Macbook Pro Kernel Panic at startup

I bought a Macbook Pro (Late 2006, 10.4.11 Tiger) from someone a few years ago, and it worked fine until now. Two days ago, I was foolishly tinkering around with the Disc Utility, and I used the restore feature to 'restore' a .dmg file into my hard drive without checking the erase destination (so my OS 10.4 is still in there, I think?). I thought nothing of it, and shut down my macbook. It froze at a blank desktop and I turned it off by holding the power button.

Now whenever I turn it on, I get the screen with the apple logo and a warning message, in several different languages, telling me to force restart it. Over and over again.

I tried doing a File System Check by booting into single user mode, however, when it gets to the part where I'm suppose to type something, it won't respond to anything I type (I tried to type /sbin/fsck -f, but nothing appeared).

I don't have anything of value on my HDD, and would like to do a clean wipe, either to factory settings, or perhaps wiping the hdd completely empty. However, I lack the original Tiger Installation disks. I was thinking of buying the 10.6 Snow Leopard (is this it?) to just reinstall everything to factory settings, would that work? I was also wondering why the OS 10.6 Snow Leopard is so much cheaper compared to other OS systems, such as Leopard, Tiger, or Snow Leopard Server.

Thanks for any help, I really appreciate it. I would love to have my Mac up and running soon.

Yes that one will work.

It is so cheap because Apple has placed it's users on the honor system.

The $30 version is designed to be an upgrade for those that have Leopard already and is specified as such in it's EULA.

The only upgrade path Apple has put out for those still using Tiger is the Box Set that includes Snow Leopard, iLife '09 and iWork '09. It was $170 originally - here it is at Amazon for $133 and have seen it as low as $130. Still a great bargain for what you're getting.

Apple has included a "do not steal OS X" kext in Snow Leopard. Personally, I think they're using it to keep track of whether they can continue "trusting" their customer base or if they will, like others, have to implement some form of activation for their OS to prevent piracy.

All I can say, let your conscience be your guide.

$133 is a bit too expensive for me. So the $30 work..? You mentioned it will work, but also stated that it's designed for a Leopard -> Snow Leopard upgrade, while I have Tiger as my OS on this MBP. Also, if I wipe my HDD clean and pop in an installation disk (assuming something like that is possible), how will the disk know what previous OS I had?

I'm mostly a Windows user, so I'm not too good with Macs; my Macbook is my one and only laptop which I use to take notes in classes (hence why I don't mind restoring, as I have nothing of value saved in the hdd).

I'm also curious, what type of kernel panic/problem am I facing? I've searched the web and most people seem to have issues w/ their RAM and running single user mode works for them.

EDIT: after researching some more, I understand what you're saying. If Apple left a way for a direct Tiger to Snow Leopard using the $30 disk, I would gladly take $30 over $130, especially since I only use my Mac to type notes. I'm concerned though, with whether it will resolve my problem once and for all. I'm fearing the worst, which would be popping the 10.6 disk in, holding C, and still getting the "restart" message.