Removing harddrive from 2005 Mac Powerbook G4

[taine]

Hi.

My old G4 Powerbook died completely several months (well, over a year) ago, and I'd like to salvage the data on the harddrive. Nothing of major importance, but there are some files on there that I hadn't backed up.

I have seen threads and tutorials elsewhere, but they mostly concern newer Macbook Pro models. I'm wondering if removing the harddrive form my G4 Powerbook and putting in an external harddrive enclosure is something straight-forward and achievable for someone that has seldom looked at the guts of a computer.

My only concern is preserving the contents of the harddrive, I doubt that the computer itself (which is completely unresponsive) is worth anything.

Any help or suggestions much appreciated!

 

[madmacfan]

Hi.

My old G4 Powerbook died completely several months (well, over a year) ago, and I'd like to salvage the data on the harddrive. Nothing of major importance, but there are some files on there that I hadn't backed up.

I have seen threads and tutorials elsewhere, but they mostly concern newer Macbook Pro models. I'm wondering if removing the harddrive form my G4 Powerbook and putting in an external harddrive enclosure is something straight-forward and achievable for someone that has seldom looked at the guts of a computer.

My only concern is preserving the contents of the harddrive, I doubt that the computer itself (which is completely unresponsive) is worth anything.

Any help or suggestions much appreciated!

Yes removing the hard drive from your old powerbook g4 is fairly straightforward and easy to get to. One thing to bear in mind is that the hard drive inside the old powerbook is an IDE type Hard drive, so you will need to use a 2.5" external IDE caddy to transfer your data from the drive. DO Not Get A Sata caddy as this Will Not Work.

 

[Mr Rabbit]

You didn't mention what size the PowerBook is, which kind of factors in to the ease of hard drive removal. The 15's & 17's are pretty straight forward but the 12" is a somewhat tedious process that sadly you can't cut many corners with since the top case takes the longest to remove. In the end though they're all held together with screws and they can all be disassembled without too much specialized knowledge.

12" PowerBook hard drive removal

15" PowerBook hard drive removal

17" PowerBook hard drive removal

Once the hard drive is out you will need to install it in a 2.5" IDE enclosure in order to access the data on it. Below are a few examples of IDE enclosures that would likely accomplish this.

2.5" IDE enclosure at NewEgg

2.5" IDE enclosure at Amazon

2.5" IDE enclosure at Office Depot

 

[taine]

Thanks very much for the advice - it's a 15" G4 Powerbook, as soon as a get a decent screwdriver the right size this will hopefully go alright!