Ode to a Macbook - Why the First Macbook is an Incredible Value for Enthusiasts + RAM & SSD Upgrade

[@paulmuaddib451]

My wife and I walked into an Apple Store in 2006 and walked out with an iMac "G5" (Intel) and that very Macbook. We still use those machines, from time to time, even now. They were and are wonderful.

[@casperes0912]

Wha? The G5 was a PowerPC processor. When you say G5 (Intel) you may just be referring to the same white plastic chassis the last PPC iMac had but with Intel?

[@paulmuaddib451]

@@casperes0912 Yes. Apple still used the "G5" language even though it wasn't a G5, hence my quotes and (Intel) in parentheses. 😉

[@sonant_bwolfe]

​@@paulmuaddib451 I don't think you're remembering that correctly. You're talking about a first generation 'mac pro'. It was in a case that was almost identical to a g5 case though.

[@douglasrogers4675]

@@sonant_bwolfe the 1st gen Mac Pro gad a case that looked very similar to the powermac g5. the first intel iMac had a case that looked similar to a iMag G5. many of the early intel machines looked like their PPC predecessors.

[@defiantDreemurr]

@@douglasrogers4675 case in point these macbooks look very similar to a bigger, widescreen ibook g4

[@MightyJabbasCollection]

If you get an Edimax EW-7811Un USB adapter, you can connect a Mac running Tiger to a modern Wi-Fi router (amazingly the company still has the Tiger-compatible software available for download). This will allow you to get the Clamshell iBook and Titanium PowerBook online, but unfortunately I haven't found a solution for Mac OS 9, short of turning off encryption entirely, which is obviously not a great choice. These adapters are like $14 on eBay.

[@ActionRetro]

Woah thanks for the tip! I also just got the clamshell battery you recommended :)

[@AttilaSVK]

When I want to hook up an old computer to my (2.4 GHz 802.11n) wifi, I use a MikroTik mAP lite as a wifi to Ethernet bridge. It's powered via USB, so if the computer has a USB port, then it can also power this little router/AP/client. Sometimes the hAP lite or hAP mini can be had for cheaper, but they are much less compact, but still powered via USB.

[@evibes512]

A bit clunky but easy solution with older macs that have ethernet is a Vonets adapter. It bridges wifi to an ethernet port and is USB powered. Once you configure the Vonets in a browser for wifi it's easy to move from one machine to another and just plug in ethernet and go. These adapters also work great on any device with no wifi or old wifi like Tivos, etc.

[@gamagama69]

couldnt you just use ethernet?

[@MightyJabbasCollection]

@@gamagama69 Obviously you could, but then it’s wired. Not ideal for a portable -especially the one that introduced wi-fi in portable computers

[@Cyber_Horse_Studios87]

The MacBook Classic is definitely a machine worth investing upgrades Into. I have a 2008 model and I really love it. Especially with a fresh battery, extra ram, and SSD’s.

When I was in school, my uncle used to have one, he was an architect, I was fascinated by Macs thanks to this and the first iMac, nowadays however as an engineer, software I use makes it incompatible with using a Mac as my main computer.

[@iphonepunker]

When I was a Apple technician we would race each other on how fast we can replace the clamshell and bottom case on a 2009 and 2010 MacBook unibody, my fastest time with a Macbook that passed clamshell alignment check was 6:43sec and we would have to pop the display out of the clamshell to fix the cracks. I did have the black version of this MacBook I totally regret selling it back in the day.

[@DJShawnyD]

I always wanted a BlackBook and remember back in the day there being a strong aftermarket of full case mods to change the color to whatever you wanted including black if you couldn’t afford the OEM finish. Good times.

[@TheiTunesFanboy]

I have one of those, but the early 2009 version. It was my first Mac, that I got back in 2016. The 2008-2009 MacBooks can go up to MacOS El Capitan officially.

[@paulwilliams4274]

Macbook 5,2 here (mid-2009): 2.13Ghz, 240GB SSD and 6GB of RAM. I am currently running El Capitan on it. I did experiment with Catalina on it, but it was just too slow. Love my 5,2!

[@ActionRetro]

Aw man I'm so jealous!

[@paulwilliams4274]

@@ActionRetro it was my first Mac and I probably spent too much on it. Macbook + 4GB RAM upgrade (to get to 6GB) + 240GB SSD...I easily have ~$260 invested in it, which is WAY more than it's worth! Still, it was my introduction into the world of Macs and it will always have a special place in my heart. I still use it here and there when I want to change things up as to what I'm using that day.

[@ActionRetro]

@@paulwilliams4274 Oh wow, how much did that 4GB stick cost? I couldn't find one under $50.

[@paulwilliams4274]

@@ActionRetro I probably spent $50-$60 on that 4GB stick at the time. Like I said, I spent WAY to much money on that Macbook!

[@c.graham8304]

That’s great! I never knew El Capitan and Catalina can be installed on it since Apple says the oldest model for Catalina is 2012 models. By the way did you downgrade back to El Capitan from Catalina?

[@thelovertunisia]

This exactly the model I still use today with Lubuntu 20.04. works just fine, though a bit slow admittedly.

[@diegomillan2806]

Maybe you need to take a try of antix Linux. Is incredibly fast for this kind of hardware

[@thelovertunisia]

@@diegomillan2806 Antix is it a full distro with a full Desktop environment?

[@diegomillan2806]

@@thelovertunisia it is a distro, but lacks of desktop enviroment. instead of use a DE only use a window manager very capable of supply this which is icewm

[@SyphistPrime]

The reason it works so well is because Linux users actually care about good performance on older systems. Not to mention older Macs are popular for Linux users and are fairly standard so it makes targeting a large number of computers easy with the limited configurations they had. Dual and Quad core Intel above 2GHz is still very viable with an SSD and Linux.

[@mycomputergl0wsblu]

This was the first Mac I ever had. I saved up for 3 years for it when I was younger. When it finally arrived I remember jumping up and down in excitement when the Tiger intro video came on. I loved that laptop and remember being so passionate about it. First time I was ever truly passionate about any electronic devices. Never experienced such a reliable and consistent computer. I ran Windows XP on the damn thing and it ran it beautifully. No laptop on the planet at the time looked so beautiful, so reliable and had great battery life. MagSafe was amazing as well. Because of that laptop it has been extremely difficult to ever have anything other than an Apple Laptop after. Got the first MacBook Air when it came out and have purchased every single generation of 15 inch MBP made since 2010. Today I am typing this on my 16 MBP, and am quite skeptical of the ARM transition as you said you were when the Intel switch was made. Fingers crossed, Apple usually comes through.

[@kaitlyn__L]

I had a similar experience! Though I bought mine second-hand for half the price when it was a year old, which also included the prior owner’s Office and CS2 licenses on it. So that was great value! I did so much photo and video editing on that thing. Eventually it started kernel panicking after an hour, and it was still under AppleCare so it got replaced with the first aluminium 13" MBP. With hindsight I expect I’d just dried-out the thermal paste, what with all those 12-hour video renders. But I don’t think the Genius Bar tried that, though I wasn’t privy to the full diagnostic details. At the time I was glad for the upgrade, but with hindsight I wish I still had that white MacBook!

[@kippie80]

The ARM transition is sound. It is smooth too thanks to NeXt tech of Fat Binaries. Wierd how they hide that truth now. Arm brings it in synch with RiscOS and is a more sensible home. Elegance. x86 is shit with near and far pointers and complex instruction set

[@CharlesBluTheXPicturesInc]

Planing To Upgrade Your 1st Gen White Poly MacBook To A Mid-2009 Model: This Applies For Mid-2006 To Early-2009 Versions!

[@atarixle]

well I got all of them: 1,1 2,1 3,1 4,1 and four times the 5,2 (three 2.13 GHz). but as time goes by I am becoming more a MacBook Pro user more and more. when using the A1181, then it is not the 2,4 GHz black MacBook4,1 but the older, me-as-the-first-owner-32-Bit MacBook1,1 1.83 GHz model running SL and Debian 10. Loving it!

[@TheAlphaWoomy]

I had this exact model as well, traded with some guy on Craigslist in 2009 an original Xbox 360 model for it. It was claimed “broken” but just need the OS reinstalled and I was up and running. I later found out the case plastics were covered under an extended Apple warranty and has the case replaced free of charge. I put some cheap ram in and sold it for $1200. Awesome little laptop when I had it.

[@theadrislt5547]

i got the same one without hardrive with dead battery for 5€ untested

[@jameswaters5133]

I just bought one on a whim for £20. Thing is, with an SSD and a clean El Capitan install, it's a very useable machine, and looks SO cool. I really didn't expect it to be a perfectly acceptable daily driver for work / office tasks, but it is. Just ordered 2 x 2GB RAM sticks for it to give it a little more room, but it's no slouch even on 2GB. Something about being able to take the battery off and press the charge indicator button for the lights is amazing. My current favourite MacBook.

[@cassadagaa]

I have one of these, but it is the last revision of this particular model, which has the NVIDIA 9400M graphics, which I find incredibly useful as you can basically run up to Catalina and still have the ability to have a retro mac experience with installing an older version on a separate partition or drive. It's still an incredibly useful machine!

[@floogulinc]

This is the exact model I had, so many memories.

[@MaxOakland]

I have one of these. The Core2Duo one. It’s in horrible shape with tons of cracked plastic and runs snow leopard and is painfully slow. Also my CD drive doesn’t work either! I wonder why I’ve upgraded the RAM and hard drive. I wish modern Mac laptops were this good at upgrading. It was such an amazing design in that way

[@eribetra]

This is the exact model I have, 4,1 Early 2008. The polycarbonate case is beautiful and the keyboard is a joy to type on! I use it with Snow Leopard as well as Zorin OS 15.3 Lite and it works like a charm, although it definitely needs an SSD and more RAM.

[@ahscott2001]

Apple now: wanna upgrade your ram? Too bad. Apple 15 years ago: wanna upgrade your ram? Here’s 3 easy steps.

[@papasivir4241]

Yeah it's crazy! Different company all together. Having those little levers to just pop the ram out is the coolest thing I've ever seen.

[@gparyani]

These computers are actually capable of running with 8 GB of RAM, with two 4 GB modules, and not only 6 GB. The reason you see many pages quote 6 GB as the max is because the versions of Mac OS X that were out at the time these were released contained a bug with memory addressing. That bug was actually fixed in Snow Leopard version 10.6.6, so as long as you're running that or a later version, it will work with 8 GB. (I have a white MacBook Early 2009 model running 10.6.8 with 8 GB RAM equipped and it works just fine.)

[@ActionRetro]

Thanks for this!!

[@stratomaster891]

This was my first mac. Used it from 2008 all the way through undergrad (2016). I kept it running snow leopard because lion really chugged on this thing. I remember some other kids in college would look at me kind of funny because at that point the laptop looked super old compared to the unibody cases at the time. Still have it and it runs great, but it's far to slow to be of any value to me. All of my retro macs are pre powerpc so it doesn't really work as a bridge but it's good to keep in mind! Back in the day the 4gb ram expansion and hard drive upgrades were an absolute must. My 2008 4,1 model came with 2gb of memory and a 160gb hard drive which barely cut it even back then if I'm being honest.

[@liverpoodlian]

One of the best deals i've ever gotten was one of these in Black, my 2006 1,1 Black MacBook running Tiger and Leopard, got it for £25 without the battery.

[@onigvd77]

I used to have one, need up trading/selling it with my sister in-law, and got a PowerBook G4 12 inch. the plastic cracking happened to me too, would prefer the unibody version, but lack of FW port sucks. But one day might get one anyway.

[@defiantDreemurr]

i just picked one of these up a few months ago for a great price and threw an SSD in it to use primarily to hold my ipod classic’s library but also as a nostalgia thing because these would have been the current consumer mac laptop back when i first was exposed to macs as a kid. leopard and snow leopard were my first exposure to using a mac even though i never actually got to own one, i remember always being impressed by how cool those late 2000s macs were and having a computer that ran snow leopard has been a childhood dream of mine ever since. after i picked mine up tho i started realizing how much more useful it was than i’d expected for interfacing with my older macs. it’s unexpectedly become super important as a bridge between my M1 macbook and my powerPC macs. i’m glad to see a video about my new favorite macbook, thanks for making this

[@douglasrogers4675]

the early 2009 macbooks (same case style, and still have firewire) can actually run El Capitan officially, and can be patched to run Catalina.

[@ps5hasnogames55]

yup cuz they have the same internals as the unibody 2008 macbook!

[@douglasrogers4675]

@@ps5hasnogames55 there are a few differences though. the unibody one takes DDR3 ram, and the plastic one takes DDR2. it actually makes a pretty big difference if you want to upgrade to 8gb of ram, because 4gb ddr2 sticks are really expensive.

[@ARBackal]

Was luckily enough that our school used only Macs, being in 6-7-8th grade this was a game changing device. Such a great looking unit

[@crystalchaos462]

I had this same model. You could boot into Snow Leopard and use Rosetta to run PPC apps, any Mac OS X from Leopard up to El Capitan (officially), and any Windows from XP to Windows 10 Pro, as well as Linux Distros like the Ubuntu shown here, I soec'd out the RAM to 4GB at purchase as well as the 300GB HDD and was able to run this machine from 2008-2015 by only adding an SSD. The 9400M graphics chip in this machine also regularly got driver updates in Windows for what seemed the entirety of it's life. This truly was a do-it-all computer. It suffered from bad screen issues though and the batteries often turned into spicy pillows. I ended up removing its bad battery and hooking it to a TV via the mini DVI out on it. This was also the first machine that every time I went under the hood, I had leftover screws of varying sizes. I have no idea where they belonged and it still seemed to hold together just fine 😅😂🤣

[@iiiiiifggffggffgfgfg]

I had a 2007 model. Great machine but the hard drive died twice and the case had this annoying cracking issue where the top tabs would eventually cause the bottom bits below the keyboard to crack. Everybody I knew who had one for a few years had this and Apple gave a few free replacements but seems like they never fixed the issue until they later resigned the case.

[@brokenelectronics3665]

This is a cool concept. Of course, I am the guy with two 5,1 Mac Pros, which do have FireWire, and can use FW target disk mode. But the cool thing about your plan is the portability of the laptop. I usually use my PowerBook for target disk mode, but I can see the value in having an Intel. I've got a Pismo coining, which does have FireWire, and can boot into OS9, that might be handy as well.

[@ActionRetro]

Aw man I love a Pismo!

[@kaitlyn__L]

Oh crap, those are the exact specs mine had, albeit with a SuperDrive instead of a combo drive. I pushed that thing way harder than that hardware wants to go. For instance, 6-12 hour SD render times in FCP7! It did it all like a champ though - well until it died anyway. (Which got replaced under the extended warranty!)

[@JessicaFEREM]

The core 2 duo is still such a powerhouse, because even today, all you'd need is to replace the HDD with an SSD and it'd be perfect as a machine to give to people who just browse the web or basic online stuff.

[@alonebysunset]

hey! I got a MacBook 4,1 as well! I'm sure you have a near limitless supply of macs... but I bought mine for $15 in "for parts or repair" condition. all it was was a password that had been forgotten. what a steal!

[@miguimau]

I find my 2016 C2D MBP a great value as well. It has FW800 and it´s of course back compatible to 400 with a simple adapter. Believe or not, I´m still using it. It flies with an SSD and Snow Leopard. The whitey Macbook had a special charm, though. Pretty good darn thing.

[@miguimau]

And easier to upgrade than the Pro is.

[@miket.220]

I got the second version of this, the Core2Duo 2007 version, brand new in 2007. Used it for many years, it was a great computer.

[@andysunley]

I have this model. I put a 256gb ssd in it with a 1Tb hd in the optical bay. It is really fast!

[@andysunley]

@Imix Muan I think it was this one. www.thebookyard.com/product.php?products_id=7092

[@darknation242]

If you like Ubuntu on an older Mac, I would suggest doing what I did with my early 2007 MacBookPro and try installing Peppermint. It's Debian/Ubuntu based with a custom XFCE DE. On my machine without anything loaded it idles at about 384 MB of RAM usage.

[@kathrynradonich3982]

Just curious why not run the latest intel build of tenfourfox? My daily is a Mac Pro running lion and a newer Ubuntu mate release so just kinda curious

[@juanKme]

I have owned both 2009 and 2011 polycarbonate MacBooks and I think that the Unibody (7,1) is quite better option because it can run with up to 16GB of RAM and with a SSD upgrade, it holds up great even now!

[@transitengineer]

This was a great informational video and, I too was very upset when apple made the transition from PowerPC processors to Intel. However, Macbook models never appealed to me the way earlier ibook models had done. During this time period my collection has a MacBook Pro 15 inch laptop with both a Fire-wire 400 port and a Fire-wire 800 port. Once, I have replaced the Hard Drive with a large SSD will add several partitions including some for a few none OS X operating systems. Thank you, for giving me the idea to include the installation of a modern version of Linux.

[@Makatosh]

I managed to get a MacBook 1.1 for pennies locally and I use it a lot. Good for hobbyists

[@snake-v9t]

Thanks for this great video. It inspired me to pick up a nice condition 2008 one for $80 CAD today. Just added a 240gb SSD, I am going to set it up with recovery/software partitions like you have.

[@RamtheCowy]

man I wish you could find these anymore. I feel like people see them as ewaste and just junked them, there's literally like 4 on eBay right now 😔

[@matthewjbauer1990]

I left with my Dad when I upgraded to a Lenovo laptop, a 1st gen Intel Macbook from 2005. It was nicknamed the Apple Crackbook because the palm rest cracked at the corners. I ended up getting a blue cover shell and keyboard/palm rest cover (also blue). I was someone at the time who used desktops at home exclusively and laptops exclusively at school or on the go. So... I also had the last Mac Mini c2d with an optical drive. I still use the Mac Mini from time to time, but it has been retired in favor of my maxed out 2012 Mac Pro (when I need to do Mac stuff).

[@christiangomez2496]

Currently picked one up in decent shape minus the battery for use as a DVD player

[@TJK152]

I own a Macbook 5,2 with the maxed out 6 GB RAM and 240 GB SSD with macOS Big Sur. It runs well like a modern mac.

[@federicosnobohm7468]

You can install Mac OSX el capitan on that macbook, i have installed el capitan on my macbook 4.1 and all is working pretty fine.

[@VikingDudee]

Well im not huge mac guy, power PC was starting to get long in the tooth for performance anyway with marginal improvements where Intel and AMD were just making impressive jumps, probably was for the best considering how IBM was doing around that time. They switch to ARM so they may get interesting again in their own way.

[@wskinnyodden]

Hah, I have 2 iBooks G4 (one sort of half dead for spares), but I am running MorphOS on it which kicks butt! And yes I did pay to have the full version of the OS without the nasty 30 minutes speed throttling. This thing is fast as crap on this system!

[@HuntersMoon78]

I do have one of those Core 2 Duo Macbook's, Also iBook G4 and a Powerbook G4 Titanium

[@FireStriker_]

I bought a MacBook 5,2 this year

[@OptimusMonk01]

Cracking wrist rest always went wrong. Also my first one had the random power off fault.

[@lifetimesofamultiplemediam1003]

Still got my 2007 white MacBook that I've had since new. Recently upgraded it to Lion, and it moves too slow for me now. Might try putting in an SSD, and seeing what that does. Old girl just goes and goes…

[@basedanetto]

Got a lot of 4 of these for trading a Mac mini. One was a 2009 unibody model while the rest were 07. Sold the 09 one and kept at least 1 of the 07 models for messing around.

[@alphastudios0906]

I have a custom black 09 model with extra ram and a ssd running a patched version of monterey

[@benyhhill]

i managed to get windows 10 install and its running pretty well for its age youtube work and got everything to work sound and open gl 1.2 wite a modded driver

[@williamlafrance2514]

Nice video mate, also, this particular version of the macbook is able to boot Tiger ! Got myself a blackbook from the same year and it's a looker...

[@thekillerpl6824]

It can be upgraded to OS X 10.8.5, my late 2006 black MacBook was faster on 10.8 than on 10.7 (yes, graphics acceleration works without any problems)

[@electriccomics]

I have the same model, I dual boot Snow Leopard and XP, I mainly use it for older games/software and to burn DVD's from ISO's over the network as my PC has no drive. I have an external but why hook it up when I can just grab my old mac.

[@mustangrt8866]

I use mine with freeBSD and it's not slow at all, mint condition black 4,1 mb

[@xalataf3365]

I still use a 2,1 MacBook on Leopard just because it has Freehand MX. And because I really love the keyboard.

[@ScarlettStunningSpace]

I have a MacBook 2,1. I put 4GB of RAM and a 128GB SSD in it, although I wish it was the newest and fastest one of that generation. It still works great for tinkering in OS X, 32bit Windows, and I found 64bit linux distros converted to work with a 32bit EFI so I'm currently running Linux Mint 20. A little slow but it's usable. Mine's in a lot worse shape and it has all the common signs of wear that you talk about. The battery is toast though which I'm bummed about, though it didn't really work in the first place.

[@Magnetik_moto]

A1181 is really better than I expected. After buying it few months ago for 100 PLN (something like $20) I was surprised that it can connect to 5 GHz wifi and how usable it is in general (keeping in mind that it's a 14 years old laptop). It's kinda sad that it can't officially run more recent versions of Mac OS, but it works well with Ubuntu Linux, so dual boot seems to be a good option. BTW what is FireWire really used for besides connecting old Macs to old-but-a-bit-newer Macs? I've never seen a device that connects to this port here in Poland, even as someone who always had a lot of computer parts laying around.

[@Johanniscool]

Cool! Good use case for my white MacBook. Although when you called it a bridge Mac I was hoping it could AppleTalk to my gen 1 PowerBooks.

[@brydon10]

Mine doesn't turn on anymore unfortunately. Bought it new back in the day.

[@ThatWhiteHand]

I have the Core Duo one. It supports Debian, but I'm unsure for how much longer Debian will work on 32 bit machines. It isn't my main machine, but it still is sad to me knowing it doesn't have much time left.

[@brokenelectronics3665]

Just thinking out loud here, would Piker's mod allow you to get El Capitan on this machine? I've only done it on a 1,1 Mac Pro, but El Cap is still a very functional operating system today, whereas Lion is really showing it's age.

[@ActionRetro]

I actually did put Catalina on here for a minute, but graphics acceleration didn't work so it wasn't really usable. From what I've read this is a tough problem to fix on most of the newer macOS versions with this MacBook. I tried a few video drivers I found on the web, but nothing worked for me.

[@brokenelectronics3665]

Action Retro , Ah, yes, that is a known issue for them.Still, El Cap might be okay, but Sierra and higher would likely be an issue.

[@ActionRetro]

I'll have to give El Cap a try!

[@andersn1989]

@@ActionRetro El Cap works fine performance wise on the MacBook 4,1, 3,1 and 2,1 (have tested them myself with an SSD and 3-4 GB of RAM). The only major issue with it (and Yosemite) is the lack of sleep. So you have to turn it on and off unless you want to keep it running 24/7, which makes it pretty annoying to use as a laptop when it runs on battery power :-)

[@douglasrogers4675]

I have one of these 4,1 macbook, and I managed to run El Cap with the RMC patcher. it says that Catalina works, but I never had any success.

[@cherkas009]

I got a brand new top case from Apple many years ago and I've kept it nice

[@Neksus-M06]

Yes, but it's rather noisy. The fan spins quite fast and after a while it gets annoying. Otherwise it's a good retroMac. Wifi works perfectly. OS goes up to 10.7, and I don't remember existing any workaround unless playing with kexts and having all sorts of issues (missing something like audio, camera...) to put 10.12 on it. 10.8 to 10.11 need MLPostFactor. Style wise I love it a lot, but a mid-2010 is a very good choice.

[@ewanmacquire-plows7095]

The Core 2 duo models were 64bit and actually supported up to el capitan (2009 and 2009 i think)

[@kennymann3705]

My Macbook 3,1 running Mint 18 has serious problems with heat -- the firmware halts the processor when things quickly get hot (like using GIMP, Firefox and a stuffed image database app simultaneously). But yeah, otherwise great at all the things you say. This Macbook and my Pismo are firewire bro and sis -- each can be the target to the other (and my SE/30 visits over ethernet all the time). Big external USB drives make ancient files available to my other, up-to-date, machines. Legacy apps and files from over 30 years of Apple-ing are always ready/handy and OS maintenance is always available to keep each other stable. (Can't decide between 10.6.8 and 10.7.5, so I have a drive with each. Run one for a month and then I get tempted to run the other.)

[@bramvandenbroeck5060]

This macbook can run up to 10.8.5 with mlpostfacto, and with that os, you get an itunes version, which can talk to an iphone 5s and 6. I have the black version of the exact same macbook, it runs great, with the spiderweb browser on there its a very capable machine.

[@MichaelJ023]

Nice video. I use my 2011 MacBook Pro with target disk mode using a FireWire 400 to 800 cable. Works great.

[@ActionRetro]

Oh nice, target disk mode is awesome.

[@TJK152]

You can use MacPostFactor to run up to el capitan on them.

[@georgesenda1952]

Could you put what year these computers are in the description please. Many may not know when these computers were released. I can’t remember & would have to look it up on Mac Tracker or look in one of my dozens of Mac books going back to system 7.

[@chrislopez1391]

this is a 2008 model in the video.

[@DavidStahlOLDHAPPyMACs]

Nice Video Good Info

[@logiconlyzone]

Put some kinda rubbery something or felt or something on that contact area.

[@SchioAlves]

The Mid '12 MBP still have FireWire, it only requires an 800 to 400 adapter

[@knghtbrd]

I have a 2012 MBP with Firewire 800 … it's so weird to have that feature, but incredibly useful.

[@lepidotos]

1,1 and 2,1 can be librebooted, so they're cheap choices to get into free computing.

[@aaronburns2858]

I actually have an 09 poly with the Nvidia 256mb graphics that I put a 128 ssd and the 6gb of ram that I used for a media/music notebook for a long time currently has 10.11 El Capitan on it

[@photolabguy]

New subscriber here! Great content! I have been binge watching your videos. Just was curious what your thoughts are about Apple transitioning away from Intel to their own processors.

[@ActionRetro]

Thank you so much, that really means a lot! I'm honestly excited about the transition. I remember back when Apple switched from PowerPC to Intel, it really felt like Apple was losing something that made it special... even though Intel processors were objectively better in every way and it was definitely the right move. Now it feels like we're getting that special "different-ness" of architecture back, while also getting power, performance and efficiency that Intel can't match.

[@kathrynradonich3982]

Action Retro that’s about how I feel about it too. I was really upset when they announced the switch to intel as I had just acquired a dual G5 tower. Kept that around forever before finally replacing it with a first gen Mac Pro

[@NepgearGM6.1]

How much is a screen for a early 2008 MacBook

[@nattankress]

I want a "retro" mac with firewire for my iPod shenanigans and to store my music library, I really want a G4 powerbook for nostalgia reasons but those are IDE and probably won't like a big SSD I might get one of this

[@GarthBuxton]

I have Ubuntu Mate running really well. However the track pad's cursor moves around alot.

[@ambirbtruckdriver]

I need to dig up another Penryn example. Mine has the T series and dude, it does not like… anything.

[@TheDrag0n.]

I use this beast for live performances and for live djing 🔥🐲🤘

[@alemail]

My only apple computer was an ibook with PowerPC, it was beautiful and.. that's it, after the second time the motherboard failed and the warranty was no longer available I smashed it against the wall out of pure frustration. OSX was really sluggish but Linux was quite nice on it TBH.

[@caviar_dreamz]

Got two of these in an auction for $70 untested and they both ended up booting so the gamble paid off. I plan dual booting and getting my Linux cert on the nicer one.

[@thelovertunisia]

Shockingly linux works even better than Leopard that came with it and the fonts look so much more crisp.

[@a.lawrence4969]

Here's the deal. Linux, 4gb ram and a SSD are all you need. If you want a Linux distro with a more MacOS feel try Peach OS or Elementary or use the theme packs to make Ubuntu look like MacOS.

[@l1oicgameplays394]

I have the black model ( the black model is the rarest and is the top model)

[@lionatwork8763]

They went out of their way to help you upgrade your macbook. Today they go out their way to prevent you from upgrading.

[@Johanniscool]

Is it feasible to have a bootable Linux partition like your Tiger one? Or does Linux need specialised drivers for each machine it’s installed on?

[@super_slav91]

Ill stick with my beloved ibook g4.

[@MaxOakland]

cute!

[@ewanmacquire-plows7095]

it was my first mac I have ever owned, sadly it died the other day after a few months of not using it and the 9400m gpu or the display has died

[@NormanF62]

The white MacBooks can run Catalina. They can’t be upgraded to Big Sur because they have non metal GPUs and they’re well past the cut off date for Apple support for their new operating system. When you stop to think about it, its amazing that Apple has supported them for as long as it did but alas, all good things must come to an end.

[@RetroReviewYT]

I have a 2,1 MacBook myself.

[@ActionRetro]

Nice! My girlfriend at the time got the MacBook 1,1 when it first came out, and I remember being super snobby about my PowerPC Powerbook while secretly being jealous.

[@PantusiaGaming]

only white macbooks released after 2009 and mac minis with ddr3 ram or above supports later macOS releases than 10.7!

[@PantusiaGaming]

you did have a Mac Mini G4 but with both intel core 2 duo and DDR3 RAM

[@PantusiaGaming]

OS X 10.11 is the final version to support Macs that still have firewire 400, the Macs that they did not have DDR3 RAM yet, and the first Macs to have DDR3 RAM (pre-2010)

[@JessicaFEREM]

yeah i can definately tell that gnome is now trying to be as lightweight as possible and i can't wait for them to do it because i cannot use gnome if it's gonna run at 20FPS

[@NicksLocker]

How have you found your driver's for Linux on this machine? The one and only issue I have been having is the trackpad is unstable and really shaky for me otherwise its renewed