Introduction
There are many benefits to adding a second hard drive to your laptop such as improved speeds, greater storage space, and less heartache when installing new software. Use this guide to install one using our optical bay hard drive enclosure.
Tools
Parts
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Use your fingers to push both battery release tabs away from the battery, and lift the battery out of the computer.
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Remove the three identical 2mm Phillips screws from the memory door.
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Lift the memory door up enough to grip it and slide it toward you, pulling it away from the casing.
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Remove the following 6 screws:
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Two 10 mm T6 Torx screws on either side of the RAM slot.
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Four 14.5 mm Phillips screws along the hinge.
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Rotate the computer 90 degrees and remove the two 3.2 mm Phillips screws from the rear of the computer.
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Rotate the computer 90 degrees again and remove the four 3.2 mm Phillips screws from the side of the computer.
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Lift up at the rear of the case and work your fingers along the sides, freeing the case as you go. Once you have freed the sides, you may need to rock the case up and down to free the front of the upper case.
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There are four plastic clips above the DVD slot, and another above and to the left of the IR sensor. These clips can be very difficult to disengage without prying. They can also be difficult to re-engage during reassembly.
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Disconnect the trackpad and keyboard ribbon cable from the logic board, removing tape as necessary.
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Remove the upper case.
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Use the flat end of a spudger to disconnect the orange SuperDrive ribbon cable from the logic board, removing tape as necessary.
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Remove the following 4 screws:
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Two 3.3 mm silver Phillips screws on either side of the SuperDrive.
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One 4.7 mm silver T6 Torx screw from the top left corner of the drive.
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One 6.2 mm black Phillips screw at the top right corner of the drive.
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Lift the optical drive up and out of the computer.
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Remove the two silver Phillips screws securing the mounting bracket to the left side of the optical drive.
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Rotate the drive and disconnect the orange ribbon cable from the optical drive.
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Remove the two Phillips screws securing the mounting bracket to the rear of the optical drive.
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Rotate the drive and remove the two Phillips screws securing the mounting bracket to the right side of the optical drive.
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Remove the plastic spacer from the optical bay hard drive enclosure by pressing in on one of the clips on either side and lifting it up and out of the enclosure.
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Make sure that the hard drive connectors are facing down before placing it into the enclosure.
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Gently place the hard drive into the enclosure's hard drive slot.
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Once the hard drive is snug, reinsert the plastic spacer while holding the hard drive against the bottom of the enclosure.
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To reassemble your device, follow these instructions in reverse order.
14 comments
i dont see how any of you guys installed the hard drive. the ATApi on the mother board is a different from the hard drive. any one know the solution to this? please help
iFixit sells a SATA to ATAPI cage for the hard drive. You'll get slightly slower speeds than via a SATA connection, so if you're thinking of installing an SSD I would move the spinning hard disk to the cage. The photos shown in the guide after step 16 are incorrect, as they reference the SATA optical drive included on newer MacBook Pro models.
Had trouble getting MBP to recognise the secondary HDD in the Optical Bay Enclosure. I could hear it spin but Disk Utility did not recognise it.
After a few hours I realised I did not push the orange SuperDrive ribbon cable into the logic board (Step 10) all the way in.
Lesson: Be gentle but not too gentle! Everything works now.
jerlou3 -
Hi,
Can someone help me?
I think that the optical drive has a ATAPI connection, not a SATA connection, as it's showed (image 20). Am I right?
Consequently, the second disk enclosure has to have a ATAPI connection for the motherboard and a SATA connection for the HD.
Additionally, the optical drive to USB cable has to be a PATA to USB.
Any help will be appreciated!
Email sales [at] ifixit [dot] com
Before start, make a clone of your old HD into the new one, if you don't want to initiate a fresh copy. (Carbon Copy software is good).
ColmillodeChile -
Besides using WD 500GB models, are the WD 640GB and WD 750GB (the 9.5mm thickness model) good to go for? I am still considering as I have heard from other websites on the computer does not draw enough power to power up the 640 and 750 as it has the clicking sound and the rainbow keeps appearing. Anyone has install one before yet?
Please advice. Appreciated! Thanks a million to all the Mac gurus out there!
Danny Lim -