For those of you who like living on the Bleeding Age – while running on older hardware – Cult of Mac received this tip from reader Matt Briggs about getting his Core Duo based MacBook running the Lion Developer Preview installation of Mac OS X 10.7:
I managed to get the Lion preview running on a supposedly unsupported Macbook Core Duo from May 2006.
I installed Lion on a USB drive hooked up to a Mac Mini Core 2 Duo 2009, then removed /System/Library/CoreServices/PlatformSupport.plist and the same drive booted in the Macbook with no issues!
there might be some stricter restrictions in the future, but pretty good right now!
IMPORTANT: This is an unverified tip of an unsupported configuration. Use a spare hard drive for any tests, do not overwrite your primary system. This capability may not last in the official release versions.
I don’t have a Core Duo system myself to test this, so if anyone can duplicate these results on their own system please let us know in the comments.
Adam Rosen is an Apple certified IT consultant specializing in Macintosh systems new and old. He lives in Boston with two cats and too many possessions. In addition to membership in the Cult of Mac, Adam has written for Low End Mac and is curator of the Vintage Mac Museum. He also enjoys a good libation.
