[DDP]

Hi, my hard drive in a Feb 2004 purchased iBook G4 12" has failed. It hung a couple of nights ago, then refused to boot. After a few attempts it booted, but then hung on the desktop everytime. Its not visible in OSX installer (from booted disc), and if you run disk utility it errors saying it can't be read. I tried reformatting the drive, and that fails too.

Luckily, I have a LaCie FW HDD that I am using at the moment to get by. I called Apple, and they wanted £250.00 to replace the HDD, which is a bit bleeding steep if you ask me. Another £90 and you can buy a Mini Mac.

Anyway, looking at options, I think it might be too hard to do myself. Has anyone here opened their iBook up and swapped out the hard disk?.

Thanks
DDP

[brother337]

Swapping the hard drive in an ibook is no small task. It's doable, but I don't want to do it again if I don't have to.

I'd recommend the drive i'm using now, a Hitachi Travelstar 7k60. It's a very highly rated drive and it gave my computer an all around boost in quickness and responsiveness.

This guy's instructions are pretty good:

http://www.sterpin.net/uk/ddibookg4uk.htm

I personally used this guy's instructions:

http://uk.geocities.com/ibookupgrade/


EXCEPT:

You never need to remove the bottom cover in the iBook G4 to get to the hard drive. You did in G3 Icebooks, but not in the G4.

[DDP]

Thankyou.
So you don't need to take the bottom of iBook off to get to the HDD? It looks like a really nasty job with lots of pential problems.. Hmm.

[tooki]

Uh, no, you take off the bottom, the top, and umpteen more layers of parts. I'm a seasoned Mac tech, and I consider the iBooks and AlBooks daunting to work on. I have done it a few times, but it's a pain in the patoot unmatched by any Apple laptop since the mid-90s. It involves about 40 screws, all tiny and most of them unique, which have to come out and go back in in the correct order.

Leave it to a pro.

tooki

[brother337]

Originally posted by tooki:
Uh, no, you take off the bottom, the top, and umpteen more layers of parts. I'm a seasoned Mac tech, and I consider the iBooks and AlBooks daunting to work on. I have done it a few times, but it's a pain in the patoot unmatched by any Apple laptop since the mid-90s. It involves about 40 screws, all tiny and most of them unique, which have to come out and go back in in the correct order.

Leave it to a pro.

tooki

I won't disagree with you on the other parts, but I was most definitely able to replace my hard drive and optical drive without removing the bottom cover of my ibook G4.

I remember reading a brief link on xlr8yourmac.com about some reader who said that you need to remove the bottom cover on G3 icebooks (and *maybe* 14" ibook G4s) but I can personally vouche for the fact that you don't need to remove the bottom cover on a 12" ibook G4. You need to remove all the screws, but not the cover.

[bimmerphile]

Originally posted by brother337:
I was most definitely able to replace my hard drive and optical drive without removing the bottom cover of my ibook G4.

I want to see pics of this.

By doing it this way, you are not doing it how apple has designed the laptop for dissasembly, as well as instructing techs how to do it.

[brother337]

Originally posted by bimmerphile:
I want to see pics of this.

By doing it this way, you are not doing it how apple has designed the laptop for dissasembly, as well as instructing techs how to do it.

Oh gawd. I don't want to have to do that all again, just for the sake of posting pics

Seriously, tho, Apple must have slightly changed the design on the 12" iBook G4s cause I had immediate access to the hard drive and optical drive as soon as I removed the top RF cover. I never had to remove the bottom cover or the bottom RF cover.

[DDP]

So how much of the bottom do you have to take off? The outer casing, and then undo screws which attach the top case to the unit?

Then flip it over, and you take the keyboard out, memory etc, then the RF layer (the shielding silver thing I presume RF is?), then you have access to the HDD?

[brother337]

Originally posted by DDP:
So how much of the bottom do you have to take off? The outer casing, and then undo screws which attach the top case to the unit?

Then flip it over, and you take the keyboard out, memory etc, then the RF layer (the shielding silver thing I presume RF is?), then you have access to the HDD?

Yes, the RF shielding is that silver thing.

Well, removing the bottom case at all is what's in debate right now. The other two guys (one of whom is an MCE tech, and has far more experience than I do) is saying that you need to remove the entire bottom casing (and RF shielding?) before you can eventually access the hard drive.

I'm not a certified tech (but I pay the bills doing sysadmin/tech support stuff at my office) but I was able (off a suggestion from the internet) to access my hard drive without ever having to remove the bottom cover. I unscrewed the bottom case (but didn't remove it,) then removed the keyboard, then unscrewed and removed the top case, then unscrewed and removed the top RF shielding. Never had to remove anything from the bottom.

I *think* it has something to do with the fact that in the previous G3 icebooks, you needed to remove the bottom case to undo the tape or foil that was holding the top RF shielding down. But in the G4 12", they did away with that design, and the top RF shielding just comes right off if you simply unscrew it.

But yeah. Unscrew that top RF shielding and remove it and you've got total access to your HD.

[DDP]

Excellent. So from that, would you say it was a much easier install? Sounds that you only have to remove a few things to actually get at it.
I'll have a more in-depth look into this week, I am still a bit weary of doing it myself..

[brother337]

Originally posted by DDP:
Excellent. So from that, would you say it was a much easier install? Sounds that you only have to remove a few things to actually get at it.
I'll have a more in-depth look into this week, I am still a bit weary of doing it myself..

It's easier than the G3 iBooks, but it's still a daunting task. There are a lot of screws to remove, and you need to remember where each one goes. I personally printed out the screenshots from the links I posted earlier, and put each screw in it's corresponding place on each picture.

That being said, if you're smart about keeping track of where the screws go, that part is not so bad. What wracked my nerves was undoing the plastic hooks from the top case to unclasp the cover (mainly cause you can't see them.)

Like I said, if you're handy, it's doable, but there's no shame lost in getting a professional to do it.

I fix computers (mainly PCs) for a living so there was a pride thing involved I had to do it myself.

[DDP]

Thanks again for the info.
Am I right in thinking any 2.5inch drive will work? I am little concerned about heat from a 7.2k drive, but I guess it would be ok if you have got it in

Couple more questions if thats ok?

- Would this HDD be alright?
http://www.ebuyer.com/customer/produ...duct_uid=81459

- Once its installed and iBook is rsassembled, is it just a case of running OSX Install Disk1 and it will find the drive in the installer window, or so I need to run disk utility to build an image on it?


Thanks.

[brother337]

The drive needs to be a 2.5 inch drive no thicker than 9.5mm, which the one you linked to is.

However, it's the 5400 rpm version. I'd still recommend the 7200 rpm version, but this one should do you just fine, if you're looking to save a buck or two.

Once you have installed the drive, yes, you can boot of mac OsX disk 1 and use the disk utility to initialize the drive and then reinstall the OS.

However, what I did was to install the old 4200 RPM drive into an external firewire case (I used a macally case), and boot off that. Then I used Carbon Copy Cloner to clone my old drive to the new drive. That save's a *lot* of time.

[DDP]

Thanks. Don't think I'll be able to do that since my hdd is unreadable and basically completely dead.

[brother337]

Originally posted by DDP:
Thanks. Don't think I'll be able to do that since my hdd is unreadable and basically completely dead.

Ah, yes. I had completely forgotten about that. Good luck! Let us know how it goes.