Replacing OS X with Windows/Linux on aging Mac

Solution 1:

Do you have the original install disks for Mac OS X? If so, there shouldn't be any issues with wiping the Mac partition completely off the hdd.

However, if you don't have those disks, I would strongly recommend keeping the Mac OS X install and creating a new partition (shrinking the Mac partition) for the new OS. Mainly because if something goes wrong (or if you don't like either alternative) it's much easier to recover a MacBook using the Mac OS. I think you can get away with 5-10GB for the Snow Leopard partition.

If you have the original install disks, you shouldn't have an issue with restoring it.

Linux will take some tinkering to get working properly. I had a particularly rough time getting wifi to work in Ubuntu 12.blah on an older MacBook Pro. Plus side: With a laptop that old, there should be a decent amount of documentation for making your hardware work with Linux. I'd stick with Ubuntu if you like fancy, or Linux Mint if you like simple. Windows 7 (if installed through Bootcamp) works pretty well without much hassle.

Solution 2:

Echoing the "backup" to have the original disks available if you ever want to return to an old MacOSX, the only warnings I'll give is that you'll be having fun with EFI using Linux, so you might need to investigate the versions that supports that (and the UEFI support should be sufficient).

If you choose the Windows 7 route, the better advice will be to remove any and everything you do NOT want on the Mac side to have the biggest space available, and then make use of the BootCamp features as that'll help you with the environment needed to boot Windows 7, as Windows 7 doesn't support UEFI/EFI "easily" out of the box (unless you use the 64bit version, and even there are "gotchas").

You might need to download the needed BootCamp .ISO/packages/etc. from support.apple.com's download site, as I've found them to "not be available" for the old MacBooks via the boot camp utility, to install all the other (after installation) drivers etc. for the Windows 7.

I've not found the "dual booting" with Linux and MacOSX on a true Mac easy, but then I didn't need it so it was just a "quick" exercise, rather than need to have.

Another "option" for backups is to "clone" the MacBook's disk using CarbonCopyCloner (CCC or something) that provides you a bootable "backup disk"/