Won't recognize new HDD?

I just tried to swap out the HDD in my MBP using this video as guidance.

‪How to replace a hard drive in a MacBook Pro (Late 2008)‬‏ - YouTube

The replacement drive was a Hitachi Travelstar 2.5", 500 gb, 7200 rpm, purchased new from Amazon. The physical installation was easy as pie. I rebooted using my Snow Leopard install DVD. From the opening screen, in the Utilities menu, I select "restore system from backup" with my Boot Camp external HDD plugged in. I select the date from which I want to restore (yesterday's backup). It then goes to "select a destination" and...nothing. It just says "searching for disks" and sits there forever. It's not identifying the new HDD. I've made sure the connection plug to the new HDD is tight.

Any ideas? Bad HDD? Do I need to take some step to "turn on" the new HDD or make the system recognize it?

Edit: this message is posted from a Powerbook G4. I knew I kept it around for a reason.

 

I think you need to go back in to disk utility and partition the drive first.
Then you should be able to see it for the restore from backup.

Let me know.
Ed

 

Okay, so the "Disc Utility" program can find it. It's displaying there. What do I need to do to actually do to get it to display as a destination for installing OSX or restoring from Boot Camp?

 

I posted before I saw this. I'll give that a shot. Thanks!

EDIT: IT WORKED!!! THANK YOU!!! +1 Rep to you.

 

I'm typing this on my MBP, which now has a 7200 rpm hard drive that is now only 40% full. Thanks again!

 

congrats! I've got two Macbook Pros with a total of 4 Hitachi Travelstar 500GB 7200rpm drives (two per laptop). So I knew it works and that you'd figure it out eventually. I just never use timemachine so I wasn't about to post up (based on your post it sounds like thats what you were using to restore your environment with). I always just use CCC to clone from one drive to another and winclone to clone from one windows partition to another.

 

Yeah, my wife apparently inadvertently threw away my copy of Window XP during spring cleaning (facepalm), so I'm just going to go without Windows until I get myself a new computer in December. Thankfully, Starcraft II and Torchlight work fine in OSX, and as for Mass Effect I and II and Arkham Asylum, I've got all my save games on a USB flash drive for when I get myself an Alienware/Asus/whatever I end up getting.

 

I would simply go the clevo way, aw/asus/msi are terribly overpriced, with only aw and clevo/sager possessing a good gpu to last anyones gaming needs for sometime

 

I want a well-rounded machine that can game well but is good for a multitude of purposes. For $1300, a P151HM1 blows an M14x out of the water GPU-wise, but it's got about 1/3 the battery life, no backlit keyboard (and questionable reviews about keyboard quality, compared to glowing reviews of the AWs), inferior speakers, etc. I'm willing to bump graphics detail down a notch in exchange for a machine I can word-process on and web-surf on for 4-5 hours at a time, which has a backlit keyboard that's centered before the screen (i.e., no numpad), with great speakers, etc.

I think the argument that Alienware is overpriced is a little like the argument that Macs are overpriced. There's more to a computer than just a specs sheet, and if you like a nicely-made case with nice materials, a good keyboard, long battery life, etc, than the super-duper-bang-for-the-buck options (HP dv6t and Clevo P151HM1) may not be the best fit. The best-bang-for-the-buck machines are good for many users, but not all--there's simply no way to offer better performance-for-the-dollar than everyone else without refinement suffering.

 

actually the build quality is pretty much the same across the board for the gaming machines.

In AW you get 5h of battery life (m14x, m17x, 18x) and the keyboard

With clevo/sager you gain the same power as the m17x, only that its in a 15''chassis. Better screen quality (second best panel on the market, only behind the dream color 2). And Im advising the P150hm (6990m-gtx 580m)

Asus is currently crappy just like msi, power is the same that you get on the cheaper P151hm, however with a higher price tag. The good thing about the msi is the speakers. Asus dont have anything that are actually noteworthy. The keyboards on both are crappy as well.

I prefer much more sager, because of the subdued design, since lights shooting through the roof (aw), and being rather larger (aw, msi, asus), aint my thing

 

Look at my sig...it's a Sager and for around $2200 . Mac's are expensive--and yes they are overpriced--but that's because they can, plus Mac's have great build quality I love their full Alu body case.