Should I upgrade my powerbook G4 hard drive?

[Johnny7]

I'm thinking about upgrading my hard drive in my powerbook. Right now it has a Hitachi IC25N040ATMR04-0 which is quite old. I'm thinking about putting a 100gb or something in this machine. I only really want to do this if it will speed up my system, so will it? It already has maxed ram but just seems sluggish to me after using it for a while and with a fresh install of tiger and a new hard drive, would I notice substantial differences in speed? I also don't know what the max hard drive capacity is for one of these. Lastly, would a powrbook hold just any hard drive ment for laptops?


Specs:
12" Powerbook G4
40GB 4200RPM HD
1.25GB of ram
Mac OS X Tiger 10.4.6
Slot loading super drive

Thanks!
Johnny

 

[MacHamster68]

i am not 100 %sure , i believe the 12" powerbooks have no limit in size of the harddrive as i seen on ebay some with 160gb and 250gb
but for more speed more important are the rpm go for 5200rpm it will be a bit faster
and even more important you need a p-ata drive!!!2.5 " and it should not be too high as it can restrict airflow then

be very very very careful with all these small ribbon cables there you need to remove ..dont want to search around ebay for spares

here a how to link
http://www.xlr8yourmac.com/systems/powerbookG4_12in_HD_upgrade/PowebookG4_12in_HD_upgrade.htm#storytop

 

[Johnny7]

Ooh! Thanks for the link, that will help a lot . I'm gonna think about this more now, I kept thinking it was going to be a piece of cake to get to the hard drive but those cables are so fragile, I don't want to break them .

Thanks,
-Johnny

 

[MacHamster68]

and another thing update your OSX to 10.4.11

 

[SnoFlo]

Uh, I was under the impression that the PB can only accept the older ATA drives and NOT the present day SATA drives. I upgraded my PowerBook to a 250GB ATA drive which was the largest ATA drive available at the time. I don't think ATA and SATA drives are interchangeable in the PB.

 

[MacHamster68]

no powerbooks can only take p-ata (ata 100) drives no s- ata

but the powerbook g4 12" are so cute , so handle with care

 

[VanneDC]

be extremely carefull with what your doing, its easy to get apart, a freaking hell to get it back together properly...

ive got a 300gb in my 15inch, but yeah, it aint for the fait of hearted.

 

[mr1970]

It'll make it a bit quicker and will definitely extend its life if, like me, you've been accumulating photos & a big itunes library so you're starting to run out of space. It won't make a night and day speed difference though so if performance is a huge issue for you, it may be time to think about something else.

I upgraded to a 160GB drive and it's basically bought my 12" PB another 2 years of life, which is great. As others have said, however, it cannot be overemphasised that IT'S A REAL PAIN TO DO. Seriously, I've been playing with computers for 20 years and getting a new drive into the PB is far and away the most ridiculously fiddly thing I've done - about 24 screws of different sizes from what I remember. If you print the instructions off (just google for them) it's perfectly doable but don't do it in a rush, don't do it when you're thinking about something else, and be careful or else (like me) your F2 key will never be the same again.