Internal HD upgrade

[kap]

Until we could afford a 13 inch MacBook, wife continues enjoying her 12 inch G4 powerbook DVI. Everything is stock. RAM is maxed out at 1 Gig. The CD/DVD is moody at times; still works. Is it recommendable to upgrade the hard drive to a faster one? Is it possible to DIY? I am not an expert but handy enough to open up the powerbook 520 b/w to replace its tube.

[C(-)ris]

The HD is kind of a PITA in those. Not as bad as the iBook G4, but not as easy as a MacBook. I'm not sure about the PB520, never worked on pre G3 stuff.

It is also an IDE drive. You are going to have a harder time finding an inexpensive 2.5" IDE drive.

I've sold some Core Duo MacBooks as cheap as $225. Might want to check your local Craigslist and see if there are any good deals to be found.

[Ken Sp.]

C(-)ris wrote:
The HD is kind of a PITA in those. Not as bad as the iBook G4, but not as easy as a MacBook. I'm not sure about the PB520, never worked on pre G3 stuff.

It is also an IDE drive. You are going to have a harder time finding an inexpensive 2.5" IDE drive.

I've sold some Core Duo MacBooks as cheap as $225. Might want to check your local Craigslist and see if there are any good deals to be found.

:agree:

[kap]

C(-)ris wrote:
I've sold some Core Duo MacBooks as cheap as $225. Might want to check your local Craigslist and see if there are any good deals to be found.

Aren't those problematic?

[sekker]

I retired my wife's PB12 for a 13 MBP. It just wasn't cost effective to update or support anymore.

If you have a strong sentimental attachment, I think OWC sells an ssd upgrade for that machine.

[Chakravartin]

Perfect candidate for a Compact Flash -> IDE mod.

[sekker]

Chakravartin wrote:
Perfect candidate for a Compact Flash -> IDE mod.

Good idea for the boot drive. And maybe an SATA to IDE to put a hd in the optical slot.

[C(-)ris]

kap wrote:
[quote=C(-)ris]
I've sold some Core Duo MacBooks as cheap as $225. Might want to check your local Craigslist and see if there are any good deals to be found.

Aren't those problematic?
Not in particular. They won't run Lion or Mountain Lion. They run a bit hot, but otherwise they are decent machines.

[Black]

Chakravartin wrote:
Perfect candidate for a Compact Flash -> IDE mod.

That would be dog slow, no?

[Chakravartin]

Black wrote:
[quote=Chakravartin]
Perfect candidate for a Compact Flash -> IDE mod.

That would be dog slow, no?
Compared to the original HD, I doubt there'd be any observable slowdown with a 300x or faster card... and 600x cards would easily beat it.

People seldom realize how slow laptop drives are (especially Apple's bundled drives) when compared to desktop drives. I recently bit-copied a MBP's boot drive in Thunderbolt target mode and barely pulled 50MBps from it.

400x CF cards can hit 60MBps during reads.

...And CF runs cool with low power-draw.