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Thanks. I remember asking about doing this a few times and every time it was always a no it won't work. Glad it does afterall, I just ordered the same drive to swap out the 160GB one haha, big jump.
 
Sadly I believed all the articles and "upgraded" to a 320GB 7200 from the stock 200GB 5400. No difference. At all... Just wasted 30 minutes for the upgrade.

ROFL, when Apple could do better people get mad at others for saying exactly what you just said. We pay for it, but we shouldn't complain?

At any rate, if you care to look here's just one of many articles I checked that say that anything below 5400 rpm slows down the computer. Should I believe multiple articles or you? :D

http://www.ontechnews.com/computer-tips/how-to-buy-pc/hard-drive-rotational-speed/ I'm sorry buddy, but where did you get the idea that faster rotational speeds don't necessarily mean faster disk access? This could only be true if there was a big difference in overall specs between hard drives. Most hard drives in the same price point have about the same overall specs, the rotational speed is generally the deciding factor.
I would love 1TB hard drive in my MBP, but not at the expense of slower performance.
 
Yes, the larger platters on the 1tb drive should make it as fast as a 7200rpm 500gb drive. Cool!!!

Bingo, you get it. 3 platters X 5200rpm = 15,600 rpm
.......................... 2 platters X 7200rpm = 14,400 rpm

The above shows you the potential for data read and write to the above drives. *If* all else is equal. The 3 platter slower rpm drive will read/write faster than the 7200 rpm drive assuming that the rpms are not the bottle neck in the drive.
 
X2, no rubbing, cover opens/closes just the same as it did.

Judging by the way the drive fits, I'm pretty sure Apple designed the unibody to accept a 12.5mm drive, they just kept it on the hush-hush.



Do you have a Time Machine backup already? If you do, then you do everything that you said accept don't install Snow Leopard onto the HDD. Once the computer has booted from the DVD, make sure that your Time Machine drive is connected and go to "Utilities" -> "Restore from Time Machine". This will basically clone your new HDD to exactly the way your old one was at the time of the last backup.

You shouldn't have any issues with removing the whole bottom cover.


Nope I do not have a time machine back up. I was hoping to install snow clean on the HDD and then use the current HDD to move over my necessary files if necessary manually if I cant set time machine or some sort of data transfer app to transfer all my stuff from my old hdd... does that sound right?
 
Nope I do not have a time machine back up. I was hoping to install snow clean on the HDD and then use the current HDD to move over my necessary files if necessary manually if I cant set time machine or some sort of data transfer app to transfer all my stuff from my old hdd... does that sound right?

I'm not too sure about a data transfer app, but all you would need to do is get a cheap 2.5" external enclosure, plug it in after you've installed SL on the new HDD and then transfer your files over.
 
This may seem a strange question... how good is battery life with the 1TB drive? Also, will the drive spin down when not being accessed (energy saver)?
 
Im too confused here.
On one page its saying that it doesnt work and isnt compatible, and on another its saying it is working great and brilliant to see 500GB free on the finder
Two threads were merged, saying two completely different things...
Does it work with no problems or not?
 
Im too confused here.
On one page its saying that it doesnt work and isnt compatible, and on another its saying it is working great and brilliant to see 500GB free on the finder
Two threads were merged, saying two completely different things...
Does it work with no problems or not?

The initial idea was to take a 1 TB external WD drive and put it in the MB, as it was cheaper. However, WD's Passport drives no longer use SATA drives with an SATA-to-USB bridge board; instead, the USB connector is physically on the drive, so these cannot be put into the MB. This is what doesn't work, and what the initial few posts refer to (the physical inability to connect the drive once in the computer)

Then the OP decided to just go ahead and get a normal 2.5" 1TB drive meant for internal use. This is what does work; the drive physically fits and connects.

What I've gathered: as long as you buy the bare internal 2.5" drive, you'll be fine.
 
The initial idea was to take a 1 TB external WD drive and put it in the MB, as it was cheaper. However, WD's Passport drives no longer use SATA drives with an SATA-to-USB bridge board; instead, the USB connector is physically on the drive, so these cannot be put into the MB. This is what doesn't work, and what the initial few posts refer to (the physical inability to connect the drive once in the computer)

Then the OP decided to just go ahead and get a normal 2.5" 1TB drive meant for internal use. This is what does work; the drive physically fits and connects.

What I've gathered: as long as you buy the bare internal 2.5" drive, you'll be fine.

Hit the nail on the head, thanks.

I know it got a little confusing when the Mods merged the two threads together.
 
will this drive

http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16822136545

work in my mid 09 macbook pro 13" unibody?

i would love to upgrade from the tiny 160gb oem drive that i have

Yes it works. I just bought it from Amazon and put it in my 13. Tip..do not use Time Machine/Time Capsule. It took 34 hours and somewhere along the way my data was corrupted and wouldn't boot. I used Carbon Copy Cloner and it took about 2.5 hours and is working fine. I noticed it was really slow at first, took a good minute to boot but is faster now. Another thread was saying the cache was doing it.. anyway it's good now.
 
Yes it works. I just bought it from Amazon and put it in my 13. Tip..do not use Time Machine/Time Capsule. It took 34 hours and somewhere along the way my data was corrupted and wouldn't boot. I used Carbon Copy Cloner and it took about 2.5 hours and is working fine. I noticed it was really slow at first, took a good minute to boot but is faster now. Another thread was saying the cache was doing it.. anyway it's good now.

Either you did something wrong or something but it shouldn't corrupt data or take 34 hours.

It took me 8 hours to transfer over 743GB of data using Time Machine Restore.
 
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Either you did something wrong or something but it shouldn't corrupt data or take 34 hours.

It took me 8 hours to transfer over 743GB of data using Time Machine Restore.

Put new drive in..put in install disk...go to restore and select time capsule and the save..start. It said it completed successfully and I needed to restart, when I restarted it went to a screen that said hold down the power button to restart the computer and then just kept doing that..in a loop.
 
Put new drive in..put in install disk...go to restore and select time capsule and the save..start. It said it completed successfully and I needed to restart, when I restarted it went to a screen that said hold down the power button to restart the computer and then just kept doing that..in a loop.

Maybe its something in the backup, like a corrupted (stopped time machine back up) or whatnot.
 
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Maybe its something in the backup, like a corrupted (stopped time machine back up) or whatnot.

That's what I figured, I tried to pick the time I thought I was on for sure..guess I picked wrong. Either way I wasn't about to waste more time trying to find one that worked haha. But CCC worked fine.
 
Sorry...

but just to confirm, this will definitely fit in the most recent 13" MBP (without removable battery)?
 
Bingo, you get it. 3 platters X 5200rpm = 15,600 rpm
.......................... 2 platters X 7200rpm = 14,400 rpm

The above shows you the potential for data read and write to the above drives. *If* all else is equal. The 3 platter slower rpm drive will read/write faster than the 7200 rpm drive assuming that the rpms are not the bottle neck in the drive.

This is completely wrong. If you don't know what you're talking about, please don't spread misinformation.

Hard drives read from only 1 platter at a time. Spindle speed thus decreases rotational latency linearly, completely regardless of how many platters there are. Indeed, the number of platters can have a detrimental effect on maximum possible spindle speeds, as seen here. (the platter size also negatively impacts maximum speed - the WD Raptor series are single-platter 2.5" drives in a 3.5" enclosure! - and the drive height positively impacts it - larger components allow 3.5" drives to consistently reach 7200 RPM). You run up against a latency wall however, with the seek time, which in 2.5" drives is about 3x rotational latency. Why they're not doing more to improve that, I don't know.

What you DO get with these higher-density platters is increased throughput, because more data is flying under the head per unit time. Spindle speed can also help with that, but at the current rates of increase, not as much as increasing areal density**. The upshot is that 333/250 < 7200/5400, but not by very much (.1% difference). So a 1 TB HD @ 5400 RPM should be almost identical in performance to a 500 GB HD @ 7200 RPM. Now, since this is only a 5200 RPM drive, performance is going to be lowered somewhat more (roughly 5%). and of course, rotational latency is going to be 38% higher, which really isn't that bad since seek time is the dominant factor and 300% of either.

Boy howdy though, once they get 500 GB/platter, a 1.5 TB 3-platter drive at 5200 RPM or a 1 TB 2-platter drive at 5400 RPM* is just going to SMOKE the current 500 GB drive @ 7200 RPM.

*there's no reason to stop here, either; it should be fairly straightforward to make a 7200 RPM 1 TB drive.

edit: it would seem things have changed a bit since I last looked. Seek time is now down to 12ms, about 2.5x rotational latency. Good for them.

edit2: ** the jump from 160 to 250 GB platters was huge, for instance.
 
grrr....

So buying this wouldn't work?

That's annoying because what I would like is 1tb in my macbook and my current 250gb in a portable case. Was going to swap over the 1tb passport and 250gb internal... Anyone happen to know if it works in the old wd passport models? 500gb ones link here

I sort of need 1tb to ovoid more upgrades in future... Anyone like to guess when prices will drop or when a competitors product would come on the market that would work by swapping out the drives? (1tb for 250gb)

Other option is just buying this and have a 250gb drive lying around

Look forward to your answers
Luke.
 
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