Mid-Late 2007 and Windows 10

[You_are_a_cunt]

Sooooooo, I picked up a mid/late 2007 Macbook (A1181, can't really remember actual release) that had its memory upped to 4 gigs.

It's currently running OS X 10.7.5, which is the latest officially supported version, which is where my issues begin.

I'm currently looking at a couple options:

use @Droidbot's recommendation to try mlPostFactor and install a newer version of OS X

OR

install 10.7.5 on a spare drive, wipe the drive already in the macbook and slap Windows 10 on it*

OR, and I'm not sure this would really work

keep 10.7.5 and install Windows 10 alongside.

 

Yes, I know it's a pretty old machine and the performance would be significantly lower compared to my main rig (it's essentially a 10 year gap worth of advancements and so on), but even after going in with little to no expectations, OS X feels, sluggish. Video playback is wonky in Chrome (using an older version, which may be the cause), switching between opened apps takes a good 5-7 seconds. I've been keeping an eye on the resource manager and, to my surprise, the resource consumption doesn't add up with the speed (or lack there of) of the OS.

Now, I still want to mess around with OS X, hence why I'd install it on a spare drive (if dual booting isn't an option)

 

I've done some light research, and, while it appears that it is possible to install Windows 10, the driver support is problematic to say the least. Most posts I've seen claim that BT, camera and sound don't work. Unfortunately I haven't actually seen any proper fixes. This would be a bit of a problem, since, if Win 10 works fine, I intend to spend a couple bucks on refurbishing the unit completely (I need a battery that keeps at least a 10 minute charge, since the charger is also wonky and I need to fix or replace it). A battery is about $35-40 locally, so it isn't exactly cheap, considering I paid $35 for the laptop itself. A charger is another $40 (!) so I'll go ahead and fix the one I have (I might look into replacing the charger with a non-apple one with the same specs that I would transplant the MagSafe cable onto).

One of the main reasons I want Windows on it is compatibility with the software I'll be using for school (which isn't available on either Linux or OS X and is completely in-house, created by students/teachers a few years ago). That, added with the lack of further support for 10.7.5 leave me in a bit of a strange situation.

 

So what are my options realistically?

 

@DrMacintosh? (you're obviously the resident Mac-head, maybe you have some ideas)

[AlTech]

6 minutes ago, revsilverspine said:

snip

You need to check what OS you can install using Bootcamp.

 

Afaik, machines older than around 2010 macs can't run Windows 10 bootcamp. They may be able to run Windows 8.1 through Bootcamp but anything newer may not work. I don't 100% know though.

 

But anyway, if it has 4GB RAM then you should at the very least be able to upgrade to OSX 10.11 El Capitan but that's about as far as it will go on the macOS side of things.

[You_are_a_cunt]

Just now, AluminiumTech said:

You need to check what OS you can install using Bootcamp.

 

Afaik, machines older than around 2010 macs can't run Windows 10 bootcamp. They may be able to run Windows 8.1 through Bootcamp but anything newer may not work. I don't 100% know though.

 

But anyway, if it has 4GB RAM then you should at the very least be able to upgrade to OSX 10.11 El Capitan but that's about as far as it will go on the macOS side of things.

There's dozens of guides for installing Windows 10 on this model (most I've seen wipe the drive clean and install Win10, whereas I want to dual boot in an ideal case, or somehow upgrade OS X and dual boot Win 10, WITHOUT bootcamp). Hell, if it works on the Core Duo, it'll work on the Core 2 Duo.

Theoretically bootcamp will let me install up to windows 7, but I have a strong suspicion it will try to shove x32 down my throat, which I won't go with since I'd be wasting a gig of ram. Once win 7 is installed I could just upgrade it to win10.

10.7.5 is the last version that officially supports tha A1181 with later versions having issues with the integrated GPU, of all things

[AlTech]

13 minutes ago, revsilverspine said:

snip

Ok. So i did some research and it looks like you can't install anything newer than Windows 7 using Bootcamp according to Apple.

 

 

[AlTech]

 

2 minutes ago, revsilverspine said:

Theoretically bootcamp will let me install up to windows 7, but I have a strong suspicion it will try to shove x32 down my throat, which I won't go with since I'd be wasting a gig of ram. Once win 7 is installed I could just upgrade it to win10.

But the 2007 models are 64 Bit capable due to using Core 2 Duos...... Unless I'm missing something.

2 minutes ago, revsilverspine said:

10.7.5 is the last version that officially supports tha A1181 with later versions having issues with the integrated GPU, of all things

k.

[Droidbot]

1 minute ago, AluminiumTech said:

 

But the 2007 models are 64 Bit capable due to using Core 2 Duos...... Unless I'm missing something.

k.

32bit EFI.

 

hence why it's stuck on 10.7.5, as that was the last version that supported 32bit officially.

MLPostFactor uses a early mountain lion beta kernel that supports both 32bit and 64bit EFI and kexts, allowing Lion kexts to be loaded

[You_are_a_cunt]

5 minutes ago, Droidbot said:

32bit EFI.

 

hence why it's stuck on 10.7.5, as that was the last version that supported 32bit officially.

MLPostFactor uses a early mountain lion beta kernel that supports both 32bit and 64bit EFI and kexts, allowing Lion kexts to be loaded

So even if I use MLPostFactor I'd be stuck on Mountain Lion, right?

[DrMacintosh]

@AluminiumTech Is right, Apple does not support anything prior to Windows 7 anymore and your 07 machine is too old to do it now. 
 

You should check out the other suggestions here in this thread to see if you can get an install going outside of the first party methods. 

[You_are_a_cunt]

Tl;dr of status updates:

 

Tried  bootcamp, keyboard becomes unresponsive when trying to boot 8.1 x64. Will try with win 7 and win 8.1 x32.

 

Managed to install rEFIt but I didn't have the energy to do much last night. will continue trying over the weekend.

I might give MLPostFactor too and see if that lets me install x64 somehow

[noahdvs]

What software do you need for school?

[You_are_a_cunt]

Just now, noahdvs said:

What software do you need for school?

It's in-house, made by the students and/or professors