Changing Hard Drive in MBP? Possible?

Is it possible for the user to swap out the hard DRive in a macbook pro? Anyone done it yet? I have the 2.16, 1gb ram and 100gb 5200 drive. Looking to replace it with a 7200. Anyone know how difficult it is to do on a MBP? Thanks!
Steve

Yes its possible and is easy as long as you have a plastic spudger thing so you don't damage your MBP case
Here is a guide to show you what to do : http://www.ifixit.com/Guide/85.1.3.html

Similar Messages

  • Have a MBP mid 2009, had mavericks, changed hard drive and now have 10.6.8 and can't update to mavericks again. Any help?

    Hi,
    I Have a MBP mid 2009, 8 Gb RAM, had mavericks, changed hard drive to get more space (500Gb) and couldn't restart from time machine so had to install Snow Leopard, now have OS 10.6.8 and can't update to mavericks again. Any help?

    You did not contact us. This is just a user to user forum where we try to help each other out. No one here works for Apple and as far as we know Apple do not even come here. Ring back the number you originally called on and ask for an explanation.
    Cheers
    Pete

  • Changing hard drive in pavillion ms228 All-In -One

    My Hard Drive has stopped working on my Pavillion ME 228 All In One DeskTop.   I have found a replacement at a reasonable price.  I bought this Computer in France a couple of years ago it came with windows 7 family in french along with a french azwerty keyboard.  Now I have to change the hard drive is it possible to put on Windows 7 "Ultimate"  in english ( I have the Disc) and would a  english qwerty keyboard work on it?
    Any advice would be really appreciated.
    This question was solved.
    View Solution.

    Yes usually the ebay Windows disks are OK to buy and use just buy from a high feedback seller. 

  • Changed hard drive successfully, but still have a question.

    I just replaced the internal hard drive in my Intel Mac Mini with a new 250G 2.5 inch SATA drive (Seagate Momentus). The original hard drive had died, after showing symptoms of illness for a while. The operation was a success, and everything is working fine, but the way I did it, it wouldn't have been possible without a second Mac, as described below. So I'm wondering if I'm missing some basic concept here. Seems like I should have been able to do it with just the install DVDs.
    I was following an instructional video at this site, http://tinyurl.com/2fow2q, which had been recommended to me in an earlier thread of mine. That made the physical part of replacing the drive easy enough. When I went to boot up, though, with the DVD in the drive, it wouldn't recognize that there was any hard drive in the computer at all.
    I assumed that I had broken something when I had the computer open. In desperation, I took a fairly new, almost unused firewire external drive that I had, and used my MacBook to set it up as a bootable drive. Then I connected it to the Mini, turned it on again, and was able to install OS X on the external drive. With the Mini working again, I used Disk Utility to look at the drives, and discovered that it did see the internal one, it just didn't know what format it was in. So I partitioned it as a bootable drive, turned off the Mini, disconnected the external drive, and booted it up again with the DVD. This time it saw the drive, and I was able to install OS X to it.
    It has occurred to me that maybe I could have skipped a step by hooking the Mini up to my MacBook, booted it up in target mode, and then have used the MacBook's Disk Utility to partition the drive. But I didn't think of this at the time, and I was just assuming that I had physically broken something inside the Mini.
    What I would like to know is if there was any way to do this without my second Mac. I had naively assumed that the DVD would allow the Mini to detect the drive, and just partition it properly before starting the rest of the install. I had bought the drive from Tiger Direct, and was sure that it wouldn't come properly formatted, but I thought the install would take care of that.
    If I had bought from a dealer that specializes in Macs, like the one I linked to above, could I assume that the drive would have arrived already formatted for OS X? I notice that their advertising doesn't specifically say this. Are there other partitioning tools that would have allowed me to set up the drive without having another computer handy, say some other CD or DVD? I remember changing hard drives back when I used Windows, and getting a bootable CD which would partition the drive before you installed the OS, but nothing like that came with this one.
    Any advice welcome. As things turned out, I found a solution, but it became obvious that I hadn't known everything I needed to ahead of time.

    if you were to get hold of a hard disk caddie (carrier) such as:
    http://cgi.ebay.com/USB-2-5-SATA-HDD-Hard-Drive-External-Enclosure-Caddy-1K_W0QQ itemZ220335852761QQcmdZViewItem
    then your mac would just see it as an external drive and you would be able to reformat/partition it as you see fit.

  • DANGER: Do Not Change Hard Drive Ownership and Permissions

    DANGER: Do Not Change Hard Drive Ownership and Permissions (Unless you know what you are doing... I didn't!)
    FIRST, THE REPAIR PERMISSIONS SOLUTION:
    Use Disk Utilities on the "Sofware Install and Restore" DVD that came with your computer to set the permissions back to the defaults. Not the MacOSX Installation Disk. (This worked in MacOS 10.3.9)
    MY SCREW UP
    In my Hard Drive's "Get Info" dialog I switched the permissions of the Owner to my username and all others to no access. I had not yet closed the dialog and decided that it was probably dangerous so I started changing them back. I first changed the owner back to system. It asked for authentication.
    After entering my password I assumed that I would be able to go back and change the others as well. Nope! The dialog disappeared, my desktop disappeared and I couldn't do anything. I was locked out.
    After ten minutes of the beachball I restarted to the "Panther Installation disk" and tried repairing permissioins using disk utility. Evertime it "lost contact" with the system and would not work. Restarting (without CD) took me to a root user login (black sreen). My username and password did nothing.
    THE SOLUTION
    I then restarted to the "Software Install and Restore" DVD that came with my computer and used its Disk Utility to repair permissions. IT WORKED! It set permissions back to the default. THANK GOD.
    NOTE: I wonder, will using the Install and Restore DVD to repair permissions reset any computer's files to the defaults? Is that a backdoor into someones currently restricted files and folders? (Assuming that you have physical access and the computer specific DVD)

    Using the Repair Permissions function will not change the permissions on an account's home folder or anything in it, but there are at least two other ways in which someone with a Mac OS X 10.4 installation disk can get access to an account's files or folders unless some or all of those files are encrypted.
    (19285)

  • I recently installed OS X Server on my mac mini and found that it took up almost 170GB of space on the hard drive, is that possible ?

    I recently installed OS X Server on my mac mini and found that it took up almost 170 GB of space on the hard drive , is that possible ?

    In the Server cache what is an OK setting ..... I mean how many GB 25, 45, 60, ?  Any suggestions ?

  • I have a macbook pro md318 late 2011 i want to know can i change hard drive from 500GB to 2TB????

    i have a macbook pro md318 late 2011 i want to know can i change hard drive from 500GB to 2TB????

    Tbh,  I really wouldn't bother.
    I may get shot down here, but I like having storage centralised, backed up etc, so I would use the internal storage for the day to day stuff, and anything more dated, and large, then dump it on an external, with backup.
    I've heard some horror stories about larger capacity drives getting over hot, and failing in some machines. Not macs particularly though.

  • Due to a slow ISP I would like to download and save tutorials on my hard drive, is this possible?

    hI, I would like to download and save tutorials on my hard drive is this possible and ow do I do it?
    My ISP Is very slow and Adobe TV does not work. 30 minutes tryingto open a single tutorial and nothing.

    Not with iPhoto.
    You can relocate the masters using Aperture if you're using the latest versions of both iPhoto and Aperture. However, if you're planning on using iPhoto going forward having the masters on one disk and the Library on another is not a good idea. Have a read of this
    https://discussions.apple.com/thread/3062728?tstart=0

  • I lost my logic 8 pro serial number. I can't find the booklet that comes with the serial number. How can retrieve this? I upgraded from logic pro 7. I changed hard drives and now it keeps asking for the serial number. But I can't find it. Where can I requ

    I lost my logic 8 pro serial number. I can't find the booklet that comes with the serial number. How can retrieve this? I upgraded from logic pro 7. I changed hard drives and now it keeps asking for the serial number. But I can't find it. Where can I request it? Thanks!

    If you still have the receipt or other proof of purchase, you can ask Apple to send you the serial. Otherwise, bad luck mate.. Good news is, you can now buy Logic Pro 9 from App Store for just 199 USD

  • Hello, I am having a macbook air early 2008 and it is having a hard drive failure i need to replace the hard drive is it possible ? the hard drive number is HS082HB

    Hello, I am having a macbook air early 2008 and it is having a hard drive failure i need to replace the hard drive is it possible ? the hard drive number is HS082HB could you please help !!

    You can replace it with a solid state drive, see the one OWC sells here.  The video on how to install it is here.
    iFixit.com has used hard drives available here.
    If it were me, I'd go with a solid state drive, as the prices have come down recently and the performance improvement is noticeable.

  • Change hard drive but keep old settings? Is it possible?

    Hello,
    I am a bit new to Mac, but liking it. Here's a question.
    My sister has a 2.0 GHz MacBook with the standard 60 GIG hard drive. She has some applications and files and music and pictures, etc. on the computer. She bought a new 120 GIG internal hard drive and has asked me to install it for her. I looked up how and to do it, including formatting the drive, and it looks pretty simple, including with instructions from Apple.
    Here's my question: I have an external USB drive. Is there any way I can copy the stuff that's on her current drive to that external drive, including applications, preferences and the like, and when installing the new drive move that stuff to her new drive so that we don't have to install all the software and apps again. Can this also be applied to the OS? A few weeks ago, I updated her OS (to 10.4.7) and firmware and other OS updates. Can these OS settings also be moved to the new drive from the external USB drive?
    Thanks.
    iMac Core Duo 17"   Mac OS X (10.4.7)   1.83 GHz, 1.5 gig RAM

    Yes, use Disk Utility's Restore function to make an exact copy of the internal drive to the external. Then swap the old internal for the new one. Then you can boot from the USB drive, open disk utility again, and clone everything back. If you find that you can't boot from the drive, just boot from the install DVD and open Disk Utility from there.
    It sounds like your sister currently has no backups. She REALLY REALLY should get her own external drive and make regular backups to it. Super Duper is a good app for this.

  • Remplacing Hard drive on MBP 15'

    firstly, sorry for my poor english, not use to post in english (i'm a french guy)
    i would like to know a few thing about MBP and waranty
    is it possible to change HD of the laptop without cancelling the waranty ? i would like to put a 320GO/7200 RPM HD in it.
    which brand and model is prefere to choose.
    same thing for the RAM
    i'll also need a external HD firewire, i think the Seagate FreeAgent Go 250 Go, anyone have test it
    the MBP will be use with a MBox2micro, protools 8.0, and BDF2 (Drum vsti), connected with a Roland TD12 Vdrum
    my other Mac are used with protools too (Macpro with protools HD 7.4, G4 with protools 6.7) so i'm used to work under mac, even if i'm a PC user (for gaming, and other personnal stuff)
    i'll need this MBP for personnal use (and have a Mac home =), i've search for PC to use my proware, but really like to work under mac =) and the price a good compatible laptop PC are the same as the MBP

    Having the hard drive changed is easy on the new MacBook Pros. I have noted links to some helpful resources for you to check out.
    Just remember to use the install disks that have been included with your computer for having the operating system installed. Do not use the retail version or disks from another computer.
    Apple’s Manuals
    See page 38.
    http://manuals.info.apple.com/enUS/MacBook_Pro_15inchLate2008.pdf
    See page 37 for 17-inch MacBook Pros.
    http://manuals.info.apple.com/enUS/MacBook_Pro_17inchEarly2009.pdf
    Videos
    http://eshop.macsales.com/tech_center/installation.cfm
    Picture Guides
    http://www.ifixit.com/Guide/First-Look/MacBook-Pro-15-Inch-Unibody/590/1
    http://www.ifixit.com/Guide/First-Look/MacBook-Pro-17-Inch-Unibody/618/1
    This will not void your warranty.

  • Can't install OS X on 160 GB hard drive in MBP

    I bought one of those perpendicular 160 GB hard drives for my MacBook Pro, and installed it. It works great, exactly as advertised, however there's one problem: both Boot Camp and the Mac OS X installer refuse to install onto the hard drive. Boot Camp gives an error, saying "Your startup disk cannot be partitioned or restored to a single partition. Back up your startup disk and use Disk Utility to format your startup disk as a single Mac OS Extended (Journald) volume." It is already formatted this way, and the drive (which I cloned from my 100 gb MBP drive) works great. How can I make it so Boot Camp will install? Do I need to reformat and reinstall everything? Is there any intrinsic reason why the 160 GB drive, or one cloned from another source, shouldn't work? I did repair permissions and checked the drive.

    Peter.
    Hopefully you have an external firewire drive you can boot from. (Thats what I make my daily backups to). Boot from this external drive and run disk utility and make sure that the drive IS actually formatted as GUID this is the Intel HFS format. If its not you should format as the Intel partition and then re-dupe the drive from your backup.
    If that doesn't fix it then there might be a BootCamp limitation on the startup volume. Its possible Apple didnt foresee this large a partition and there may be some glitch. I know when I installed my 160G drive (2 weeks ago) I forst reformatted the drive by booting from an external forewire drive and wiping the new internal drive, leting DU create the single partition and formatting in DU. I noticed that the drive was actually preformatted HFS but not the Intel version.
    HTH,
    Peter

  • Sata or IDE hard drive in MBP?

    Hi all,
    I have a MacBook Pro 2007 Intel core duo 2.4 which has decided not to boot up anymore. I have been informed from a tech guy at work that it is most probably the logic board. So have decided to transfer my photos/movies/music files from the hard drive and on to my wife MBP under a different user.
    I have been told that the easiest way to do so is by making my hard drive into an external one and then connect it to a new computer and drag the wanted files across e.g  photos/movies/music (this is possible right???). However I don't know if the hard drive is SATA or IDE nor what the dimensions are of the physical drive, therefore I don't know what enclosure/caddie to buy.
    Any advice on the enclosure or other ways of getting my file off what be great.

    For a laptop drive, you will need a 2.5 inch enclosure although ebay will list them probably as a laptop hard drive caddy.
    If your drive is IDE, the drive will look like this:
    http://www.mp3car.com/attachments/general-mp3car-discussion/5576d1097012581-50-p in-laptop-ide-convertor-ata5.jpg
    It it's SATA (which I suspect it may be) it will look like this:
    http://www.datarecoverytutorial.com/wp-images/recover-data-from-laptop/laptop-sa ta-hard-drive.jpg
    The physical size of the drives are both the same, but if it IS IDE, then it may have a convertor attached to it that looks like this:
    http://l.thegreatchai.com/ide_laptop.jpg
    When you buy the caddy, you will likely have to remove this convertor to plug it in. It just pulls off, but make sure do it gently because you don't want to bend or break the pins of the drive itself.
    By the way, buy the caddy off eBay and do not spend more than £5/$5. It will likely come with a USB cable and carry case.

  • Changing Hard Drives

    Hello,
    My old ibook (G4 12" 800MHZ 256MB 30GB) died like a month ago and now I am using a new Macbook. I want to backup all the old information I had on the ibook before giving it away and I just dismantled it and took the Hard Drive out of it.
    I really don't know much about computers so before I do something that could harm the new Macbook, I wanted to see how safe it is (and if it is possible) to connect the old ibook drive inside the new macbook so I can make the backup.
    Do I just have to open the inferior lid and change it, or should I better go and ask for a backup at a computer store?
    Thank you for your responses and sorry if my post is too basic.

    What are you going to back it up to? Do you have an external hard drive? Your Hard drive you have now is ATA and not SATA so I don't think you can put it into your new Macbook. You should really buy a backup hard drive with enclosure. If you had a 2.5" ATA external enclosure you could easily put it into there and then put your files onto the new MB. Without that, you may have to have someone else take the data off of it.

Maybe you are looking for