Can I upgrade my 2.4 iMac's HD (1st Aluminum gen) to a 1TB?

Question

Hello,
I have a 20" 2.4GHz iMac (first generation of the Aluminum series) with a pre-installed 320GB hard disk. I'd like to upgrade it to a 1TB. Is that possible? Would my machine run a 1TB or is my maximum a 500GB?
I need to purchase the Hard disk separately because it is not available in my country. So what exactly are the recommended specs and brands that will be fully compatible with my iMac? And what is the maximum size I can go for?
Thank you,
Carol

Answer 1

You can go for 1.5TB if you really wanted to (kind of grey, since some PC's cant support 1.5tb properly). Pretty much any SATA 3.5 inch hard drive will work. The ones you want would be SATA or SATAII or SATA2 or SATA 3.0 (which are all the same, most companies will just call it a SATA drive. the 2/II just represents the generation of SATA which reads at 3gbps or something like that, hence the 3.0, but you dont have to worry about it, just get a SATA and it will work).
For the 1TB lineup, I chose the Samsung Spinpoint series because it had the fastest read times compared to the rest of drives from seagate etc ect. Just make sure the hard drive is initialized before you go and install it into your imac. I did this by initializing it from my PC before sticking it in. Im not sure if you can initialize the harddrive while installing OS X, so i didnt take that chance. (Taking it apart waskind of a hassle).
It reads everything fine at 1TB, you can get a OEM harddrive (without any cables or mounting brackets) because everything you need, you can just take from your harddrive already in there. Look online for step by steps of how to open the aluminum imac. youll need non-magnetized screwdrivers and a bunch of suctioncups to remove the plexiglassish cover.
I would personally recommend the Samsung Spinpoints, i have 4 of them in 3 of my computers and none of them arrived dead or are having any defects. They go for about 120-150$ canadian, or about 70-130$ american. Ill admit ignorance, and say i dont know what currency Egypt uses. :P
Remember though that theres only space for 1 3.5 inch desktop hard drive in there.
- SATA Desktop Harddrive 3.5inch (standard desktop size)
Message was edited by: Neoblackout
Message was edited by: Neoblackout