[fosters2]

We do a lot of development work on Windows and Mac, so I decided to upgrade the hard drive of my Macbook Pro to 250GB to coincide with Leopard. That would give me approx 100GB for Windows (Virtual Machines) and the rest for OSX.

I ordered a 250GB drive (Samsung HM250JI) and the install wasn't too difficult. BTW, I know about the warranty issue and planned on keeping the old drive just in case it needed repairs.

This is where the problems started. During the install of Leopard, it would hang with 2 hours 43 minutes indicated to go. Restarted a couple of times and same hang. Different times indicated but same problem.

I verified the OSX 10.5 DVD and I also did a repair on the hard drive (I also remounted the drive a couple of times).

No joy.

I then took out my old OSX 10.4 disks and did an install. The first try didn't work (same problem as above) but I was able to get it installed on the second try. Go figure.

So, I then tried to do a plain upgrade install from 10.4 to Leopard and ........ it stopped at 2 hours 43 minutes.

Took it to the Genius Bar at the local Apple store (5 miles from where I live ). They had the same problems and could not get it installed. They declared the hard drive defective and wanted me to send it in for repair. Note, they never said anything about the drive being non-standard.

Took it home and reinstalled the old drive. Did the Leopard install and all went fine the first try.

So, I plan on getting a new 250GB drive and see if that does the trick.

Any ideas?

[Cold Warrior]

weird. As a workaround, you could try putting the drive in an external enclosure and try to install it there (if you're so inclined; you shouldn't have to do this; Leopard should have worked for you if your drive isn't defective). Just a workaround thought. Then you could pop it in your MBP to see if it boots.

[NeXTLoop]

I have that same hard drive. The issue is the firmware for the HD. The Apple System Profiler should read: "Revision HS100-08".

If it says "HS100-06" or earlier, then you need to update it. Once I updated it, the HD worked beautifully.

Here's the link...

Accelerate Your Mac News Archive for Wednesday Aug 8, 2007

[fosters2]

Thanks for the info. I'll try it this evening.

[fosters2]

Worked like a charm! Thanks.

[NeXTLoop]

Originally Posted by fosters2 

Worked like a charm! Thanks.

Awesome! Glad to hear it. One other thing to bear in mind about this drive is that it tends to make a semi-loud "Click" sound when it parks the head. Worried the heck out of me the first time I heard it... until I checked around and read most people reporting the same thing.