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White & Black MacBook Q&A - Revised December 29, 2009
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What version of the MacOS is pre-installed on the MacBook?
MacBook models prior to the release of the "Late 2007/Santa Rosa" models on November 1, 2007 shipped with a version of MacOS X 10.4 "Tiger" and subsequent models shipped with MacOS X 10.5 "Leopard". For the particular build number, please refer to "MacOS: Builds Included with Intel Macs" from the Apple Support Site.
For the maximum supported version of MacOS X for all "recent" -- G3 and later -- Macs, please refer to the Maximum Supported MacOS listing.
Can the MacBook run existing MacOS X applications?
A good percentage of MacOS X applications written for PowerPC-based systems can run on the MacBook, and other Intel-based Macs, using the "Rosetta Universal Binary Translator", but as one would expect, these applications will run more slowly than they would if they were "native" for Intel-based processors.
The always excellent MacInTouch [no longer online] prepared a list of "Universal Binary" applications that will run natively on the MacBook and other Intel-based Macs. The same website also has a list of applications written for the PowerPC with readers opinions regarding their performance using "Rosetta". You may wish to consult these lists to ensure compatibility with any particular application of interest [no longer online].
For more on Rosetta, please refer to "What is Rosetta? What does it support?" from the "Macintel" Q&A.
Can the MacBook run MacOS 9/Classic applications?
Apple provides no support for running MacOS 9 or the "Classic Environment" on Intel-based Macs like the MacBook. The MacBook relies on the "Rosetta Universal Binary Translator" to run software for MacOS X for PowerPC, and this emulator cannot run "Classic/MacOS 9" applications.
If you have a mission critical application that only runs on MacOS 9, you likely would be best served by maintaining a PowerPC-based Mac. However, you may also be interested in reading "Are there any third-party programs to run MacOS 9/Classic applications on Intel Macs?" from the MacOS 9/Classic Support Q&A.
Yes. For those unfortunate ones condemned to use Windows, the Windows on Mac Q&A provides answers for just about everything you need to know about running Windows on the MacBook or any other Intel-based Mac.
Yes. The MacBook is capable of running a number of Intel-based distributions of Linux through Apple Boot Camp or by using "virtualization".
For more on Boot Camp and Virtualization, please refer to the Windows on Mac Q&A.
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