Macbook HDD swapping and backing up

Hi everyone,

i am looking for the easiest and the best way to do a little HDD backing up and swapping, Here is my issue.

i have a late 2009 macbook i recently ordered a new 1tb HDD for it but before i even got it my logicbored fried so i ended up getting one of the new Macbook Pros, now what i would like to do is get all the information (movies music and documents) off the 2009 macbooks HDD and put it on the 1tb and then put the 1tb into the new macbook pro. i Unforunently do not have a time machine set up from the old macbook.

so i am kind of wondering if i can clone the Macbook pro's HDD drive on to the 1TB then put it right into the new macbook pro and then the late 2009 macbook hdd into an extrernal SATA case and use that as if it were still in a Macbook and do the Load from oldermac service.

or

put the 2009 macbook HDD into the Macbook pro and then clone that one on to the 1tb and replace and what not.

i have not recived the new macbook pro yet, shipping is a little slow for me because i am in afghanistan the supplies i have are pretty good as i am an I.T. in the USMC but they are still just the essentials

i have read alittle bit about the swapping HDD on the forums but nothing that could quite help with this small predicament.

any help would be greatfully apperciated even other ideas and tips!

thank you very much for your time!

Let me preface my reply with this bit of info for you:

The proper hard drive dimensions for fitting in a MacBook or MacBook Pro are - the drive must be SATA, 2.5" wide, and no more than 9.5 MM thick.

1 TB hard drives are typically 12.5 MM thick. The drive will probably fit in your new MBP but may be subject to overheating. There are reports that the 1 TB drives will work OK, but others have reported problems with them.

My advice is not to use it in your new MBP especially over there in Afghanistan where the climate is very hot.

actully thats not the issue samsung released 1tb 2.5" 9.5 mm

Newegg.com - SAMSUNG Spinpoint M8 HN-M101MBB 1TB 5400 RPM 8MB Cache 2.5" SATA 3.0Gb/s Internal Notebook Hard Drive -Bare Drive

its been proven to fit and run well in the new macbooks.

my issue is more along the lines of migrating the data from the old macbook to the new TB HDD and putting that HDD in to the new macbook when the old macbook wont power on

Saw that drive a couple days ago, then saw it was Samsung... hit one... then saw it's a 5400rpm... hit two... then it's only a 8MB cache... hit three. But, I guess if you just gotta have the space on your notebook, it's the only game in town.


Cheap way is to get yourself a universal IDE/SATA to USB kit. Something like one of these. Once you have the drive in your MBP, have installed Snow Leopard on it... pull the drive from the old MB, connect it and try using the Migration Assistant or just drag and drop what you want.

It's good to know that Samsung has released a 1 TB drive with the proper dimensions. Western Digital likewise has said they are soon to release a 1 TB model for notebooks.

As bobtomay stated, the Samsung drive's performance is not that great, but it does allow for the extra space. Follow his advice about copying the data from your old drive and you should be OK.

I completly forgot about migration assistan! that will work from putting the old HDD in to the sata case? nop other hardware needs to be detected or anything?

i was pretty excited to see 1 TB that i could slide in to my macbook will help so i dont always have to carry a pesky external with all of my movies and pictures on it.

how they did this is by making the HDD a 2 platter 500gb disc instead of the usual 3 platter 333.3gb way i think that is possibly why the cache is a bit lower. but that also makes for less moving parts wich in my opnion means less chance to break.

i think there is a WD HDD that is a tb but i have a personal vendetta against that company me and my barracks room mate both had WD bought with in a month of each other 2 months later they both failed out of no were and from what we saw for no reason. i have had other WD drives do the same thing.

The Migration Assistant app should work. But it requires the installation of the OS first before you can run it and copy over from the external hard drive in the SATA carrier.

It would be better to make a Time Machine backup of the old drive to an external drive and restore it during the installation of the new drive and OS X. That will be faster and will restore everything for you.

so you think i should install the old drive into the new computer time machine back it up. put the new 1tb into the macbook install osx and then use time machine to restore it?

That's what I would do. I've done that procedure numerous times and it works well. Much faster and surer than the Migration Assistant.

I think the most pain free way for me to do this. after lots of web searcing and opinions is going to be.

boot new mac to format 1tb drive
install 1tb hdd into new mac
install OSX on to drive
on first sytstem boot up after install
use migration assistant to transfer files from old HDD

and then blam!

i will have a working

13" Macbook Pro 1TB HDD 8GB RAM

any ideas on how long it will take to transfer apx 150gigs over a sata/USB cable to the new HDD?