Replacing Fan and Possibly HDD

Well I have noticed that the right Fan has developed quite an annoying hum. The was substantiated by using smcFanControl, and as I increase its speed, the hum worsens.

This seems to be a new noise since the latest auto update, but probably is coincidental since the left one doesn't make the noise at the same RPMs.

My main question is this, where do I find a replacement fan? Is there several to choose from, ones that run quieter than others. Back in my PC building days, there was a huge difference between fans, and panaflo by a huge margin was the quietest. Is this the same with Mac?

Second, while I have the computer apart, I was thinking about upgrading the HDD as well. I seem to be running out of room easily, and I would rather not use my HDD space conservatively, but rather liberally. Again, the same question, what is the best HDD replacement for the MBP? I am concerned with noise, obviously since I want to replace a noisy fan, the quieter the better. But of course performance as well. I would like to go at least 250 if not bigger. Thoughts out there?

Another question, I can probably search for this when its time, but feel free to comment if you are bored. How would I go about transferring data from this HDD to the new one. I have part of this HDD partitioned out for Boot Camp. Will the HDD Cloning programs take care of this, how complicated will it be?

Thanks ahead of time! Again the main questions here are where and what parts to get for the quietest and best performance.

Floyd

MBP 2.16 GHz Core2Duo, 3GB 667 Mhz DDR2, 120 GB HDD Serial ATA

floyd923 said:

Well I have noticed that the right Fan has developed quite an annoying hum. The was substantiated by using smcFanControl, and as I increase its speed, the hum worsens.

This seems to be a new noise since the latest auto update, but probably is coincidental since the left one doesn't make the noise at the same RPMs.

My main question is this, where do I find a replacement fan? Is there several to choose from, ones that run quieter than others. Back in my PC building days, there was a huge difference between fans, and panaflo by a huge margin was the quietest. Is this the same with Mac?

Click to expand...

Laptop fans are generally proprietary. So, you'll need to find the correct OEM replacement for your fan. Apple typically uses very high quality fans. If it's making a lot of noise, it might just be caked with dust. I would clean it before you decide to replace it. You can get parts and instructions from iFixit: iPod, iBook, & PowerBook Parts and Accessories.

Second, while I have the computer apart, I was thinking about upgrading the HDD as well. I seem to be running out of room easily, and I would rather not use my HDD space conservatively, but rather liberally. Again, the same question, what is the best HDD replacement for the MBP? I am concerned with noise, obviously since I want to replace a noisy fan, the quieter the better. But of course performance as well. I would like to go at least 250 if not bigger. Thoughts out there?

Click to expand...

I just bought a Seagate ST9320421ASG, which is a 320GB, 7200RPM drive, with shock protection. I paid about $91+shipping. The drive is virtually silent and is very fast for a notebook drive. I would highly recommend Seagate was they all come with a 5 year warranty. My only other recommendation would be a Western Digital drive, but they only carry a 3 year warranty. Steer VERY CLEAR of Fujitsu, Samsung and Toshiba drives.

Another question, I can probably search for this when its time, but feel free to comment if you are bored. How would I go about transferring data from this HDD to the new one. I have part of this HDD partitioned out for Boot Camp. Will the HDD Cloning programs take care of this, how complicated will it be?

Thanks ahead of time! Again the main questions here are where and what parts to get for the quietest and best performance.

Floyd

MBP 2.16 GHz Core2Duo, 3GB 667 Mhz DDR2, 120 GB HDD Serial ATA

Click to expand...

I used SuperDuper to clone the old drive to the new one. Then, I created a Boot Camp partition using Boot Camp Assistant and used WinClone to backup and restore the Boot Camp partition from the old drive to the newly created Boot Camp partition. It worked perfectly. A note of caution though - make sure you use the Boot Camp Assistant to create the partition on the new drive. WinClone will NOT work with a self-created partition using Disk Utility or something similar.

The HDD that you mentioned above, is it the same as this one from Newegg? Or is there two different models, ST9320421ASG (with G protection) and ST9320421AS (without G protection). I was about to order it, but just wanted to make sure the one I linked also had the G protection.


Also, below is a PM conversation between me and cwa107, under his recommendation, I wanted to let those interested in this topic the opportunity to see what was going on, as when I get the HDD, I will be asking a few more questions and wanted everyone to be up to speed.


His words: Sounds like you're looking to do an almost identical upgrade to what I just went through. I'll be happy to help, although I would recommend keeping it in the public forums, just so that others can benefit from the discourse.

My Words: "stay VERY CLEAR of fujitsu..." - great, the default apple drive...

His Reply: Fujitsus aren't all that bad reliability-wise, but they have a tendency to bleed EMI (ever hear a bunch of weird noises when you're using headphones? - that's your Fujitsu drive). Samsung and Toshiba are consistently unreliable. Hitachi is similarly unreliable, but they occasionally produce a decent drive.

I work as a network admin and see a lot of different failed hard drives in my line of work, so this opinion is representative of my experience in the field.

My first MacBook Pro had a Seagate, so I don't think Apple limits their OEMs to just Fujitsu.


What I Said, "Seagate made a great drive with the name baracuda that i always went with on my builds (reliable and quiet!), so I can only assume that your recommendation of a seagate for the MBP is equally as good, thanks!"

His Reply: Seagate had a few bad years, but once they reintroduced the 5 year warranty, their product line and marketshare really came back. I've been using their drives almost exclusively in my PCs and Macs, and have had nothing but good experiences with them.

What I Said: "How are you setting up the new HDD to clone? How are you hooking it up, etc. The only, albeit old school, way that I can think of is to clone onto time capsule, then hook it up as a slave on my Windows Box and copy the files over...then what about the windows partition files?"

His Reply: I used a SATA/PATA to USB adapter that I picked up for $20 from NewEgg. It allows you to attach any hard drive externally, without the need to mount it in a case - very handy tool. I actually have two of them (one for home and one for work).

I don't believe SuperDuper, or any of the Mac cloning tools can do a clone to an NTFS partition, so you might want to reconsider that option.

Once I finish the clone (and use WinClone to create an image of the Boot Camp partition and save it over to the new drive), I then install it. After that, I use BCA to create the new partition and restore it. And finally, I used Paragon's free "CampTune" to resize the Windows partition to my liking (in this case, 80GB from 60GB).

What I Said: "Also, on the new hard drive, if I want to partition a larger section for the Windows side, will that be ok, or does the partition size have to be the same for winclone to work properly?"

His Reply: It does need to be the same size, otherwise it will restore your image, but Windows will think it's the same size, despite the fact that the partition is in reality, larger. Even Disk Management in Vista can't convince Windows to use the entire partition. I tried about a thousand different ways to work around this, but the only thing that worked was CampTune, after having restored the image to the original partition size.

Good luck, and let me know how it goes (although I would ask that you keep it in the public thread, for the reasons I mentioned before).

floyd923 said:

The HDD that you mentioned above, is it the same as this one from Newegg? Or is there two different models, ST9320421ASG (with G protection) and ST9320421AS (without G protection). I was about to order it, but just wanted to make sure the one I linked also had the G protection.

Click to expand...

Thanks for including the content of the PMs we exchanged.

I looked at NewEgg first, and was considering that drive as well, but as I looked through the user reviews, I noticed that one of the users pointed out that it was not the model that has the G-force protection. Since I was putting the drive in a machine that travels with me constantly, I decided to opt for the "ASG" model, which I found at mwave.com (using Pricegrabber) for $91+shipping. I usually order all of my stuff from NewEgg, but they just didn't have that model at all. I had no trouble with mwave.com, however it was a bit slow to ship (two days from the time I ordered), and of course it came ground from CA, which takes quite awhile since I'm in PA.

Alright, bringing this thread back to life. Couple of questions. First, I replaced the HDD, and expanded to 320. Got the Mac partition working great, no problems. Then I created a partition using boot camp assistant, and used winclone to put the windows image on the new partition. I then boot up into Windows through boot camp with no problems. It loads up for the first time, says it found new hardware, then restarts after it has it installed, and continue to boot and run perfect. But then when I try to get Fusion to open windows, it gets to the windows load screen, like everything is fine, but then just goes black and nothing happens, and I have to close Fusion.

But then when I try to go back into windows through bootcamp, the same thing happens, it just goes black and nothing works. Keyboard doesn't respond (light on caplocks for instance) and it just stays there. But it will boot up in safe mode if I try that.

Any ideas? Thanks

Also, a second question to string on instead of opening a new thread. With iStat, in the battery information, what does the letter A mean. For quick and ease, my signature has the picture of what I am talking about. This picture is the best way to explain what I am asking:

Did you install VMWare Tools immediately after booting it from Fusion?

Not sure on your 2nd question.