Upgrading RAM & HDD in Unibody MBP

Impspeed

Impspeed

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David
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I have just bought a MBP (13") and I'm looking at slotting in 4GB RAM and a larger, 7,200rpm speed, HDD.

Is it sensible to do? I am probably looking at Crucial RAM at around £80.

What HDD would be recommended? Having just had a look on Scan I see Hitachi are about to release a 500GB 2.5" 7200 disk (http://www.scan.co.uk/Products/500G...00-25-HDD-SATA-3Gb-s-7200rpm-16MB-Cache-12-ms) or would it be better to go with an older 320GB 7200 disk (Maybe more reliable)?

Finally, where is the best place to get it fitted or is it easy enough to do myself?


DB
 
Okay, I can see upgrading the RAM is easy enough but will it affect warranty? Also, is the HDD any good?

DB
 
Honestly I don't think putting in a faster drive will make much of a difference. I put one in here thinking 'o aye, this will speed it all up' and hasn't made a blind bit of difference. The spindle speed isn't the only deciding factor either. You can have a 5400 RPM drive that is realistically just as fast as a 7200RPM, due to having better seek time. The RAM upgrade will probably be much more noticeable.


Impspeed said:
Okay, I can see upgrading the RAM is easy enough but will it affect warranty?
Click to expand...

Don't give them ideas!
 
Chers for the replies. Looks pretty simple to do both at the same time. Going to go for the RAM and definately a bigger HDD, just need to decide whether faster is also the right way to go now...

DB
 
Just give this a quick update. Bought 4GB of Crucial Ram and a 500GB 7,200 Seagate HDD and fitted it all last night. Took no more than 15 mins to fit them both, mainly being careful not to slip with the screwdriver and scratch the underneath.

It's like a new machine, 1-2 bounces for applications to start and easily 30 seconds quicker with start up.

Cheers all for your advice.

DB
 
I want to upgrade mine at some point....Now umming and aaahing over the 500GB 7200RPM or 1TB 5400 RPM options, so I don't have to worry about filling it with RAWs for a while!
 
Impspeed said:
Just give this a quick update. Bought 4GB of Crucial Ram and a 500GB 7,200 Seagate HDD and fitted it all last night. Took no more than 15 mins to fit them both, mainly being careful not to slip with the screwdriver and scratch the underneath.

It's like a new machine, 1-2 bounces for applications to start and easily 30 seconds quicker with start up.

Cheers all for your advice.

DB
Click to expand...

How much was the drive? I need something bigger for my MBP, let us know how you get on with it.
 
The drive was £77 from Scan.co.uk. From the little use, but constant over the past 12 hours the drive hasn't got hot at all which is good.

I am going to probably fill it with RAW's but transfer them every couple of months to my permanent storage (keeping a backup at the same time, obviously) so I think 500GB is perfectly adequate. Already got 117GB of music on it!

DB
 
Thirty seconds quicker to start is quite an achievement given Macs generally boot fast anyway. Makes you wonder what crap Apple put in there to start with!
 
just brought a used macbook white

thinking of upgrading my 120gb. i'm no techie, but i assume the ram is like plug and play

as for the harddrive, can i find out which speed mine is now. i don't want anything to overheat etc.

also i don't have original discs, i've been told to change HDD, i can swap them around and plug original in an external drive usb link up and do a mirror copy (all easier said than done, as never done anything like this)
 
Yay! At last ;)

For copying the HD you need Superduper. There are loads of tutorials if you Google ;)

Ram is plug and play.

To find out about your hard disk, go to about this Mac click more info, then Serial-ATA this will give you the disk model number, then Google is your friend ;) It will more thank likely be 5400rpm though.
 
System Profiler will tell you the model number of your drive, a quick google search would reveal the spec of the drive.

As for the disk copy, in theory that should work although I have never tried this using the Mac boot options, maybe someone else could give you first hand advice on that.
I would have thought Time Machine would be a good point to 'restore' from.

:bonk: note to self: refresh the page before posting....
 
thanks

anyone recommend say a 320gb 7200rpm external hard drive that i can take apart to swap with what i have now?
 
You'd be much better off getting a caddy for £10, then choosing the drive you want to use.
 
been doing some research

when you mean caddy, a HDD docking station?
if so can you recommend one from scan as would be a good place to order a HDD aswell.

i'm thinking 320gb 5400rpm western digitial at £41.

do i need anything else:
hdd
hdd docking station (assuming all leads included)

and download superduper?
 
I bought this enclosure from Scan - http://www.scan.co.uk/Products/Icy-...losure-for-25-SATA-HDD-with-Smart-AP-software

Put the ld 160GB drive out of my MBP into it and now have an external HDD which will easily fit in my briefcase.

I out the new RAM and HDD in at the same time, started up the computer, inserted the OSX disc, ***'t into disk utilities and formatted to Mac Journaled and then ran the OSX installer. Simple as really, so long as you remember the disk will have to be formatted in the first place (I forgot and got all worried I had ******ed it)!

Got to say a big thanks to Cowasaki for his help too!


DB
 
is the caddy plug and play type with all leads etc.
 
May be dumb question....but are the sata connectors on 2.5" drives the same as 2.5"?

I want to upgrade my MBP soonish, but want to pop out the old one and ghost it onto the new drive on one of my other machines, rather than go through the faff of OSX, then bootcamp, then W7 install, then install apps, then files etc etc...
 
p1tse said:
is the caddy plug and play type with all leads etc.
Click to expand...

It is completely plug and play. Comes with the screws, case, connections and USB cable. Simply connect the old drive, screw it in place and away you go.

DB
 
mid_gen said:
May be dumb question....but are the sata connectors on 2.5" drives the same as 2.5"?

I want to upgrade my MBP soonish, but want to pop out the old one and ghost it onto the new drive on one of my other machines, rather than go through the faff of OSX, then bootcamp, then W7 install, then install apps, then files etc etc...
Click to expand...

The drive I bought has the same connections as the drive in the MBP. I'm not an expert, and never claim to me, so may be worth checking first.

What age is your MBP? If it's one of the newer unibody designs and you buy the same drive as I have you won't have a problem. I did have the option to transfer an older version of OSX, with all my old files and applications, through either the USB caddy (old HDD) or my Time Capsule so it won't be n issue. Only reason I went for a new install was it was getting a bit slow and I'd filled it with junk.

DB
 
JasonRS said:
Easy to do.

However, the 7200RPM drives do generate quite a bit of heat.

I put one in my MBP, but took it out again after a couple of months as the heat was too much to comfortably use on my lap.
Click to expand...

what make and model 7200rpm did you try?
 
I've got a 13" current model, bought in October.....will probably get that Seagate 500Gb 7200rpm you used. Lightroom + 5D2 RAWs on the stock 5400rpm drive is starting to annoy me a little!
 
ordered from ebuyer: western digital 320gb, 7200rpm version
 
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