First I should state that I have advanced knowledge in the IT world; 15 years and counting. But I need some help here on a MacBook white HDD upgrade, and I was hoping someone may have some answers that will help me out. I've been reading for more than 3 hours now, trying to solve this issue.
Replacing the HDD on a 2006 MacBook White unibody (had a 80GB 5400rpm Sata) with a 500GB WD 7200rpm Sata2 HDD.
The setup would not see the HDD. The disk utility does see the HDD but says the unit is 3.6TB. An attempt to partition or erase the drive gives an error "input/output error".
I plugged the drive up to a external USB connection and could install Mac OS X (default CD that came with the system). It boots up fine. But if I put the HDD back in the system (internally) I just get a "cannot be found" picture (circle with a line through it).
I've read a lot of things over the hours....
- I read of trying the external USB connection, then pop it back in and it will work > this half worked.
- I read that the unit has a limit of 5400rpm, but others have gotten 7200rpm drives to work. Personally I've never heard of a rpm limitation with hardware as all Sata specs are backwards compatible.
- I read that Snow Leopard OS was needed to complete the job. (have not tried this yet, need a dual layer DVD-R)
Things I am currently trying...
- Acronis Disk Image software = cloning the old HDD to the new HDD (will take hours).
- Using the Disk Utility to partition the drive in two. (< this failed, same input/output error message)
If anyone has any experience on the topic and can shed some light on this, maybe some workarounds I would really appreciate it. Thanks
Replacing the HDD on a 2006 MacBook White unibody (had a 80GB 5400rpm Sata) with a 500GB WD 7200rpm Sata2 HDD.
The setup would not see the HDD. The disk utility does see the HDD but says the unit is 3.6TB. An attempt to partition or erase the drive gives an error "input/output error".
I plugged the drive up to a external USB connection and could install Mac OS X (default CD that came with the system). It boots up fine. But if I put the HDD back in the system (internally) I just get a "cannot be found" picture (circle with a line through it).
I've read a lot of things over the hours....
- I read of trying the external USB connection, then pop it back in and it will work > this half worked.
- I read that the unit has a limit of 5400rpm, but others have gotten 7200rpm drives to work. Personally I've never heard of a rpm limitation with hardware as all Sata specs are backwards compatible.
- I read that Snow Leopard OS was needed to complete the job. (have not tried this yet, need a dual layer DVD-R)
Things I am currently trying...
- Acronis Disk Image software = cloning the old HDD to the new HDD (will take hours).
- Using the Disk Utility to partition the drive in two. (< this failed, same input/output error message)
If anyone has any experience on the topic and can shed some light on this, maybe some workarounds I would really appreciate it. Thanks
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