I decided to upgrade my Macbook Pro hard drive not long ago as I was running a little low on disk space. So I had a look around and decided on a WD Scorpio Blue 500gb SATA Drive (WD5000BEVT). I chose this drive because it’s fairly cheap and the performance looked pretty good compared to the 7200rpm drives. 500gb is perfect because I wanted to set up a windows partition with bootcamp as well.

Before you begin you will need the following:

1. A small Phillips head screwdriver
2. A T6 Torx screwdriver
3. The ability to read

You will want to make sure that before you begin, you have backed up all the data you want to keep to a removable drive/DVD/other media. The whole process will take you around 30-45 minutes. It took me about 35 minutes and I was taking photos so you could probably do it quicker. But seriously, don’t rush or you could break something!

Step 1: Start by removing the battery. Slide the two tabs and the battery will pop up. Once that’s out, remove the RAM compartment cover by unscrewing the three Phillips screws that hold it on.

Step 2: You can do the swap without needing to remove the RAM modules, but I did this just in case. If you want to remove the RAM, just use your finger to push the little metal brackets on the sides out and the RAM will pop up a little. You can now slide them out.

Step 3: Begin removing the screws on the back edge of the laptop (there are four of them). You also need to remove the two Torx screws next to where the RAM modules go. Once you have taken these out, check the inside edge of the battery compartment. There are two Phillips screws you need to remove here.

Step 4: On the left and right sides of the notebook, there are 8 small Phillips screws. Remove these. Once that is done, remove the last two on the back (at either side of the hinge).

Step 5: Flip your Macbook Pro over and lift the screen up. Starting from the top area of the keyboard (on either side), GENTLY pry the top of the notebook off. You want to start prying from near the screen and work downwards towards the front. This step may require a little gentle pressure, but DONT just yank it open as there is a small ribbon cable attaching the keyboard to the rest of the notebook. I needed to move the top panel up and down a few times to get it to loosen a little.

Step 6: Once the top panel with the keyboard is free, lift it from the front (as shown in the photo). You will see the ribbon cable joining it to the rest of the computer. Lift the tape and gently remove the ribbon cable from the board.

Step 7: Time to remove the hard drive. This is located towards the front left of your Macbook Pro (shown below). There is a small metal bracket holding the hard drive in. Begin by removing the two Phillips screws that keep the bracket in. Once this is done, remove the bracket. There is a ribbon cable that is stuck with adhesive to the top of the hard drive. Try not to damage the cable by bending it when you remove it from the top. I used a small plastic knife (relax, it wasn’t sharp), just to get under the adhesive and use it to get the ribbon cable off.

Step 8: Pull the hard drive up and out a little from your Macbook Pro. You will notice the SATA data/power connector at the back. Remove this from the old hard drive. You should now be holding the old hard drive in your hand without it being connected in any way to your Macbook Pro. Remove the four little Torx screws from each side of the hard drive and re-attach these to your new hard drive.

Now you just need to complete the steps in reverse order to reassemble the whole thing. Once you have it all back together, boot up with your OS X install or Recovery disc. From inside the OS X Installer, my new hard drive wasn’t recognised at first. To fix this, click on Utilities and select Disk Utility. Select your new hard drive from the list here and “Erase” it. Once that’s done, proceed through the OS X Installer and you’ll be sweet!

After a few weeks of normal use with all my apps back on, I’ve noticed a pretty drastic performance increase! Applications load quicker and copying files is noticeably faster! The whole upgrade costed me $130 in total which was the cost of the hard drive. With 5 times the space, and at least a 50% noticeable performance gain, this is the perfect upgrade for those of you who are wanting more space and a little extra performance from your Macbook Pro.

disclaimer: if you attempt this and somehow break your hard drive, your macbook pro, or both, i take no responsibility. please seriously consider this before you do it. if you dont feel comfortable pulling your macbook pro apart, please take it to an apple technician and get them to do it for you. the above were the steps i took to replace my drive. your experience may differ (lets hope it doesnt, but hey, it might)