Hard drive upgrade

[ledgehammer]

Hi, im having issues with my macbook pro hard drive. I think I'm going to upgrade it.
I am not sure on what spec I can upgrade it to, I currently have 750gb but ideally could do with more. I saw this but cannot confirm if its compatible although its tricky as im on my phone.
WD 750 GB 2.5-inch SATA Internal Hard Drive - Blue.

Will it fit, is it just the 2.5 inch that fits, ie what do I need to make sure etc.

Its a macbook pro 13 inch mid 2012, if I wanted a terrabyte would this fit etc?

Thanks
Tom

 

[JTToft]

Yes, that one will work. You just need to make sure that it's SATA, that it's 2.5 inch, and that it doesn't exceed 9.5 mm in height. If it meets those criteria, it will work. Storage size does not matter; you can get as large a drive as you want.

May I suggest something? Get a small SSD instead and then swap out the optical drive for as large a hard drive as you want. An SSD will speed up your machine immensely, and with the additional hard drive you can still get the large storage space you seem to require.

Additionally, depending on which sort of issues you have, it's quite possible they don't have to do with your hard drive but rather with the SATA cable connecting the hard drive to the logic board.

 

[keysofanxiety]

+1 for installing an SSD instead. It'll vastly improve performance.

As JT also stated, your model does have documented issues with the HDD SATA cable failing.

 

[ledgehammer]

Hi,
With the ssd, how does that work?

Will it fit in the machine and does it require both a hard drive and an ssd drive (money is a key factor)

With the sata cable, is this interchangeable and do you get one with the hard drive or if not are they easy to install?

Thanks for your advice and patience.

Tom

 

[JTToft]

With the ssd, how does that work?

- Exactly in the same manner as a hard drive.

Will it fit in the machine and does it require both a hard drive and an ssd drive (money is a key factor)

- No, only one of them is required. SSDs are expensive compared to hard drives, which is why I suggested a small SSD and a large hard drive rather than simply a large SSD.

With the sata cable, is this interchangeable and do you get one with the hard drive or if not are they easy to install?

- You do not get the cable with hard drives or SSDs. It needs to be purchased from a place like iFixit.com. They are reasonably easy to install but some experience with computer repairs is required, I would say.

Here is the cable: https://www.ifixit.com/MacBook-Part...Unibody-Mid-2012-Hard-Drive-Cable/IF163-041-1
And the instructions: https://www.ifixit.com/Guide/MacBook+Pro+13-Inch+Unibody+Mid+2012+Hard+Drive+Cable+Replacement/10379

However, it's worth testing whether your issue is the drive or the cable before buying anything.
You can do this by taking out the hard drive and connecting it via a SATA-USB cable externally. If it works there, the internal cable is the issue. If it does not, the drive is the issue.

Perhaps you could describe a bit further which sort of problems you're seeing.

 

[ledgehammer]

Hi,

My hard drive failed about a month back, repaired the disk and reinstalled everything - working much better but recently pauses on finder related windows. Copied some film data onto it and was slow, rebooted it and got disk issue warnings - booting it up now but will change it before its completely buggered.

I dont actually need any more than 750g, im not using half and have a year of h.d footage clips which can be edited down.

Some good advice there, I'll do some research on my screen when I fix it - this phones not the best, but presumably they fit inside, does one encase the other?

Thanks again

 

[hallux]

Some good advice there, I'll do some research on my screen when I fix it - this phones not the best, but presumably they fit inside, does one encase the other?

Does one what encase the other?

The SSD installs in place of the HDD that's there, using the existing mounting locations and cable (provided the cable isn't the failure).

 

[ledgehammer]

Does one what encase the other?

The SSD installs in place of the HDD that's there, using the existing mounting locations and cable (provided the cable isn't the failure).

sorry,
So the s.s.d drive is a hard drive, I.e you don't need to purchase a separate hard drive for it.?

Cheers again

 

[JTToft]

sorry,
So the s.s.d drive is a hard drive, I.e you don't need to purchase a separate hard drive for it.?

Cheers again

- The SSD (Solid State Drive) isn't strictly a Hard Disk Drive. But it serves the same function, has the same SATA connector, and has the same physical dimensions. It fits exactly in place of the existing hard drive without any extra bits needed.
An SSD has the advantage of, among other things, being several times faster and not having any moving parts.

Here are images of a Samsung 850 EVO SSD on the left and a traditional hard drive on the right.

 

[MacInTO]

We will all bully you into getting a SSD - but you won't regret it!

Instead of a spinning platter inside, it's a bunch of memory chips. It works much faster. When I boot up with a SSD, it takes me 12 seconds. With the hard drive, it would take me 90 seconds. It's night and day and makes an older machine really fast.

Here's the wiki for SSD, https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Solid-state_drive

I recently bought a 960GB SSD (Sandisk Ultra II) for $165 (on sale), but it's normally only about $225.

Do it, you won't regret it.

ps. Here are the instructions on changing the HD/SSD, https://www.ifixit.com/Guide/MacBook+Pro+13-Inch+Unibody+Mid+2009+Hard+Drive+Replacement/1337

 

[snaky69]

sorry,
So the s.s.d drive is a hard drive, I.e you don't need to purchase a separate hard drive for it.?

Cheers again

A SSD has the same function as a hard drive, and in a lot of cases the exact same form factor (you can swap one with the other with no issues), the difference is in technology used and in speed.

A SSD's roughly 5x faster.

 

[ledgehammer]

Cheers,
Its worth considering
Bit of a price jump but worth it I'm sure