Comments on: MacBook Pro and the Seagate Momentus 500GB 7200RPM Drive

By: Ivan

Ivan — Thu, 08 Jul 2010 12:48:13 +0000

This is for Greg,
I’m having similar problems with an Hitachi 7K500 drive to replace the stock Hitachi 5K250 of my brand new MBP 13″ 2010. Battery life dropped from 10+ hours to 5+… awful. The original drive is firmware locked to 1.5 Mbps and this may be the difference as you suggest. Now the information to you… with Hitachi there was a DOS application (so you’d need a PC) to change the settings (1.5 to 3 Gbps among them), so I’ll give it a try tonight. Maybe you should check your manufacturer’s website for an application like that.

Ivan.

By: ANTHONY

ANTHONY — Sun, 13 Jun 2010 00:16:14 +0000

PLEASE!!!!! THANK YOU

By: ANTHONY

ANTHONY — Sun, 13 Jun 2010 00:15:20 +0000

I am interested and need one someone contact me I am a video editing student at the Art Institute and I really really need something so I could work from home can anyone please help me out?

By: Robert

Robert — Wed, 09 Jun 2010 21:24:40 +0000

Hi,
I put in 6 gb samsung ram kit from other world and a seagate momentus 500 gb 7200 rpm hd into a june 2007 2.4 macbook pro 15″ and my logic board blew out …(heat seems to be an issue, that sucker got hot) …luckily I still had 2 weeks left on apple care …Still doesn’t know if the HD is dammaged …
Any ideas ?!

By: Roberto Winter

Roberto Winter — Wed, 09 Jun 2010 03:32:21 +0000

Hi there,
can anyone give me a followup on how these drives are holding up? I’ve read about people complaining about them failing after about 6 months to one year. Are those cases exceptions? Jason, how is yours (or have you stopped using it after the Corsair SSD)?

Oh, and apparently there are two versions of this HD one is ST9500420AS and the other ST9500420ASG (notice the last character there, the “G”). So let’s make it clear that we’re talking about the *non* shock protected version (which is know to freak out when in MacBooks and so on).
Thanks.

By: Michael Manley

Michael Manley — Fri, 14 May 2010 20:59:00 +0000

Oops! Early ’08 MBP — I bought it in early ’09, but it’s actually the early ’08 model w/250GB HDD and 2.5GHz processor. In any case, the Seagate Momentus was a problematic upgrade. I may put it in my Dell laptop where I expect it will work as advertised.

By: Michael Manley

Michael Manley — Fri, 14 May 2010 19:40:45 +0000

I tried the 7200rpm, 500GB Seagate drive. AFter a dozen or so attempts to set it up, I’m pulling it tonight. The drive made my system unstable. Repeated attempts to load the OS from disc and go through the updates failed. Upgrading to Os X 10.6 wouldn’t work because the system kept hanging up part way through the upgrade. I’m not sure why this drive has performed so badly in my 15″ early ’09 MBP, but it has caused me endless headaches and I’m done with it. I ran a TechTool test on the drive itself, during one of the brief periods when I could maintain a working OS on the system, and it showed no bad sectors or other anomallies, but the system evidently doesn’t like this drive. It crashes the OS and requires freequent cold reboots — a bad situation when you’re in the middle of an OS installation or upgrade.

By: Pac

Pac — Sat, 08 May 2010 22:52:11 +0000

Dont use it , it got a lot of problem with my macbook pro….hang -> format -> hang -> format……….* 20 …i gotta get a new hard disk for my mac

By: deejay nme

deejay nme — Sat, 13 Mar 2010 14:49:35 +0000

i’ve been looking thru all these comments and i have some to reply to….
as far as battery life, yes it decreases the battery like and cuts that 7-6 hours down to about 5-4 hours. (its sad i know) but its the truth. i installed this drive a few months ago on my MBP 15″ 2009 model and i absolutely love it, i’m a power whore house and a DJ. i have a ridiculous amount of music, videos etc… i use this for active work in clubs and it throws down perfectly. i do experience heat issues but who doesnt? i feel like the ventilation for the MBP is not sufficient for the space under the screen and especially if its on your lap or if u have it on a pillow it gets hot because the vents get blocked. thats the only time i’ve had heat issues.
i have little to none for vibration issues…seagate is pretty good so far and hopefully it wont fail. i had a WD scorpio blue 500gb @ 5400 and it kept on freezing my comp.

By: Mike

Mike — Sat, 06 Mar 2010 01:58:35 +0000

This is for Bart, relative to the potential heat problem. I’m interested in knowing if that is resolved; I have a 2006 Macbook Pro, 15.4″, and had heat problems until I installed smcFanControl, a freeware program that has worked flawlessly for me since I installed it. However, I’m getting ready to install the Seagate Momentus 500gb 7200 in my machine, and wondered if you were having heat problems in spite of having a fan control program installed.

By: Jaime

Jaime — Tue, 09 Feb 2010 10:16:48 +0000

There seem to be a lot of reliability problems reported with this drive:

http://www.amazon.com/Seagate-Momentus-ST9500420AS-Bare-Frustration-Free-Packaging/dp/B001R4BBLU/ref=sr_1_1?ie=UTF8&s=electronics&qid=1265710557&sr=8-1

Anybody here seen any problems?

By: Greg Iafeliece

Greg Iafeliece — Sun, 31 Jan 2010 03:06:27 +0000

Malcolm,

Sorry, not checked back in a bit. Mine will go to sleep and give the warnings about low battery. I still have the original drive, use it for time machine. There is no way I get anywhere close to 7 or 6 hours of use on my machine. I have not done a stand-bye battery test with it unplugged and maybe email open. Maybe later…

Greg

By: Malcolm A. MacIver

Malcolm A. MacIver — Tue, 27 Oct 2009 00:17:22 +0000

Hi there,

This is for Greg in case he’s still tuned in. I have a weird problem where my 13 Macbook Pro is not going to sleep when I run the battery down – it shuts off completely. I’ve gone through one logic board and battery via Apple repair, and the issue remains. So, now I’m thinking that Greg’s comment about slightly higher power drain may be the culprit. Unfortunately I gave up the original drive so it’s not handy to check out. But if anyone else is noticing this it would be helpful to hear.

By: JasonTomczak

JasonTomczak — Fri, 09 Oct 2009 02:15:30 +0000

Hi Kirt, Almost any 5400 or 7200 RPM laptop hard drive should fit in your MacBook, so long as it's SATA and not olde schoole ATA. Here's a how-to from ifixit.com. As for the LCD replacement (yes, you sure have some work cut out for yourself), check this how-to from ifixit.com should give you the basic steps, complete with photos. If that's not the exact model MacBook, you can search that same site for a closer match. Good luck!

By: kirt

kirt — Fri, 09 Oct 2009 01:37:59 +0000

I was wondering if it would work out putting a Seagate Momentus 500GB 7200rpm into a 2007 Macbook (2.o/2×512/80/Combo) that has a 5400rpm 80GB Sata hard drive. And I’m also replacing the screen. So I’ve got my hands full, and it’s the first time ever working on a Mac. So can I do that up grade with the hard drive ? And does anyone have any suggestions for a good site to follow a step by step guide ? I’m doing this now so a quick answer would be greatly appreciated. Thanks Kirt M.

By: Marwan Salfiti

Marwan Salfiti — Mon, 05 Oct 2009 18:38:27 +0000

hey Jason,

great info here. You suggested to Willis that he shell out an extra 15 bux for the WD 500gb drive, but that one still runs at 5400rpm… Isn’t the real thing that you want to do is pick up the speed with the 7200 rpm drive? I am leaning towards the WD 320gb/7200rpm for my MacBook Pro mainly because of reviews on new egg… The seagate seems to be getting a lot of bad reviews as of late with drives doa or failing. Any update on your opinion of this drive?

thanks for the help

By: bart

bart — Mon, 05 Oct 2009 00:01:10 +0000

Just installed Seagate Momentus 500 GB 7200.4 in 15″ 2006 MacBook Pro. Was 80 GB Seagate OEM… we’ll see.. heat issues anyone… Working wonderfully for two days now.. but feels a bit “hot” in the power input (upper left corner near escape key)…. will keep you posted.. please advise on heat issues anyone….???

By: Greg Iafeliece

Greg Iafeliece — Fri, 02 Oct 2009 00:51:44 +0000

Ok I put the jumper in and the computer would not boot from the drive so I removed the jumper and everything is working. After speaking with a tech at the mac store I was told the drive is set for ‘performance and quick access’ from the manufacturer so I guess I have to live with a shorter battery life..

By: Greg Iafeliece

Greg Iafeliece — Thu, 01 Oct 2009 20:30:02 +0000

I installed the same drive in my 13″ MB Pro and I noticed my battery draining quicker. After searching a bit I found that the SATA interface on the MB pro is 1.5Gbits/sec and the drive is 3Gbits per second, so a jumper may need to be placed on the drive to force it into 1.5 mode to stop it from spinning and save batter life. I am going to give it a try to see if it changes anything. I can feel the drive humming through the keyboard now so hopefully the jumper will work. I have my energy settings to put the drive to sleep when no in use and there has been no change.

By: JasonTomczak

JasonTomczak — Sat, 05 Sep 2009 00:22:03 +0000

When I got mine, I paid roughly $130. It looks like the current price is $119, however I noticed on newegg.com that this hard drive has been getting a number of bad reviews. It could be that the newest iteration of this drive is experiencing problems that the previous model did not. Mine is still working beautifully. So, caveat emptor and all that good stuff.