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youngjeezy · Feb 14, 2009, 01:15 PM

Hey guys,
I am needing to upgrade my white MacBook HD. What I was wondering is, is it possible to backup everything on my HD right now to a portable HD (Western Digital MyBook 500gb 2.5") and then take that HD out of the case and install it into my MacBook? Will it make a bootable backup? Also, which software is the best for this?
Thanks

Koralatov · Feb 14, 2009, 01:45 PM

Originally Posted by youngjeezy

Hey guys,
I am needing to upgrade my white MacBook HD. What I was wondering is, is it possible to backup everything on my HD right now to a portable HD (Western Digital MyBook 500gb 2.5") and then take that HD out of the case and install it into my MacBook? Will it make a bootable backup? Also, which software is the best for this?
Thanks

It’s a piece of cake — I helped my little brother do the same thing three weeks ago. We used Carbon Copy Cloner to make an exact duplicate of his internal HD onto the new one, then popped out the old one, installed the new one, and put the old 120GB into the enclosure.

It really is that easy, and by far the longest wait was whilst CCC duplicated the old disk onto the new; the actual installation of the drive took about 15 minutes.

Good luck!

mduell · Feb 15, 2009, 12:24 AM

I'd suggest buying the 7200RPM 500GB Seagate and a separate external; faster, easier to disassemble than the WD, and you keep the warranty intact on both pieces.

mukeshcb · Feb 15, 2009, 01:17 AM

Well iam agree with mduell just go through that..definitly you will have what u need..thanks

jogi · Feb 16, 2009, 12:23 AM

What is the power consumption like on the 7200 rpm drives? Also price difference? Considering that SSD's are falling rapidly in price, an SSD with 512GB could be affordable in half a year or so.

mduell · Feb 16, 2009, 02:29 PM

Originally Posted by jogi

What is the power consumption like on the 7200 rpm drives? Also price difference? Considering that SSD's are falling rapidly in price, an SSD with 512GB could be affordable in half a year or so.

The power consumption is about the same. The price difference is about $40.
SSD prices are falling, but not that fast.

Doc HM · Feb 16, 2009, 07:34 PM

If you don't have a removable enclosure for the new drive you'll have to do it in stages, using carbon copy cloner. Once to clone your drive onto your external and again to clone back onto your new drive.

It's not too hard just a pain waiting for ccc to do it's stuff, can take a good few hours on a big drive with lots of data. Doubled obviously if you need to clone back.

If the drive installation takes you 15 minutes, you're doing it wrong. Should take 3 or four mins max, it's that easy.

Koralatov · Feb 17, 2009, 08:44 AM

Originally Posted by jogi

Considering that SSD's are falling rapidly in price, an SSD with 512GB could be affordable in half a year or so.

It depends on your definition of "affordable", I suppose, but I don't forsee even 128GB SSDs being within most people's reach in that time. If they are, they definitely won't be ones that perform well.

Originally Posted by Doc HM

If the drive installation takes you 15 minutes, you're doing it wrong. Should take 3 or four mins max, it's that easy.

I wouldn't say that at all. We were taking our time, and it was the first time my little brother had done anything like this, so he took it nice and slow to make sure he did everything right. He just spent £85 on the 500GB drive, so he really couldn't afford to screw it up.

That said, if you fire through it at top speed, you could get it done in less than five minutes.

mduell · Feb 17, 2009, 09:12 PM

Originally Posted by Koralatov

It depends on your definition of "affordable", I suppose, but I don't forsee even 128GB SSDs being within most people's reach in that time. If they are, they definitely won't be ones that perform well.

In the context of $1000-3000 laptops, a $250 SSD (128GB) is certainly affordable and compared to similar capacity HDDs also performant.

CharlesS · Feb 17, 2009, 09:31 PM

What I would do would not to get a pre-built external hard drive, but just to get an enclosure and put your old drive in it. Then, after you put the new drive in your MacBook, you can just connect the external enclosure and use Migration Assistant to move everything over from the old drive.

Simon · 05:16 AM

Originally Posted by mduell

In the context of $1000-3000 laptops, a $250 SSD (128GB) is certainly affordable and compared to similar capacity HDDs also performant.

Actually any $250 128GB SSD will be a disappointment in terms of overall performance. Half the price will get you a very fast and much higher capacity HDD right now. You need to pay much more for a really good SSD.

Really good SSDs like the Intel X25-E that use SLC rather than cheap MLC are more along the lines of $405 for 32GB!

The 160GB medium performer Intel X25-M is $779 (it's MLC though). Much too expensive for a $1000 notebook. Price-wise that equipment is reserved for high-end notebooks ($3k).

Simon · Feb 18, 2009, 04:54 AM

Originally Posted by CharlesS

What I would do would not to get a pre-built external hard drive, but just to get an enclosure and put your old drive in it. Then, after you put the new drive in your MacBook, you can just connect the external enclosure and use Migration Assistant to move everything over from the old drive.

That's good advice.

Once the enclosure arrives, you swap the disks, put the old one into the enclosure, and boot from the install DVD. Either have migration assistant move over everything from the old drive to the new one or use Disk Utility > Restore (once booted form the installer DVD you'll find it in the Utilities menu) to clone from the old external drive to the new internal one. Make sure you check "Erase destination" to ensure a bootable and fast (block copy) clone.

In terms of enclosures, if you're interesting in swapping drives on a more regular basis or you want an enclosure for both 2.5" notebook disks and regular 3.5" hard disks, I suggest you look at SATA docking stations. Newegg has a USB dock for $34.

DCJ001 · 09:04 PM

I've got a FireWire external hard drive with a partition that I use for Time Machine and another partition that I use to make bootable clones, with Carbon Copy Cloner, of my internal hard drive. I've ordered the Hitachi 7k320, 320GB 7200 RPM, hard drive to replace my internal 200GB 7200 RPM drive.

When the new drive arrives on Monday, I'll clone my internal drive to the external drive. I'll install the new 320GB 7200 RPM Hitachi. I'll format it. Then, I'll clone from the external drive to the new 320GB 7200 RPM Hitachi.

ZipZoomFly is currently selling the 320GB 7200 RPM Hitachi for $49.99, after a $20.00 rebate, with free shipping! It's the best value that I've seen. If you're interested, this price and $20.00 rebate are good for purchases made through 02/21:

http://www.zipzoomfly.com/jsp/Produc...%26prodlist=at

Simon · Feb 21, 2009, 04:53 AM

Originally Posted by DCJ001

I've got a FireWire external hard drive with a partition that I use for Time Machine and another partition that I use to make bootable clones, with Carbon Copy Cloner, of my internal hard drive.

For cloning, you should switch to /Applications/Utilities/Disk Utility > Restore.

It makes bootable clones, it's much faster (block mode), and it never had any of the issues CCC had.

DCJ001 · Feb 21, 2009, 01:59 PM

Originally Posted by Simon

For cloning, you should switch to /Applications/Utilities/Disk Utility > Restore.

It makes bootable clones, it's much faster (block mode), and it never had any of the issues CCC had.

Good info. I actually planned to do that for the HD switch. But it's good to hear you agree.