The Year of the Geek » new purchase

Upgrading the Hard Drive in a MacBook Pro (Late 2006 – Core 2 Duo)

John Mahlman IV — Tue, 25 Nov 2008 16:10:38 +0000

Thursday night my roommate and I decided to buy new hard drives for our Mac’s. I was running very low on my 100GB drive, and he wanted something better than his 160GB 5400RPM drive. I was looking into upgrading for a few weeks by now and was very tempted to buy this 320 GB Western Digital Scorpio that runs at 7200RPM. This is the same one that my boss, Carl, purchased for his MBP. The major difference is that he bought it from iFixit.com for $199.

I use one of the best programs for a Mac to backup your hard drive simply and cleanly, Carbon Copy Cloner, and best of all, it’s 100% free. The backup takes roughly 2 hours using an external drive interface via USB, and I begin the dissection.

I’ve installed and replaced several parts in Powerbooks before but not a MBP. It’s relatively the same,, with the exception of a few screws and innards. I like using the How-To’s on iFixit.com, they have everything from drive replacement to replacing the screen for Mac laptops old and new. I use the one suitable for my laptop of course, and in the end takes about 45 minutes or so to replace.

Almost 3 hours to backup and install a new 320GB hard drive into my laptop, not too shabby I think. Of course my roommate was done in about 2 hours because it is a lot easier to get to the hard drive on the new MacBooks, but that’s how it works.

The Good:

Very easy to backup drive, CCC is very quick and safe
No BIOS settings, plug the drive in, you’re done
Fairly easy to get to drive once case is opened

The Bad:

Too many screws to open MBP
Apple uses some TORX screws to secure case and drive

The Verdict:

Noticeable increase in speed with new drive (16mb cache)
VERY quiet drive
No vibrations (some people online complained about vibrations from the new drive)
Well worth the $100
Stay away from iFixit for hard drives;-)

Apple 3rd Generation iPod, 2003 ~ 2008

John Mahlman IV — Mon, 20 Oct 2008 14:47:24 +0000

I own an iPod. To be more precise I actually own a 3rd Generation iPod; if you don’t know what kind that is, check it out on Wikipedia. It’s the first iPod to have a dock, the only iPod for have 4 light up buttons, lined on the top, and the iPod with the worst battery life, period. It also uses firewire to charge and sync, no USB charging on this guy.

My iPod is 40GB, and I’ve never filled it. But I love my iPod, I love how it looks, and I used to love how rugged it was. It’s been through a lot, here’s a run down of stuff:

3 batteries, all replaced by me
1 headphone connector
dropped on asphalt and stepped on accidentally
dropped in a sink full of water (not by me)
dropped several times from my pocket to the ground
sat on
banged about

I bought it in 2003, when it was new, from eBay for $300. It has lasted me 5 long years, and now the battery is dying again (it only holds about an hour charge). I’ve finally given in and decided to buy a new one.

When looking, I decided to get another iPod, just because I like them, and I’m very impressed with my iPods durability. I decided to get a refurb from Apple. It’s the “previous generation”, basically meaning they don’t make it anymore. It’s 80GB, black, and $100 cheaper than the new ones. Of course I got Applecare for the additional $59. Worth it.

I am anxiously waiting for it to arrive from California now. I’m hoping that this new iPod gives me the same amount of life that my 3rd gen has given me. I of course will not be doing away with the 3rd gen, it’ll still be used for files and backups until something else on it dies (the hard drive or the port).

So, in this post I shall thank you 3rd Generation iPod. You’ve given me countless hours of entertainment, you’ve been around through my entire college career, and I know you’ll always be around somewhere for me.