Hard Drive swap from Mac mini to MacBook Pro?

[dubhe]

Ok, thinking of relegating my mini to HTPC and buying a new base model 15" MacBook Pro. As both these systems have essentially the same hardware, including 9400M graphics, can I just swap the hard drives so my current 7200rpm mini drive goes into the new MacBook Pro, and the new, unused, 5400 rpm drive comes out of the Pro and into the mini?

Any reason this wouldn't work? I just think it would take a lot of time to back everything up to Time Capsule and then fresh install both hard drives.

 

[GoCubsGo]

It will work because the drive I have in mine came from a MBP.

 

[dubhe]

Cool, I wonder if it would be different on the dual graphic models? When installing an OS the system only installs what it needs for that hardware configuration right?

 

[sOwL]

It would work, hardware based. But what about the drivers? Those 2 machines use different hardwares, so the drivers on your HD as it is right now are meant to work with the mac mini. I'm not sure if that's a problem though, as it could just work and then download the needed drivers from software update... Just my 5c here anyway

 

[cjmillsnun]

It shouldn't be a problem.

I cloned my MB Hard disk (when I was running Leopard) onto my external and booted it successfully on my G4. Everything worked. That was from Intel to PowerPC architecture. So from a Mini (I assume it's an '09 Mini) to an '09 MBP should be fine.