Anyone replaced the hard drive in an iMac ?

[RogerS]

Looked at a couple of Youtube instructional videos and nothing out of the ordinary as far as I can see. An hour tops, if that

But asking a couple of local repair shops, they want a couple of days. So am I missing something ?

 

[Droogs]

They are a pain in the behookie depending on how old it is. If out of warranty crack on I used to have to do this all day everyday. Apple invented their own screwhead to stop you doing just that and then charge their authorised repairers 75 quid for a flamming PZ2 sized effing driver. they are pr**ks as far as I'm concerned. They did it for just 1 flaming screw as well on the macbook. but a 3mm flat watchmakers will do if you press down hard. other than that its a piece of cake no different to any other laptop or pc

oh I hate Apple bunch of sanctimonious money grabbing capitalist psuedo-hippies fleecing so and sos

 

[Fitzroy]

I’ve done it on a 2009 iMac 27”, no real issues, took about an hour. Only thing I recall is something about the temperature sensor on the replacement drive. Lots of vids on YouTube. Also took the opportunity to clean our vents and fans. Ran cooler afterwards.

F.

 

[Jonzjob]

It's a doddle to replace an HDD in an iMac, also to upgrade the memory. I now have a SSHD (hybrid) drive in my late 2009 21 1/2" jobbie along with 8 gig of memory. It was a little daunting to start but it is easy to do. There are lots of youtube videos on how to do it. Mine has now gone from a 2 gig memory to 8 gig and 500 gig HDD to a 2Tb SSHD. It has made quite a difference! Something similar to this https://www.amazon.co.uk/Seagate-ST2000 ... words=SSHD

This was the little tool tub I now have and I use it all over the place from tightening glasses legs to changing all sorts on both my iMac and MacBook pro https://www.amazon.co.uk/Complete-Piece ... driver+set No need for hard pressing on titchy screwdrivers :mrgreen:

You don't say why you want to change the HDD Rodger?

Can I take it from your description Droogs that you are not a great fan of the Wonderful Apple :? :?

 

[RogerS]

.....
You don't say why you want to change the HDD Rodger?
....

The old one is dying....

Thanks chaps for the reassurances. Will probably just get a low capacity hard drive. It's for LOML's iMac. No point in getting anything too expensive as (a) she doesn't store much on it but more importantly it can't have its OSX upgraded (too old now) and it's starting to get a bit of a battle finding the right browser to work with website A then a different browser that works with website B and so on that I can see us replacing it with a new one as soon as funds become available.

Even Mail is not displaying some embedded images in some emails correctly. Mind you that could be the actual emil content but you never know.

 

[Jonzjob]

I had meant to ask just what year it is too Rodger? Ours is a mid 2009 and I have upgraded it to High Sierra Os 10.13.6 That's an easy job too and it gives you the max in security.

I am a member of https://www.mac-forums.com/forums/index.php and they are very good and really helpful on all things Mac.

On our mid 2010 MacBook Pro 13 I have upped the memory to the max at 8 gig, moved the 1Tb SSHD across to where the DVD/CD drive would normally sit and put a 250gig SSD in as the main internal disk. It needs some cleaning up after a while like that but it transformed the machine. Something like this one http://uk.crucial.com/gbr/en/BDL250GBMX500SSDCONV

It make a hell of a difference and it ain't that expensive either.

Off out to our new place to do more floor sanding for the day. I'll look in later this eve.

 

[Fitzroy]

An SSD (solid state drive) will make the machine much quicker. I didn’t go for one as they were about 250 when I did mine, but that price JonJonz has linked is a steal!

 

[RogerS]

I had meant to ask just what year it is too Rodger? Ours is a mid 2009 and I have upgraded it to High Sierra Os 10.13.6 That's an easy job too and it gives you the max in security.

I am a member of https://www.mac-forums.com/forums/index.php and they are very good and really helpful on all things Mac.

On our mid 2010 MacBook Pro 13 I have upped the memory to the max at 8 gig, moved the 1Tb SSHD across to where the DVD/CD drive would normally sit and put a 250gig SSD in as the main internal disk. It needs some cleaning up after a while like that but it transformed the machine. Something like this one http://uk.crucial.com/gbr/en/BDL250GBMX500SSDCONV

It make a hell of a difference and it ain't that expensive either.

Off out to our new place to do more floor sanding for the day. I'll look in later this eve.

It's an early 2007 and I've checked that Mavericks is as far as it can go. It's also maxed out with memory. It's not worth spending a lot of dosh on it for reasons above. SWMBO is not bothered about speed....other than the length of time it takes her iMac to do things as the hard drive makes many re-reads.

I agree with you re an SSD. I bought an early MacBook Pro with SSD for £300. It's in immaculate condition and runs High Sierra. And fast with the SSD.

 

[Sideways]

I've done HDDs on my macbook a few times. I'd encourage you to have a go at your imac. There shouldn't be anything too scary.
Apple charge such a premium for storage that it's cheaper to buy a low memory device with the rest of the spec as you want it and swap out the drive after a year or two.