Possible to install Vista (only) on a Mac??

Hello, my friend recently puchased a new macbook (the black one) much against my protest because well I don't like Macs. However he doesn't like OS X and because I'm somewhat computer saavy he asked if it were possible to have only Vista installed on his Mac book and totally wipe it of OS X. I honestly have no idea if this is possible as I am not a Mac user, does anyone know for sure?

He just wants to wipe it clean and have Vista as the primary and only operating system. I told him to get a PC for this reason but he was an obsessed zombie with the Mac's books style. Can anyone help? Thanks...

 

Not really. You'd have to use BootCamp and basically make the OSX partition nothing. Macs use an EFI, rather than a BIOS, and Vista doesn't really work with that. Why doesn't he like OSX? What exactly was he expecting? He should give it a week of really using it, and then see what he thinks. It's not Windows, and if you try to think of it like Windows, it will not work for you. He needs to be willing to wipe his "knowledge" of computers mostly clean to start understanding it.

 

Honestly, I'd ask why he bought a MacBook if he's not going to even use OSX. There are much cheaper notebooks out there that can do what a MacBook does for the price. Aesthetics of a notebook shouldn't have THAT much influence!

 

The only reason he bought a Macbook was because he liked the looks of it and the screen. I told him that OS X was something unlike Vista/XP and it would take time to get used to it. After two weeks he wants me to install Vista on it, I guess I will have to try and figure out the bootcamp thing. Thanks for the replies.

 

The easiest way is use Boot Camp and take the OS X partition to the minimum which I believe is 5 GB. The only other problem is that Vista is not actually supported by Boot Camp yet, and may not be until the release of Leopard, which could be as late as June, or even later. So a little trickery would be required to Vista installed and then not all the drivers will work. I do not know which ones or how many, but expect hiccups. XP would be much more seamless. The only other thing is that the Boot Camp beta will expire when Leopard is released. At that point your friend will either have to purchase Leopard or buy Boot Camp separately for Tiger. I believe Apple will be charging $30 or so.

But if I were you, I would encourage your friend to give OS X one more shot. Tell him to take a fresh approach and recognize it is different that Windows. I suspect if he really gives it an honest shot and is willing to adapt he will find OS X to be quite good.

 

Alright, thanks for the information cash, that was extremely helpful

 

Yeah. I don't see any harm in leaving the OS X partition there, even if he shrinks it to be a small part of the overall hard drive. You can even set Windows to be the startup disk, so he would only switch to OS X when he likes to.

I agree with cash, it's worth spending some time in OS X and getting to know it better; as long as he has a MacBook, it's worth giving it a shot.

Frankly I would say if he ultimately dislikes OS X, he really should resell the MacBook and just get a PC laptop with Vista preinstalled, frankly. The cost of a MacBook plus the cost of a Vista license really doesn't make much sense if you're not even going to be using OS X.

 

Agreed. The Macbook is a great machine, even for the price. But add in the Vista price, and it's just not worth it if you're not going to use OS X.

 

Wait, so can Vista be installed via Boot Camp, or do I need to install XP and then partition the XP Partition and install Vista on that? (triple boot??!) I don't want to use OSX only, dear god that might kill me.... I don't mind learning it, but still....XP is good enough though, I suppose.

 

Not sure where you got the idea that you would need to tripleboot. I'm pretty sure you can just do a straight install of Vista (not sure though, haven't tried it myself).

 

No Vista is not officially supported. You can get it installed, I am sure you could just do an upgrade on top of XP, but I do not believe all of the drivers work yet. I am sure Vista support is imminent, but for now it is sketchy.

 

Here's a guide to installing the final version of Vista on Boot Camp:

http://www.geocities.com/nja469/

Presumably the final version of Boot Camp included with Leopard will have proper Vista support.

 

I totally agree. Why bother wasting your time with M$ Vista when you have OS X? However, if you are really desparate for Vista, then there is always zadillo's instructions...

Good find, here.

 

The drivers for the macbooks and Vista are not theat great. He may want to use XP.