upgrading the hard drive in my mbp

Hi,

I am planning on upgrading my 13in macbook pro mid 2009 to a 500gb hard drive. I already have an external drive where I have it back up to via time machine.

Now when I put the new drive in, will i need to reinstall osx 10.6.whatever it is now? And after I do that, how do I restore my files from my backup? Thank you!

Yes, you will need to put the SL install disc in, restart, hold "C" while it is restarting until you hear the 2nd chime, go through the setup process, at the end it will ask you if you want to restore from a Time Machine backup. Make sure your external drive is plugged in at that point and then tell it to use your T.M. backup.