Trying to install Leopard to a Mac with no OS or optical drive

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My wife's hard drive crashed and we were able to rescue nothing. Her optical drive doesn't work. Neither of our machines are under warranty any more and I'm trying to install Leopard from my machine onto hers via Firewire to avoid having to pay for a new optical drive. I've found plenty of places that tell me how to remotely install Leopard onto a machine that already has an optical drive, but so far no one's been able to tell me how to install Leopard via firewire onto a machine with no os. Any advice?
 

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My wife's hard drive crashed and we were able to rescue nothing. Her optical drive doesn't work. Neither of our machines are under warranty any more and I'm trying to install Leopard from my machine onto hers via Firewire to avoid having to pay for a new optical drive. I've found plenty of places that tell me how to remotely install Leopard onto a machine that already has an optical drive, but so far no one's been able to tell me how to install Leopard via firewire onto a machine with no os. Any advice?

What color are the install disks you're using...grey/silver...or black?

Thanks,

- Nick
 
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It's just one disk, the Mac OS X Leopard Install DVD, the one with the aurora in the background.
 

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Applications / Utilities / Remote Install Mac OS X.app

Open this up on the machine with the working optical drive.
It will walk you step by step through the install.

It will require a valid Leopard disk.
 
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bobtomay, i've seen those instructions elsewhere and tried to follow them, but when I open finder on my machine, then applications, then utilities, i do not find anything like "Remote Install Mac OS X."
 

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It's been part of the standard Leopard install on my machines.

You haven't mentioned which model Macs you're dealing with or the OS you have on the working machine.
If it's Leopard, you may need to try re-installing that app from the Leopard disk by using Pacifist.
If you have a PPC machine, really don't know if that app is Intel only or not.
And the PPC is before my time with a Mac.
Others may have another method. That's the only one I'm familiar with.
 
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I'm about to try the same thing tomorrow... bringing my fiancee's sick eMac to my dad's office at the university he works at and trying to boot it into target disk mode and install leopard that way (they're both PPC machines that I'll be using, from around the same time). If that is a phail, then I will pull the hard disk out of it... (really trying to avoid that) and dump it into an ATA external case and try it that way.

If all else fails, I guess she'll have a new Mac Mini and my bank account will be a bit lighter.
 
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I'm about ready to say the heck with it, and replace her optical drive myself. I haven't gotten an estimate for the job for less than $300. From what I can tell, it's a job, but it can be done DIY.
 

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I'm about ready to say the heck with it, and replace her optical drive myself. I haven't gotten an estimate for the job for less than $300. From what I can tell, it's a job, but it can be done DIY.

You were asked earlier to post what model Mac's you're dealing with!

If you don't give us information...then it makes it more difficult to help you!:(

- Nick
 
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My apologies. We both have 2006 (not late 2006) MacBooks. Mine has a 2 GHz Intel Core Duo processor. Hers has a 1.8. We each have 300 gig hard drives and 2 megs of RAM.
 

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My apologies. We both have 2006 (not late 2006) MacBooks. Mine has a 2 GHz Intel Core Duo processor. Hers has a 1.8. We each have 300 gig hard drives and 2 megs of RAM.

Thanks for the additional info.

Since we didn't have your Mac's model info previously...you could have had a:

- G4, G5, or Intel cpu computer
- laptop, desktop, iMac, or Mac mini style computer
- and your computer could have been brand new...or as much as 8 years old..since 10.5 Leopard will install on as old as an 8 year old computer

That's why it's so important to include your computers model info...especially when we are talking hardware related issues.

As far as your issue...it seems very strange to me that your wife's hard drive & optical drive are "busted" at the same time...unless the optical drive was bad before the hard drive crashed. Which in that case the optical drive should have been fixed previously.

Obviously replacing the superdrive in a laptop or an iMac is more difficult than it is in a desktop. If doing this is something you would rather not do...you could consider purchasing an external optical drive.

This external optical drive doesn't have to be capable of writing CD's/DVD's...since you only need it to be able to read a 10.5 Leopard install disk. So you may be able to save a few bucks with a "read-only" external optical drive.

Here would be an example of a lower cost option...that does happen to have "burning" capabilities:

OWC MercuryValue FireWire/USB2 SuperDriv... (OWCVLFW2SD22X) at OWC

Good luck,

- Nick
 
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Yes. Her optical drive failed before her hard drive, but we didn't replace it because I had a machine with a working optical drive. Now that we've had to replace her hard drive, though, her not having an optical drive has made things difficult. Just buying an external optical drive might be the best route. Thanks for the advice.
 
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Couldn't you get an external SATA drive bay (firewire) and install OS X onto the volume since you have identical hardware otherwise?
 
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Just ordered the external optical drive at the link Nick provided above. Looks like the most foolproof/cheapest/easiest route. Thanks, all.
 
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I hope I won't need an OS on the computer I'm going to connect the external optical drive to. Will I?
 

pigoo3

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Just ordered the external optical drive at the link Nick provided above. Looks like the most foolproof/cheapest/easiest route. Thanks, all.

Good deal!

Since the optical drive in your wife's laptop is not functioning...she of course could use that external drive for other things as well. Such as listening to music CD's, watching DVD's, software installations via CD/DVD...and of course that external drives can "burn" disks as well, which can be good for backing up important files!

- Nick
 

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I hope I won't need an OS on the computer I'm going to connect the external optical drive to. Will I?

Of course you will...isn't that the point of what we have been discussing in this thread!

The optical drive is for your wife's computer which just had the hard drive replaced. Well that hard drive is probably blank...so you need to install the OS onto the new hard drive so your wife's computer can "boot" via that new hard drive.

- Nick
 
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Nick, perhaps a dumb question, but is this external optical drive going to work on a machine with no OS?
 
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Sorry for the above post. I didn't see it post, so I reentered a post similar to one previously without realizing this thread had continued to another page. Nick, obviously you're dealing with a real greenhorn here, so I'll ask this ignorant question as plainly as I know how. Am I going to be able to plug this ext. optical drive into my wife's USB port (starting to sound kinky) and insert the OS X DVD and install Leopard, or will her machine not recognize the ext. optical drive because it doesn't have an OS?
 

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