Swapping the hard drives in two Macbook Pro's

[suhaylz]

Hi,

I've got two Macbook Pro's (15" and 17") and i've recently purchased a new internal HDD to swap in the 15". However the 15" does not have a disc drive, so i basically just decided to put the hard drive into the 17", format it with OS X Journaled and then just install Leopard. It's currently installing however what has just really smartly hit me is whether it would be compatible into the 15". If so whether there are going to be any issues and so forth.

Many thanks in advance,
Sy.

 

[Hls811]

Hi,

I've got two Macbook Pro's (15" and 17") and i've recently purchased a new internal HDD to swap in the 15". However the 15" does not have a disc drive, so i basically just decided to put the hard drive into the 17", format it with OS X Journaled and then just install Leopard. It's currently installing however what has just really smartly hit me is whether it would be compatible into the 15". If so whether there are going to be any issues and so forth.

Many thanks in advance,
Sy.

By no disc drive, you mean no optical drive, so you cant load the OS from there, right?

I think it would work. Its not like a PC where you have specific drivers based on the model.. If nothing else you should at least be able to boot up to the OS and then update whatever you need via the internet...

 

[calsci]

you have two macs that both have firewire i am assuming. why don't you just boot into target disk mode and use the 17" optical drive. i am assuming it would work. all the macs me and my family own have an optical disk drive. well besides my dad's air. i'm not sure if target disk mode would work for an installation. why don't you have a drive in your 15 inch?

 

[Thiol]

Hi,

I've got two Macbook Pro's (15" and 17") and i've recently purchased a new internal HDD to swap in the 15". However the 15" does not have a disc drive, so i basically just decided to put the hard drive into the 17", format it with OS X Journaled and then just install Leopard. It's currently installing however what has just really smartly hit me is whether it would be compatible into the 15". If so whether there are going to be any issues and so forth.

Many thanks in advance,
Sy.

It should work, but be sure to use the Install Disk that came with the 15", not the 17". The Install Disks are labelled differently in some cases, and I think it does make a difference. For example (I know this doesn't apply here, but it's just for illustration), you can't use a hard drive with an OS X install from a Macbook Install disk in a Macbook Pro, and vice versa.

 

[alphaod]

Hi,

I've got two Macbook Pro's (15" and 17") and i've recently purchased a new internal HDD to swap in the 15". However the 15" does not have a disc drive, so i basically just decided to put the hard drive into the 17", format it with OS X Journaled and then just install Leopard. It's currently installing however what has just really smartly hit me is whether it would be compatible into the 15". If so whether there are going to be any issues and so forth.

Many thanks in advance,
Sy.

If they're from the same generation it should work; also if you have an external HDD, you can image the restore DVD onto it and then boot from that.