newbie needs help

[nelsonmay]

I am new to this software and don't have any programming experience. I am a video editor and can get things done on the technical side. Anyway, I tried to download and use virtual box and can't get it to work. I am lost on the instructions. Here is what I am trying to do. Please tell me if I am right or wrong.

1. Can I put MAC OSX Leopard and Snow Leopard on VB? There is a drop down menu that says OSX and then OSX server.
2. I can build the virtual machine, but when I try to load Show Leopard or Leopard, I get the welcome and installation screen. After that you get the dialogue box that asks you what drive you want to load the OS. Nothing appears in the box and I have no where to go from there.

3. Can you please tell me what I need to download and the exact steps to setting up my OS (if question 1 is true). If there is a shorter tutorial out there I would like to see it.

Again, I don't really understand this software, but would like to test it on OSX Lion to run other OS's so I can run older programs.

[rpmurray]

In answer to question 1, yes you can, but you can only legally use the OS X Server version of Leopard and Snow Leopard.

If you meet the criteria for question 1 then it all really depends on the model Mac that you currently have. Because of limits Apple has put in the OS X installer, you can only use versions of OS X that you would actually be able to install natively on the Mac. For example, if you Mac was built in 2011 and came with Lion you won't be able to install earlier versions of the OS and you won't be able to do that in VB either. If it's a 2008 Mac Pro (like mine) that came with Leopard then you can install Leopard, Snow Leopard and (haven't tried this one yet) Lion.

[nelsonmay]

What about not being able to find a hard drive when I am in the installer?

[rpmurray]

You get that because the hard drive you created for the VM hasn't been formatted yet. You should be able to go into the menus and switch to the Disk Utility application and use it to format the drive. Then you can continue to install the OS.

[nelsonmay]

I am reading the instruction and I don' think VB supports MAC OSX only MAC OSX server. I have tried, but I can't find the disk utilities in VB. I tried them in Snow Leopard, but I can't see the virtual disk to format.

[Johann6]

I'm in the same boat trying to install 10.6.8 client on VB running under Lion on a 2008 Mac Pro.
I get stymied when VB offers only Snow Leopard Server or Snow Leopard Server 64-bit as options for a guest OS.
I have the Snow Leopard install DVD but can't find a way to use it.
Help?

[Sasquatch]

I am reading the instruction and I don' think VB supports MAC OSX only MAC OSX server. I have tried, but I can't find the disk utilities in VB. I tried them in Snow Leopard, but I can't see the virtual disk to format.

You're looking in the wrong place. You need to look inside the OSX installer for it. It's an OSX tool, not a VB tool.

I'm in the same boat trying to install 10.6.8 client on VB running under Lion on a 2008 Mac Pro.
I get stymied when VB offers only Snow Leopard Server or Snow Leopard Server 64-bit as options for a guest OS.
I have the Snow Leopard install DVD but can't find a way to use it.
Help?

Well, that is clearly noted in the User Manual, and more specifically, here: Important notice regarding Mac OS X as Guest. Apples EULA does not allow the client/desktop version of OSX to be virtualized.