Is my 2007 MBP HD dying? Should I replace? Or could it be unsalvageable?

Problems: Constant grey screen asking me to restart. Looping of log in screen when restarting. Having to boot in safe boot. Finder constantly lagging just hitting a file for quick preview no matter how small. Unable to try to save files by moving them to an external HD because an error about file not readable or writable pops up midway through transfer. All this continues even after a clean Snow Leopard install.
Could it be the hard drive?
Crash report said something about a problem with the CPU, screen capped it twice, disappeared off my desktop along with a few other files.
Now is my 2007 MBP 2.33GHZ screwed? Should I just attempt to buy a new one?
Mind you, my MBP has never given me a problem until a month ago. It's my sole work computer and I really can't afford a new one.
Any help would be greatly appreciated.
Trying to get help by the end of the day to decide whether or not to buy the HD and get it over night to start work again. Or bite the bullet and have to find a way to get a new mac book

You can use a powered external drive, c boot off the installer disk and install OS X onto it. (format HFS+ journaled in Disk Uitlity first)
Reboot holding option key and update, see if the computer runs fine like that.
If not it's another issue. If fine then perhaps you shoudl switch the hard drive

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Late 2007 MBP went black screen. I've been told it is the logic board but not due to the Nvidia GPU

My sister's Oct 2007 MBP just died suddenly. Yesterday when she opened Entourage it said it couldn't open because there wasn't enough memory. We rebuilt the Entourage Identity and it then worked fine. It wouldn't shut down though, and when woken from sleep went gray then black. The apple store here in Spain says it is the logic board but not due to the Nvidia GPU, and it's not worthwhile to replace it. Is it possible they are wrong? They also say it will cost about 800 Euros to replace! It's a 2Ghz Core 2 Duo/2GB/256MB, EMIC No: 2136.

Go step by step and test.
1. Reset SMC.     http://support.apple.com/kb/HT3964
    Choose the method for:
    "Resetting SMC on portables with a battery you should not remove on your own"
2.Reset PRAM. http://support.apple.com/kb/PH4405

Random crashes (Late 2007 MBP)

Hi there,
I have a late 2007 MBP and recently have been experiencing random crashes which I am unsure of the cause. Looking through the console logs following the crashes I haven't been able to notice any common themes, but then again I'm not quite sure what I should be looking for. This computer has gone through numerous repairs (3 logic boards, 1 superdrive, 2 batteries that failed, my right fan went out...). The issue is random and occurs when normally using the computer, as well as during start up. I feel like it may be heat related, although I have never seen the temps of the CPU get above 180 during this, and the computer has never been very hot to the touch. Using it in a room with an ambient temp above ~70 F seems to amplify the problem, although sitting outside in 60F weather in the shade has resulted in no problems for the last hr.
To date I've tried PRAM and SMC resets, reinstalled 10.6, and was going to try and run the hardware test, but my superdrive won't boot the cd (is there any other way to run the hardware test save for borrowing an external disk-drive?) Also, should I accept that this computer is at the end of its tumultuous run? The only other thought I had was opening it up and checking the thermal paste.
Thanks for any help.
-John

Since AppleJack came back clean, and your temps are reasonable, it doesn't sound like your drive is going out. It is possible that you have some corrupted files on your drive, but I would have expected AppleJack to have found something too if there were. The only other thing I can think of that might cause what you are seeing is bad hardware (RAM, GPU, etc). In general my temps are simiar to yours except my CPU is about 95 cooler, but it is also running much closer to 15% utilization right now. Out of curiosity, what is your HD temp? Most notebook drives have a max operating temp of 55C (about 130F). If your drive is close to that it may be throwing intermittent errors.
I would tend to lean towards drive or RAM as the most probably hardware components to cause what you are seeing. I'm sure there are other possible causes, but from my personal experiene, those two tend to be the most common. If you can get an appointment at a Genius Bar, they might be abe to run some hardware diagnostics to see if they can detect any problems for you.

Giving late 2007 Mbp to Mom - Need to set it to her name and upgrade to SL?

I am giving my late 2007 mbp to my mom. I want to change the administrator account to her name.
This mbp came with Tiger, and I have since upgraded to Leopard.
I want to give it to her with Snow Leopard.
Is my only solution to erase and reinstall Tiger, upgrade to Leopard, and then upgrade to Snow Leopard?
What is the best course of action?
Thank you.

It shouldn't be necessary to install Tiger again, but she should have the original Tiger disc set so that she can run the AHT if she needs to. There is some ambiguity as to whether you can just erase and install Snow Leopard, or if you need to install Leopard first. I'm not sure if Leopard contains other software that Snow Leopard might not.
My Mac is also from 2007. When I originally went to Leopard, I did an erase and Install. When I got Snow Leopard, I just did an upgrade and it went fine.
Also, if your Mom has a printer, be sure to install the proper driver for her.
Good luck!

HD won't spin down in combo SSD + HD 2007 MBP

I installed an SSD in my optical drive bay in a late 2007 MBP hoping to improve performance, reduce the noise of the HD spinning and increase battery life with virtually no HD activity.
I set the system to boot from the SSD but the HD is always still annoyingly spinning. Set option to have HD spin no when no activity, of which there should be none (that I am aware of).
Any ideas on why this might be happening?

I'm confused now, Martin. Your original post said that this was an "iMac DV+ "450" ruby red"
All of the 450's (they came in Ruby, Sage and Indigo ) had a DV drive fitted as standard. As you say, the 400's didn't.
Can you spin the drive down manually, using the sleep command under the Apple menu?
The slave issue could be involved, but, as I said, this was a very common problem with the Summer 2000's anyway. (I suffered it myself)
David, I must have dealt with hundreds of queries about exactly this issue with the Summer 2000 iMacs here over the years (though I don't look in here as often as I used to). I promise you, at least with the drives originally fitted, the very common problem of spin down failure of the drives in this model was directly asociated with increased bearing whine and wear over time. The hard drives factually fitted to these machines were generally a "LC" (low cost) model, with a reduced warrantee period.
Of course, as you say, if a new drive is fitted this may not be as big an issue.
Cheers
Rod

I am having an issue waking my late 2007 MBP from hibernation after update to 10.8

I am having an issue waking my late 2007 MBP from hibernation after I updated to OSX 10.8 Mountain lion. Anything I can do to fix this? I cannot keep doing a hard reset.

for people with this problem in the future. I ended up solving this by taking out and reinserting the RAM. I had previously bought RAM from crucial.com and I thought it may have been a compatibility issue with that. After taking out the RAM and reinserting I have not had the problem. Be sure to insert the RAM with force, almost to the point it hurts. I think the problem for the MAC not waking from sleep was due to the RAM not properly inserted or being jarred out over time and not related to the instal of 10.8. also, if you are no longer under applecare and you call apple with an issue you get retards.
cool. thanks. <3

Can't insert a CD/DVD into the disc drive. Recently installed a new harddrive, and the CD/DVD drive hardware is no longer recognized. Also, with new harddrive, OS was updated from Snow Leopard to Mt. Lion 10.8.5 on late 2007 MBP.

Can't insert a CD/DVD into the disc drive. Recently installed a new 1 tb hard drive, and the CD/DVD drive hardware is no longer recognized. Also, with new hard drive, OS was updated from Snow Leopard to Mt. Lion 10.8.5 on late 2007 MBP (2.2 GHZ Intel Core 2 Duo. 4 GB 667 MHZ DDR2 SDRAM)

Also, when I check out the hardware list, under Disc Burning - the following is reported: No disc burning device was found. If the device is external, make sure it’s connected and turned on.
The disc drive worked fine prior to the HD upgrade and OS update to Mt. Lion.

Win7 x64 Installation on late 2007 MBP+Mountain Lion

Dear All,
As a long time mac and bootcamp user, I've never expected to face this problem but I've been trying to do this for 3 days.
I'm having trouble installing bootcamp (win7 x64 ultimate) into my late 2007 MBP (2.4GHZ core 2 duo)
Pretty much use the bootcamp assistant from start to finish, tried using install dvd and create boot-able USB stick (by changing the plist.info on the bootcamp assistant package, as my MBP isn't supported.)
With USB stick created by bootcamp assistant, my mbp just simply won't read it even during startup and rEFit startup.
Sometimes it goes into the blank state and says no bootable device.
With win7 install DVD, whenever I use built in superdrive, it got ejected after 2-3 mins,
When I tried using Samsung external dvd burner/player, in place of who-knows dead superdrive, it went into blank screen with only a dash blinking (just like when the first time you start a PC) then disc stop spinning after awhile.
Burned few copy DVDs from extracted ISO (from the orginial install disc) and came up with same results
Recent changes, current condition,etc:
- Changed the stock 160gb harddrive into WD500GB blue scorpio.
- Installed fresh OSX Mountain Lion downloaded from App Store (was Lion) and updated everything.
- Had the very same win7 on bootcamp 3 installed on snow leopard few years ago and keeping it even with Lion (the exact same dvd!)
- Superdrive cannot be used to write but can read normally (install DVD shows up normally in OSX environment.)
- With USB created by bootcamp assistant, rEFit shows "legacy booting" and can't find files inside the USB
- Installation is working flawlessly on my 2011 iMac.
- Can still boot into bootcamp on old internal stock hdd (using external case)
- DVDs burned are Verbatim DVD-R and Sony DVD-R, both are top brands.
- Burner I tried to burn them are 2011 iMac's, 2012 MBP's, Samsung external dvd burner (all fail to boot on my 2007 MBP)
- Tried the method to create usb stick on windows 7, still can't boot.
- Burned DVD using Nero and alcohol 120% on windows 7, still fail.
I wonder if you guys can help me, I'm a designer and I really need to install Corel Draw on bootcamp so I can work on some CDR files on my MBP. And other stuff such as office's finance control program that can only work under windows.
Thanks in advance!

Found a workaround, to sum it up, it's pretty much my dead internal superdrive (as for unbootable USB, that's still a mistery). What I did was moving the HDD to my 2012 MBP and install from there. The problem is now that since I installed it on another machine (with ofc all different hardwares) I got blue screen whenever I tried to start Windows7 (in 2007 MBP after moving the HDD back there).
Next step will be replacing the superdrive on 2007 MBP with 2012's. Or if someone got a suggestion like installing the drivers via target disk mode etc, please advice

Will my late 2007 MBP 17" run the Thunderbolt Display?

Will my late 2007 MBP 17" run the Thunderbolt Display? I know my display port is DVI (may be Dual-link).

Lightdrm wrote:
Will my late 2007 MBP 17" run the Thunderbolt Display? I know my display port is DVI (may be Dual-link).
No it won't. You need a computer with a Thunderbolt port.
Here is a list of compatible computers: http://support.apple.com/kb/HT4885
Mario

2007 MBP, couldn't install Lion, now can't re-install Leopard

I have a MBP from late 2007. It came with Leopard installed on it. I recently tried to upgrade to Lion, but received the message "Lion can't be installed on this computer". Now I can't reinstall Leopard. When I try to boot, it will always select the Lion partition, but I can't erase/unmount the Lion partition. Now, when I try to boot from the Leopard DVD, it also won't work.
How can I get rid of all remnants of Lion on my computer and install leopard, from the CD?
Thanks!

Your 2007 MBP would have to been updated to Snow Leopard 10.6.8 to install Lion. Now that you're in a mess, boot from your Leopard installer disk and Erase the disk and then install Leopard.

HT203254 My 15" 2007 MBP has the NVDIA chip

My 15" 2007 MBP has the defective NVDIA chip however I had to pay Apple several hundred dollars to repair it. I was told that Apple would not cover the cost of the repair because it was 2 months outside the coverage period.
First of all, it's bad enough that I would have to pay Apple to repair a known defect. Apple won a court settlement and was awarded a financial settlement to repair these machines. What did Apple do with this settlement? They certainly did not repair my computer.
Now after only 80 days of getting this computer repaired by Apple, the NVDIA chip problem has reoccured. My MBP is back in the shop again. Apparently the first repair was only a short-term fix. There's no way that a quality repair would last only 80 days! This has to be the worst experience ever with a major company.
Had I purchased a cheap off-brand computer, I would expect some problems later on, however, this MBP cost $2100 in 2007. This was a major purchase and a reputable brand. Don't get me wrong, I like Apple products, however, I'm beginning to feel that maybe, just maybe Apple doesn't value me, their customer as much as I value them.

Apple has a special test they can run to diagnose the NVIDIA issue, so that's probably what needs to happen. Not sure why screen sharing works, though.

OS X Mavericks in Late 2007 MBP

I upgrade my Late 2007 MacBookPro from Tiger -> Snow Leopard -> Mountain Lion -> Mavericks. During booting when the 'Option' key is pressed, option to boot into older versions is seen, which is occupying space in the 160 GB hard disc.
Now that Mavericks is working fine in the Late 2007 MBP, how to identify all older versions of OS X and have them deleted?

1. According to this:
http://images.apple.com/legal/sla/docs/OSX109.pdf
you may run it if it is already installed on your Mac and under certain circumstances:
2. and 3. - there is no disk. Digital download only.
Note that Mac software can only be installed on Mac hardware. Anything else is in violation of the SLA and we are not allowed to discuss it here.

FCPX on late 2007 MBP?

Has anyone successfully installed and run the new Final Cut Pro X on a "Late 2007" MacBook Pro with 128 MB VRAM?
Specs allow the GeForce 8600M GT but require 256 MB VRAM. Is 128 MB a brick wall against functioning or just a slow-down?
Thanks

Hi,
I've got a mid-2007 MBP. It does work for me (Geforce 8600 with only 128MB VRAM). I tried to download it from the App Store and got no message that my computer does not meet the minimum requirements.
Downloaded fine, installed fine, works a bit sluggish, but enough for me to see what the future might look like. Not sure if I like it, but when I moved from Avid to FCP 10 years ago, I had to adjust, too. So we'll see.....
Hope this helps,
Colin

Having problems erasing and reinstalling Mac os x on 2007 MBP 15in

Hello
I am having some problems here and was hoping for some help.
Just recently here, I decided to erase and reinstall Mac Os X on my sister's 2007 MBP. She just recently got a new 15in MBP and wanted most of her content on the 2007 to be erased. Well... I did some reading around and found that the easiest way to do so was with the os X DVD that came with the thing. Problem is....I can't seem to find it for the 2007 MBP. So I decided to try the 2010 version. Went into the disk, ran disk utility, wiping the hard drive, did all the right steps according to Apple, and then rebooted to try get a clean version of OS X on. Well, problem is, it would come to the language select screen, but after that selection, it would come up with this error:
"Mac OS X can't be installed on this computer
If you want to restore your system from a Time Machine backup, click "Restore from Backup"
I've tried reformatting the HD several times and even tried restoring, but it wouldn't display my system restores...
So my quesiton is, is it becuase I have the wrong DVD that its not working or is there something else I"m missing?
Any help would be vastly appreacited (especially since its not my computer!)
Thanks!
Jordon Spronk

The install disks that come with a model of a Mac have certain hardware drivers for the computer and video card, you can't use another Mac's install disk.
However you can use the $29 Snow Leopard install disk, but it doesn't come with iLife, that's extra.

No Mobile Documents Folder Being Created on a 2007 MBP

This is just a observation regarding iCloud that someone might have a answer for but it's not imperative.
I'm running a MBP 2010 as well as a MBP 2007 and using the iCloud works since I've tested it out with Pages, were I uploaded a document from Pages on the 2010 and downloaded it onto the 2007 without a hitch other than having to verify my email address with Apple, but through all this the "Mobile Documents" folder was'nt created on the 2007 MBP but it has been on the 2010 MBP.

I'm not certain if there's a cause and effect here, but I was able to find the Mobile Documents folder on my iMac easily. But when I went to my MacBook, it was not there even though I had Lion on both with iCloud docs enabled. I tried everything and nothing worked. But before hitting the sack, I realized I had not yet set up "Mail" on the MacBook. I set that up with my accounts and just for the heck of it went back to the library and Mobile Documents was there. Not sure if this is related at all...but that was the only thing I did. Perhaps just a fluke but if you're like me, I was pulling my hair out. Relieved that a solution somehow appeared.

Is my 2007 MBP HD dying? Should I replace? Or could it be unsalvageable?

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