

Have you priced a new screen for your MacBook? They're not as expensive as you suppose. Check it out here:

http://www.ifixit.com/Categories/MacBook-13-Inch/86

A new screen varies in price anywhere from $299 to $399; not what I would consider "insanely expensive".

Regards.

You're right, that's not absolutely terrible (cheaper than I thought), but I already have enough laptops... I just want to use this as a nice multimedia box for my TV, so replacing the screen really wouldn't do much except waste money on something I'd rarely look at.