Upgrading hard drive

I am new to this forum and not very computer literate but I do know I love my Apple products. We purchased three macs 3 years ago and our warranty just ran out on all three and now all of a sudden my daughters computer is having problems one month later. We have appt tomorrow at the Genius Bar but I have a couple of questions just so I will know what to ask.

1. Have you every heard of them honoring a warranty that has just expired and we never used the warranty.

2. I did a back up today and noticed we have a 160 gig hard drive I guess is what you call it. She only has 5.1 gig left. That could be one problem. My question is ball park how expensive is it to add gig or does this require a whole new hard drive?

3. There is also a crack in the screen - can they just replace the glass or does the entire top part have to be replaced.

4. My husband thinks humidity may also be a problem with the computer. Our daughter has been living in the West Indies for 3 months with no AC. I just returned from a trip there and brought her computer back to get it worked on. Do you think this could be a problem as well or are these computers pretty well sealed.

5. Our daughter takes tons of pictures and has a highend camer so I can imagine that it is filled with pics and video. Any suggestions on an upgrade - or should I just delete all.

Here are the stats on the computer: not sure if this even matters but wanted to share


Hardware Overview:

Model Name: MacBook
Model Identifier: MacBook5,1
Processor Name: Intel Core 2 Duo
Processor Speed: 2 GHz
Number Of Processors: 1
Total Number Of Cores: 2
L2 Cache: 3 MB
Memory: 2 GB
Bus Speed: 1.07 GHz
Boot ROM Version: MB51.007D.B03
SMC Version (system): 1.40f2
Serial Number (system):
Hardware UUID:
Sudden Motion Sensor:
State: Enabled

I appreciate any advice. Thank you.

1. Depends. No legal requirement to do so, but sometimes the local manager will bend the rules for folks that are nice.

2. You cannot add to a Hard Drive. You can replace it with a bigger one. Look at OWC for good options. They have videos showing how to install a hard drive in just about every type Macbook.

3. I think the entire top is replaced, but I've not had that problem.

4. Humidity should not be a problem. The laptop runs hot enough to dry out any humidity that may be inside.

5. I wouldn't delete anything unless your daughter agreed. That drive is FULL, and you need more space, but unless she has backups somewhere, or if she says she doesn't want the pictures, I wouldn't just go wild deleting her stuff.

One other alternative may be to get an external hard drive and move the pictures to that device, freeing up space on the internal drive. OWC has those options, too.

Hope that helps some.

I believe yours is white book macbook, if you go thru apple store to get the hard drive, the hd
and screen might run around $250 or up. The reason why I got this number because I had an apple care mbp with the 320gb hard drive would not mount, the warranty work paper shows $125 part and labor $30 to replace. your screen replacement will cost more.
It is worth that kind of money ? Your macbook is not worth that much to repair.

What kind of problems are you seeing?

I would copy the pictures to an external drive and delete it from the HDD (after that). 5.1GB is low and you might see performance issues with that kind of space remaining.

Yeah, I concur with my colleagues. If the hard drive is just "running slow," I would bet serious money that clearing up a bunch of space (let's say 15GB or so for starters) will allow it to make a "miraculous" recovery.

That said, it might well be time to upgrade to a larger hard drive, they're quite inexpensive these days. A nice 500GB (plus an external one for BACKING UP, very very important!) shouldn't set you back that much and will probably make the machine run like new.

I believe yours is white book macbook, if you go thru apple store to get the hard drive

Click to expand...

I'm pretty sure that Apple have stopped supporting White MacBooks, so you'll have to source a hard drive from elsewhere.

Thank you all for advice. I sure used it. I did not delete anything but did back it up to Time Machine - at least I think it worked - it took a long time.

Next, I made an appt with the Apple Store for this morning. The fellow checked the computer and ran a utility check and said he fixed any glitches and was ready to send me out the door. He did not even look at the space available. I had to point this out. With only 4 gig left he said that could be one of the problems and said I needed to upgrade. He sent me to CompUSA to have 500 gig installed and also buy a Sata hard drive enclosure for the 160 hard drive to reload it. After leaving CompUSA I went back to the Apple store and they re-installed the operating system but they would not reload my original 160 hard drive. I told them that I had upgraded a couple years ago to Snow Leopard and it does not look like that is what they installed. Do you think it is on the 160 gig hard drive with all the data files. You can see I know very little about computers - I am doing this for my daughter who is out of the country.

Now I am back home and need to get the files on the 160 gig back on the computer. I already put it in the enclosure and pretty sure I know where the USB goes. I plugged it in but nothing happened. I went to finder and could see it under the main hard drive. Where do I go from here to get the files on the computer. I thought it would automatically do it. Should I try and drag it. I don't want to mess anything up so I am a little nervous without advice. Will it be menu driven or ask me questions at some point. I want it to be set up just as before all the files back on the computer in the main hard drive. I would appreciate any comments if there is anything particular I should look for when doing this.

Second, the Apple employee told me it would cost me $500 to replace the cracked screen as they only replace the entire thing. He thought I might could have the glass replaced but made no suggestions about how to go about this. Does any of this sound correct? This is the first Apple employee I was displeased with. I wish I had gotten one of the more energetic ones. I did not pay the $500 to replace screen.

Again I appreciate all of your help.

Also in is not a white macbook - it is silver. 2008/09 MacBook 5,1

at this moment your 160gb original drive should have all the good stuff. Just set aside, for future use.
the best choice will be get another 500gb or more drive to back up the current 500gb, since you have the external enclosure to copy over, use carbon copy clone (google internet) and you have the copy of the current drive, should another situation comes up, you can sweep the drives and get back into business no time.

I still need to know how to get the files on the computer

Thank you ycl1688. I will tell my daughter to get another 500 gig for back up.

I still need help getting the files and aps that are on the 160 gig back on her computer since she uses them often for school. Can you share a link or give instructions for this process. I am looking for elementary instructions since I am not as computer literate as most folks on this site.

I have the external plugged into the USB and can see both hard drives (500 internal and 160 external) when I go in to finder on the macbook. I just assumed it would automatically load but I guess it is wanting me to manually load and this is what I do not know how to do.

Thanks again.

use the following link migration assistant to transfer your data over pay attention to "time machine back up or other disk'' should get it done. Mac OS X v10.6: How to use Migration Assistant to transfer files from another Mac

Before you take ycl1688's advice, be aware that at this point Migration Assistant will probably transfer the files to a different user account than they are in now. This thread shows the problem and how another user resolved it. If the files your daughter needs are all in her home directory, I'd just copy and paste them directly. If your daughter has software that she installed, she can reinstall it when she gets the machine back, unless you have the installation files and registration information (if needed.)

To find what OS they installed, click on the Apple icon and look at About This Mac. You'll see what OS they installed there.

MacInWin - I can see the problem are talking about. Do you think I could just reload the Snow Leopard Operating system and start all over and transfer files at the time of re-registering. This sounds easier than Migration Assistant and files going to a different user.

I have not used MA personally, but from the reading in that thread and the documentation, I would say that if you are going to reinstall SL on the new drive, and if you don't have anything on the new drive that you need to preserve, you would be in the best condition if you did a complete install of SL, then used MA to move the files/programs/settings from the old drive to the new. That way MA should move your daughter's account and files to the same place they are on the old. The problem in that thread seemed to be that the poster had established the new account first, then used MA. MA won't move files into an existing account, so it didn't put them where he expected.

I defer to one of the OSX wizards to jump in here and give you their advice.