Will MBP's ever have a user-upgradable hard-drive?

I'm just curious on whether Apple will include the ability to allow end-users to upgrade the hard-drive easily in the next revision of the MBP. What are your thoughts?

 

I really don't see why they wouldn't.

 

stealthsniper96, hope your wrist heals quick. having a broken arm or leg is no picnic.

 

It probably won't.

This chassis design has been in use for close to a decade, and they have not added the replaceable hard drive in anything other than the ibook/macbook lines.

We can hope though :-D

 

Well, the thing is, it seems Apple will only get "even thinner" with its products, which makes it even more difficult for user upgrades as things are cramped in even more. Hard to say.

 

I think so too, I think the MB and MBP will follow the design of the Air.

 

Since when has it ever been Apple's priority to allow user access to their hardware? Will the MBA's will ever have user-accessible batteries? Or what about iPods?

 

I thought you could change the hdd, but it would void the warranty?

 

Well you have to remove the whole upper keyboard panel to access everything in the MBP. Technically this would void the warranty, but as long as you didn't damage anything/leave any visible marks, I don't think there is any way for apple to know (assuming you put everything back to how it came before shipping it off for repairs). I think most states have laws that say a company can't void a warranty for modifications to the hardware unless they can show that the modifications are causing the problem (in which case it is your fault). Still I wouldn't count on a company honoring this without a fight.

 

I did it just last week ... wasn't really all that difficult, just a matter of removing tiny screws and making sure not to lose them. Here's a shot of the book opened. Replaced a 160GB HD with a 320GB HD. If I really needed to, I imagine I could put the old drive back in if I had to send it in for warranty work, but doubt I'd go to that trouble (and, it doesn't seem quite fair, since I knew what risk I was taking).

Going to pop the 160GB drive into a white MacBook (I'm not sure, but I think you can upgrade the HDs in MacBooks without voiding the warranty).

 

If its that simple to pop out the chassis, I might give it a go once my warranty expires in August.

I used to have a Gateway laptop (M320X) that I needed to pop open to replace the fan. It was incredibly difficult to get there, so I had to enlist the help of a former Dell technician to do it. I loved that laptop, until my brother took ownership of it and it died shortly after. I wish Gateway kept that line around a while longer.

 

ifixit.com has some very good, detailed instructions on removing the drives

 

Yep ... I used the ifixit.com guide. Found it didn't apply directly to my version (15" Santa Rosa / LED screen MBP) ... it was even easier to remove the drive in mine than it was in the guide.

Fair warning to anyone who plans to change their HD ... make sure you back up everything before hand ... even better, make a bootable clone of your HD if you don't plan to do a fresh install of everything

 

Gutsy. No pun intended.

 

I upgraded my hard drive as well. It really is not difficult.

 

This has probably been asked before, but is there really a big difference in battery consumption between a 5400 RPM drive and a 7200 RPM drive?

 

Depends on which one. Some of the 5400 drives take even more power than 7200.
http://www.storagereview.com/Hitachi250WD320.sr?page=0,5
http://www.tomshardware.com/reviews/hdd-galore,1762-10.html

But how it will affect your battery life also depends on what you are doing.

 

I replaced my 5400 rpm hard drive with the hitachi travelstar 7200 rpm hard drive and my battery life did drop by 10-15 minutes. THe gain in performance is worth it though imo.