Out with the old, in with the Macbook Pro!

Hello all! Well after a long and horrible experience with HP customer support, I have been turned off by PC's altogether and canceled my recent $2K purchase. In a spontaneous turn of events, or maybe I was simply enraged, I decided to throw the towel and click on apple.com for the first time. Well it's D-Day and after 3 or 4 hours of research trying to find solid forums, I have decided that here is one of the places I should be if I have any hopes of getting through this transition with ease.

Let me first off say, even thought I know Windows 7 inside and out, Snow Leopard makes me a tad bit intimidated. So I backed in hopes of getting my hardware and software in order first. Well here's my current situation...

I just opened my first Apple product ever. It's a Macbook Pro 13, 2.53Ghz.

I recently purchased from a 3rd party:
- Samsung 256GB SSD
- 8GB of HYNIX RAM
- Office 2008 Business
- Windows 7 Ultimate 32bit & 64bit

Is there any tips or concerns I should be aware of when:
- Upgrading the SSD and RAM? (besides static discharge and screw placement)
- Reinstalling Snow Leopard? (I don't have any current data to transfer)
- Installing Windows 7 Ultimate 64bit??

Finally, is there a feature to securely reformat the stock HDD? (I would like to resale the stock 256GB HDD & 4GB RAM)

It seems to be slightly overwhelming to dive into the world of Mac, but I'm really looking forward to it. Any help, input, or comments would be much appreciated!

I think you should be okay with the first two steps; as for installing Windows 7, just be sure to follow the instructions for Boot Camp provided here. Once you install Snow Leopard and connect your old hard drive, you can open the application called Disk Utility from the Utilities folder inside your Applications folder. Once it's open, choose the disk from the list on the left and click the Erase tab in the main section. You can click the Security Options… button to choose how securely you want to clear the disk.

In the case that you don't have an external drive to connect the disk once you take it out, just erase it before you install the SSD. Put in the Installation Disc, hold the C key when booting up, and the installer will start. Instead of going through the steps for installation, click Utilities on the menu bar at the top and then choose Disk Utility. You can then follow the instructions above.

Don't worry about the initial shock; in a week or so, you'll feel right at home. Every once in a while you'll run into something you can't figure out, but if you take the time to learn it right, you'll be fine. The key is to remember that Apple approaches many problems from an entirely different perspective from other companies, so it's not worth trying to make things work the way you are used to them working. You can come here with questions (of course), and if you're really having trouble relearning things (or if you just want to learn all kinds of neat tricks), check out the Missing Manual for Snow Leopard by David Pogue. It's a great book.

Welcome, and good luck!

First, welcome to these forums! And welcome to the Mac platform.

As for your questions...

Since your MBP is new, swapping out the stock HDD for the SSD should be fairly easy especially if you haven't installed many programs yet. There are several ways you can go about swapping the drive:

1. Clone the stock HDD to the SSD so that it's bootable and then make the swap. That requires software. I recommend either SuperDuper (shareware) or Carbon Copy Cloner (donation ware).

2. Remove the stock HDD and install the SSD. Then use your Snow Leopard install DVD to boot the MBP, select Utilities from the top menu and then select Disk Utility. Use Disk Utility to format the new SSD and then proceed to install Snow Leopard and applications.

Of the two methods, I recommend method 1.

As for the actual installation of the SSD and memory, there are DIY intructions on the web and even videos on U-Tube which show how. Do some Googling.

Be sure to read the Boot Camp PDF installation instructions that are included with your copy of Snow Leopard. Print them out and have them in front of you when you get ready to install Windows 7. Since you have all that memory, install the 64 bit version. As a note.... Apple will be issuing an update to Boot Camp before long. The update will provide better driver support for Windows 7.

If you need any further help, feel free to ask. The folks in this forum are very helpful and knowledgeable.

Have fun.

Regards.