The following guide provides step by step instructions on how you can disassemble and upgrade your Apple iMac 20" or iMac 24" (aluminum, models 2007, 2008 and 2009) to 1 TB or 1.5 TB (terrabyte) hard drive and 4 GB RAM (and 8 GB RAM for iMac 2009 models only) - all by yourself, and save some serious money (I've personally saved over US $1,000 upgrading my iMac 24" aluminum by myself), however you will need some background in electronics and relevant experience to make it happen...

Which color are you?

Disclaimer

You WILL need some basic technical knowledge to upgrade your iMac hard drive by yourself - upgrading hard drive is not user serviceable part and it might void your Apple warranty. Therefore, I cannot be responsible for any damages or losses you'll potentially incur from following this guide - proceed at your own risk!

Desire for the Top of the Line iMac 24" Aluminum (2007, 2008 and 2009) for Least the Money $$

Copyright 2007-2009 Amfiteatar Portal. All rights reserved.

It all started in Oct-2007 - I wanted a brand new iMac 24" Aluminum with the 2.8 GHz Core2Duo Extreme CPU, max. memory (4 GB) and lots of internal hard drive capacity (1 TB), however ordering a custom built model with such features through Apple's web site was costing an arm and a leg (US $3,449 to be exact in Nov-2007), so I've decided to take a DIY approach, also taking into consideration my electronics background.

I've ended up ordering iMac 24" AL (2007) with 1 GB RAM, 320 GB HDD and 2.8 GHz Core2Duo Extreme CPU (approx. US $2,049 - the Extreme CPU was the only custom upgrade to my order). Then I've ordered 2 modules x 2 GB RAM (total 4 GB, costing me approx. US $140) and 1 TB hard drive (costing me approx US $310). My total cost for the machine and parts was ~ US $2,499 - saving approx. US $950 than ordering machine with such configuration through Apple (US $3,499 retail). In addition, after the upgrade I've sold the remaining parts - 1 GB RAM module and 320 GB hard drive through eBay, hence my saving on my new iMac reached over US $ 1,000 US. Cool, eh?

RAM upgrade was a breeze, just opened up the memory bay slot, plugged in the new modules and closed it up! However, upgrading hard drive proved to be somewhat challenging, hence I wanted to share my experience with the Mac community. Good thing is that I was taking photos as I've went along with the upgrade. The result is the following upgrade guide.

Danny, 5. November 2007. 

Updated message: Since my original experience, I've replaced my iMac 2007 with a newer iMac 2008 and have had numerous iMac upgrade experience with all three models 2007, 2008 and 2009. This guide applies to all three models as all three models are internally 98% the same. 

I would like to thank all readers for their support and over 140 useful reader comments below. 

Danny, April 2009.

Revisions: Jan-May-Oct-2008. Jan-Mar-Apr-2009.

What You'll Need

1) Apple iMac 20" or iMac 24" AL (aluminum, models 2007 - MA876LL, MA877LL or MA878LL or 2008 models - MB323LL, MB324LL, MB325LL, as well as 2009 models MB417LL/A, MB418LL/A, MB419LL/A, MB420LL/A): If you purchase your iMac online you can save additionally on the sales tax, and most of the retailers offer some sort of rebate as well. The configuration you're looking for is with 250 GB hard drive for 20" model or 320 GB hard drive for 24" model (the lowest drive capacity available, because you'll anyhow upgrade the hard drive to 1 TB or 1.5 TB.

You might choose from one of the following iMac 20" and iMac 24" aluminum 2008 and 2009 models you'd like to upgrade with 1 TB or 1.5 TB hard drive:

Save up to $100 on a New Mac and Printer! (Apple store special)

Also make sure to check out Apple's refurbished deals, from time to time (you just need to keep looking as offers change weekly) they'll have iMac AL 20" and 24" at bargain prices (e.g. iMac AL 20" for about US $850 and iMac AL 24" for about US $1200 - info spring 2009):

Save big on Apple-certified refurbished Macs (Apple store special)

2) 1 TB or 1.5 TB (terabyte) SATA III, 3.5" hard drive:

in my original iMac 2007 upgrade in Nov-2007 I've purchased a Hitachi 1 TB drive A7K1000 (data sheet from Hitachi), primarily because of 32 MB cache memory, SATA III interface having 3 Gbit/sec. throughput, and also due to its long-lasting life and reliability - Hitachi extending 5 year warranty and advertising 1.2 million hours average time before failure (choose a good drive - don't you just hate when the drive dies on you and you lose all your data!). I've owned this hard drive for more than a year and I was really happy with it. The average running temperature was about 57C (135F), which is within Hitachi's standard operating parameters - up to 60C - 140F .

Hard drives Apple installs in iMacs are Western Digital, you are also well set purchasing one of WD's 1 TB drives.

Update 1: Some of our readers have reported that their 1 TB WD Black and 1 TB Seagate hard drives are not as quiet as they've hoped for.

Update 2: Since my original upgrade, I've replaced my machine with iMac 2008 and I have upgraded my new machine with Seagate Barracuda 1.5 TB drive (32 MB cache). I'm very satisfied with this drive as well (owning it for several months now) - it has a great performance, it is very quiet and the average running temperature is about 58C (136F).

Update 3: Some of our readers have reported that Seagate 1.5 TB is very quiet in their machines as well. (Apr-2009)

The appropriate 1 TB and 1.5 TB SATA hard drives going into your iMac are the following: 

Your choice of recommended 1 TB drives is as follows:

Newegg.com specials on hard drives, internal and external (also a great source for an external hard drive for your Time Machine backups)

3) Torx screwdrivers: You'll need several specialized TORX screwdrivers, size T6 and T8 (these screwdrivers are the same type used to work with mobile phones).

Durston Mini Screwdriver Set, Torx, ESD, T4-T10, Ergo, 7 Pc

4) Kitchen \ bathroom hook suction cups: In order to open your iMac AL, you'll need to take the glass cover off the display. The glass cover is held in place only by several magnets -- in order to remove it you'll need a specialized suction cup handle: 

Heavy-Duty Dual Head Aluminum Suction Cup Handle - 180 LB Capacity

However if you don't own such a fancy tool, several kitchen \ bathroom hook suction cups will do the trick instead (as in my case :) Just make sure they're larger cups - at least 1 to 2 inches in diameter.

Suction Cup with Hook

Upgrade Guide - Step-by-Step Instructions with Photos

Applicable to iMac 2007, 2008 and 2009 models (both 20 and 24 inch):
- iMac 2007 models MA876LL/A, MA877LL/A, MA878LL/A
- iMac 2008 models MB323LL/A, MB324LL/A, MB325LL/A
- iMac 2009 models MB417LL/A, MB418LL/A, MB419LL/A, MB420LL/A

Step 1 

Take a good look at your iMac AL - no screws (besides the memory upgrade slot) to be seen - how neat. :))))

In order to open your iMac, you will need to lift up the protective glass covering your display. The glass is held by several magnets only, so you just need to lift it up. Naturally you won't be doing this with a screwdriver beneath the glass as you will damage the frame for sure. You need suction cups to lift up the glass.

If you don't have specialized suction handle tools, using kitchen \ bathroom hook cups will do just fine. You will need about 4-6 of these, 1 to 2 inches in diameter.

Place the suction cups as shown on the photos. You might want to use a rubber string to tie up all suction cups (as shown on the photo) in order to have a grip at all suction cups simultaneously (otherwise you can try lifting up the suction cups with your bare hands ;).

Just LIFT UP the glass with the suction cups applying some moderate force. Make sure you do it carefully, as while pulling you might damage the glass!

Update 1:  Some of our readers have managed to get the glass off using only two larger suction cups placed at the two opposite corners of the glass (e.g. upper right and lower left corner), and pulling with hands only (please check out the comments at the end of the page).

Once you lift up the glass, put it aside on a soft cloth. Finally we can see some screws in the frame! Use your Torx screwdrivers to take out all screws within the frame. Once you're done, lift up the upper side of the frame only, but carefully, as in the upper mid section (behind the integrated iSight camera), there will be a wire you need to disconnect (as shown in photos).

Update 2: One of our readers reminds there are various length screws you will be taking out - what he suggests is using a piece of 8.5 x 11 (or A4) paper and taping the screws with scotch tape on the paper in the proper location such that it would remind you as where do they go back (thank you Doug)!

Update 3: Some readers have reported they've managed to make the upgrade without disconnecting the iSight cable - leave it plugged in and just flip over the front panel at your desk (thank you Claudio).

Step 2 

Now make sure you take off the bracket from the memory slot at the bottom of the frame. If you don't do this, you won't be able to take off the frame.

Once you've put the memory slot bracket away, you may lift up the display frame entirely and set it aside.

Step 3

At this point we've unleashed the inside of your iMac AL - I truly admire Apple's compact design :) The next thing we need to do is to detach iMac's gorgeous display. Make sure you do this with utmost patience as you don't want to be responsible for any dead pixels in the process!

The display is attached with three connectors. The first two you can find on the left and the right hand side of the bottom of the motherboard. Let's start with the right-hand side connector first -- this connector is locked in with a screw - thus you need to take it off and pull out the connector. Now we move to the left-hand side connector - just unplug it carefully. You might want to use a precision screwdriver to help you out in the process. 

Update: One of our readers managed to upgrade the hard drive without removing the display - althought I've found it to be a lot easier to swap the hard drive with the display off.

Step 4

The third connector attaching the display is located underneath the display, in the upper left corner of it. The next step is to lift up the display VERY carefully from its right hand side and up (as shown in the picture), and you need to detach the third cable - which is a power connector connecting it to the power board (smaller blue board shown in photos).

In my case, I had to take off the screw holding the power board in place first in order to be able to take off the connector. You might want a second pair of hands helping you with this step (holding the display in the air while you pull out the power connector beneath it)!

Update: One of our readers reminds there are two screws on the side of LCD you need to remove in this step in order to lift the screen (please read the comments section at the end of this page).

Once you detach display power connector, you are ready to entirely lift off the display and place it aside. Make sure you put the display on a soft and safe place, away from the tools and work area (you don't want to damage it)!

Step 5

Finally, we can see the hard drive placed in the middle upper section of iMac's aluminum back frame. In order to take out the hard drive, you must first take off the temperature sensor from the drive (as shown in photos). The temperature sensor looks like an ordinary transistor component. Make sure not to bend its pins as it may damage it!

Next, pull out the SATA and power connector from the hard drive (left hand side of the drive in my photos). 

Step 6

For this step you will need to apply a bit of force - you need to push down the plastic handle attached to the upper part of the hard drive - push down until it unlocks and lift up the drive. Alternatively, the handle is held up with two screws, so you might want to take these off and slide out the handle easily out of its place.

You can see at the photo that Apple has used Western Digital WD3200AAJS - 320 GB hard disk in its iMac aluminum.

Step 7

The hard drive side opposite to the plastic handle has two metal pins screwed in - holding the hard drive's bottom side within the frame. Take (unscrew) these pins from the original hard drive and put them onto the new hard drive. Also, move the plastic handle from the old hard drive onto the new one (held up by two screws only).

Step 8

Use the backward logic to put back the new hard disk in place, bottom side with pins going into the frame first, then you snap it into the place by pushing the upper side handle into the frame (as show in photos)

Step 9

Attach the hard disk temperature sensor at approximately the same place where it was on the old hard drive. Use some glue if necessary (in my case there was enough adhesive left on the sensor, so I've just pushed it onto the drive and it stuck). Make sure you put the protective sponge on the top (as it was on the original hard drive).

Plug in the SATA and power connector to the drive (left-hand side of the drive in my photos).  

Step 10

It's time to put back the display -- we'll use the reverse logic - you need to plug in the power connector first (left hand side of the display) into the blue power board). Then place back the display firmly in its place - as shown in the photo. You might want a second pair of hands helping you with this step.

Then attach the two remaining display connectors at the left and right hand side at the bottom of the system motherboard. 

Step 11

Put the aluminum front panel back into its place (starting with the bottom side first), making sure you connect the integrated iSight camera wire at the top before entirely closing up the frame.

Then put all the screws you've taken out back into their places within the frame. 

Update: Make sure the silver piece (the protective foam) around the RAM slot is tucked back in as putting back the front panel will be much smoother (thank you Vincent).

Step 12

Before putting the protective glass back onto the display, you might want to wipe it off and the display itself with a soft cloth (e.g. such are cloths used to clean reading glasses) in order to get rid of the dust particles that have fallen at the display in the mean time. Please take care of what kind of cloth you use - you don't want to unnecessarily scratch your display!

You are ready to put back the protective glass on top of your display. Use suction cups to handle the glass. Make sure you put it back carefully, as magnets will snap it into the place.

Step 13

Put back the protective bracket onto the bottom memory slot (upgrading your RAM is as easy as plugging in the new memory modules into the slots).

Upgrading the RAM (optional step for those upgrading the RAM as well)

Your iMac has two memory slots available.

Please note that 1 GB configurations shipped by Apple use a single memory slot (1 GB memory module inside). Configurations shipped with 2 GB memory by Apple use both memory slots (two 1 GB modules inside). Update: iMac 2009 shipped with 2 GB memory uses both memory slots, and iMac 2009 models shipped with 4 GB memory  also uses both slots available.

You can also verify the amount and type of memory installed in your iMac, including the verification of memory slots used if you click on the Apple logo (upper left corner), About This Mac, then click on More Info - a system profiler window will show up - click on the Memory menu on the left hand side and you'll be able to see the amount of memory installed and memoy slots used.

upgrade options

If you've purchased your iMac 2007 or 2008 from Apple with 1 GB memory, your upgrade options are as follows:

If you would like to move to 2 GB, then you just need to purchase an additional 1 GB memory module. If you would like to move to 3 GB, then just purchase an additional 2 GB module. If you'd like to upgrade to 4 GB RAM, you need to purchase two 2 GB memory modules (also meaning your existing 1 GB memory module goes out for sale on eBay :)

if you've purchased your iMac 2007, 2008 and 2009 from Apple with 2 GB memory, your upgrade options are as follows:

If you would like to move to 3 GB, then you just need to purchase an additional 2 GB memory module (and one of your existing 1 GB modules goes out for sale on eBay). If you'd like to upgrade to 4 GB RAM you need to purchase two 2 GB memory modules (also meaning both of your existing 2 x 1GB memory modules go out for sale on eBay :)

if you've purchased your iMac 2009 from Apple with 4 GB memory, your upgrade options are as follows:

If you would like to upgrade to 8 GB RAM you need to purchase two 4 GB memory modules (also meaning both of your existing 2 x 2GB memory modules go out for sale on eBay :)

Choosing the appropriate modules

I've always had a great experience with Kingston (also having a lifetime warranty) - never came across a faulty module!

The appropriate memory modules going into iMac 20" and iMac 24" AL 2007 models are the following PC2-5300 modules (1 GB or 2 GB modules, DDR2, 667 MHz, SO-DIMM 200 pin, unbuffered):

RAM for iMac 2007 models

1 GB module (667 Mhz)

2 GB module (667 Mhz)

4 GB kit (2x2GB) (667 Mhz)

iMac models from the early 2008 use faster 800 Mhz memory PC2-6400 (compared to 667 Mhz modules used in 2007 iMacs). Although the above suggested 667 Mhz  modules will work in your 2008 iMacs, you should really look into getting the faster 800 Mhz memory - therefore the appropriate memory modules going into iMac 20" and iMac 24" AL 2008 models are the following (1 GB or 2 GB modules, DDR2, 800 MHz, SO-DIMM 200 pin, unbuffered):

RAM for iMac 2008 models

1 GB module (800 Mhz)

2 GB module (800 Mhz)

4 GB kit (2x2GB) (800 Mhz)

iMac models from the early 2009 use newer DDR3 memory running at 1066 Mhz memory PC3-8500. Memory modules for iMac 2009 are not compatible with iMac 2007 or iMac 2008 models. iMac 2007 and 2008 models use DDR2 memory with 200 pin layout, whereas iMac 2009 models use DDR3 memory with 204 pin layout.

Therefore the appropriate memory modules going into iMac 20" and iMac 24" aluminum 2009 models are the following (2 GB or 4 GB modules, DDR3, 1066 MHz, SO-DIMM 204 pin, unbuffered):

RAM for iMac 2009 models

2 GB module (1066 Mhz)

4 GB kit (2 x 2GB) (1066 Mhz)

4 GB module (1066 Mhz)

Step 14 - install OS X

Finally, as you've just installed a blank hard drive, you need to install OS X operating system on your iMac. Please note that if you have Leopard upgrade DVD, you will need to install Tiger first, and then upgrade the system to Leopard.

Update: One of our readers mentions that you can install OS X from the upgrade DVD version without previously installing Tiger if you select Time Machine Backup, and then cancel it by going back - at that point the upgrade DVD will allow you to install OS X on a blank hard drive without prior OS installed.

On the other hand, if you have the full version of Leopard OS X, just go ahead and pop in the DVD, turn on your iMac and it will boot from the DVD - just follow the instructions on the screen to install the operating system.

Please note that once you are booted to OS X Leopard installation you will need to start the Disk Utility in order to partition and format your new 1TB or 1.5 B hard drive.

You might also want to consult Leopard OS X installation guide from Apple.

Update: In order to transfer data from your old hard drive, you can place your old hard drive into USB external case, connect it to your iMac and start Utilitie, Migration Assistant. If you've used Time Machine for backups, you can also recover you data from Time Machine utilizing the Migration Assistant.

Once you install the OS X, in order to verify the hard disk installation you need to click on the Apple logo (upper left corner), About This Mac, More Info, then Serial-ATA (or simply start System Profiler application from the Utilities folder).

 In order to verify the amount of memory (RAM) installed, click on the Apple logo and select About This Mac.

Hundreds of blowout Mac deals updated weekly - MacMall

Comments (194)

...
written by Fernando Leiria, December 28, 2007

Obrigado e-amigo
Thanks a lot e-friend

Thank You
written by Rich, December 28, 2007

Thank you for taking the time to photograph and document your upgrade. Nicely done!

goooood !!
written by xplane93, December 28, 2007

Bigs thanks for this Doc and photos very utlils.

Very nice job!
written by Rene Larsen, December 29, 2007

As the title implies, very nice job! This is by far the best documentation available currently for changing out your hard drive in an Aluminum iMac and the photos are great. Thank you very much for taking the time to put all of this together in such a logical and professional manner. Cheers!

Beautiful!
written by popeye cahn, December 30, 2007

Now I know what I'll be doing soon. Thanks for the excellent write up and detailed photos!

Awesome
written by beosro, December 30, 2007

You're the man!

Totally Execellent Documentation
written by iMC, January 01, 2008

As with one of the user posted, this is by far the best documentation on how to upgrade your Intel iMac (Mid 2007) aluminum. I just bought one ( refurbished ) with 1GB RAM/250GB HDD, and I was wondering how am I going to upgrade the memory and the HDD. Through some searching at the Apple Discussions board, I found your documentation through one of the posts. Great job on this.

These Intel iMacs (Mid 2007) aluminum aren't as user-friendly as on the G5 iMac. Just unscrew 3 to 4 screws, pop the back cover and voila, there it is, all at your disposal. Looks like Apple doesn't want the end-user to tinker the inside.......

A good idea
written by Opa, January 04, 2008

Thats really a good and needfull help for all Apple-Users.
And many thanks for all the detailed photos.

...
written by Tom Loki, January 04, 2008

Great work - thank you!!!!

COOL
written by moreliaV, January 05, 2008

A really helpful instruction....it works !!!!

About the Leopard upgrade DVD
written by Miguel Palma, January 06, 2008

I did the replacement of my drive with a 500GB samsung HD501LJ, but I used a putty knife to remove the glass in Step 1, I also found a trick to bypass the Leopard Upgrade DVD check (on a forum...), just select the option for Time machine restore on the menu and them click on goback, the button to proceed with normal installation will them be activated

Can you upgrade the cpu as well?
written by Madmac, January 07, 2008

Thanks for the post, even that I'm a PC technician, look a little difficult to do the hard drive upgrade, I mean it's a little too risky, including messing with the iSight camera, but well done.

I have 2 more questions though. Is the CPU upgradeable or it is soldered? In the 20" mac it is possible to use a terabyte hard drive? I ask this because in the Apple website in the upgrade option shows that you can only install a hard drive up to 500 GB.. maybe a BIOS locked option?

Once again thanks a lot for showing the light!

Backside of glass front?
written by DrFelix, January 07, 2008

First: Thanks for the excellent How- To, brought up another idea: I would like to exchange the whole front with an anti- reflex glass. Found a company who cuts the anti- reflex glass to fit my 24 inch iMac. Black bezel will be painted from the backside. Only problem: How to fix the new glass into the frame. I've yet to open up my iMac and thought someone could help me out: Are there magnets glued to the backside of the original glass? Or is the black paint of the bezel magnetized?

Thanks in advance,
Felix

Reply: Can you upgrade the cpu as well?
written by Danny, January 08, 2008

Madmac,

In terms of difficulty of the upgrade - it's very relative - the above guide sure makes it a lot easier. I'll quote an editor of the specialized French Mac site Bidouille saying that this upgrade is not too difficult - http://www.hardmac.com/news/2008-01-03/.

The new iMac aluminum 20" will take 1TB drives (the motherboard is the same as with 24" model) - although Apple doesn't sell 20" models with 1TB drives, thus you can go ahead and upgrade your iMac 20" to 1TB hard drive.

Unfortunately I believe it is not feasible to upgrade the CPU in iMac 2007 models above 2.8 Ghz - Apple's 2007 product line. The reason might not be in the actual upgrade (replacing the chip) but in the fact that Apple motherboard (BIOS issue) might not recognize the newer CPUs (for example 3.06 Ghz) in iMac 2007 models.

The only way to test this is through a trial and error - I don't have the time or motivation to do it at this time, perhaps some of the readers will try if newer 3.06 Ghz CPUs will work in iMac 2007?

On the other hand I believe iMac 2008 models will most likely have no trouble upgrading the CPU to 3.06 Ghz - as Apple uses the same motherboards for the entire product line (and there is a 3.06 Ghz product in 2008 line up).

Danny

What other drives (like 500GB) can be used...also, what about 17" iMac (white)? is it similarly opened?
written by Kevin, January 10, 2008

Thank you for this amazing guide!!! I'm excited to crack open my new iMac and upgrade the drive.

First, I'm not all that interested in the full 1TB drive upgrade so what drive type can be used for about 500GB?

Second, is this guide anywhere near how to open up the previous white iMacs (17, 20,, 24)? I have a 17" I'd like to upgrade, but I don't know how to take it apart.

Reply: Backside of glass front
written by Danny, January 11, 2008

Felix,

That sounds like an interesting modification

I've zoomed up one of my photos were you can see the back of the glass.

The magnets are not located on the glass - they're embedded within the aluminum bezel. The back of the glass - around the borders - is applied with a metallic stripe. Also, please note several spike-looking guides helping fix the glass within the frame.

Hope the above helps. Please send us photos of your modification.

Danny

Reply: iMac white hard drive upgrade and 500 GB HDD recommendation
written by Danny, January 11, 2008

Kevin,

I believe a very good guide to open previous generation iMac white was written by John Wood.

In terms of what hard drive to choose for your iMac white (these could also be used in alu iMacs), I can recommend Western Digital Caviar 500 GB hard drive (SATA, 16 MB cache).

Good luck upgrading!

Danny

Sr. IT Consultant
written by Sijo, January 13, 2008

Hi,

really helpfull. Thanks a TON !!!

Temperature sensor adhesive recommendation?
written by Ken, January 17, 2008

Will ordinary Elmer's Rubber Cement work well enough or can anyone recommend a better adhesive that can be used to adhere a temperature sensor to a new hard drive? A URL to an appropriate adhesive product would be appreciated.

This is just too cool info!
written by Gary Stamey, January 24, 2008

THANKS so much!

Amazing thank you
written by artske, February 09, 2008

I have been searching for this tutorial for a while now , I plan to do this upgrade very soon and will let you know how I get on, once again thank you for such an in depth tutorial

...
written by Dave, February 16, 2008

did this. couple things of note: 1) suction cups are easy, use 4 - one at each corner. 2) make SURE you put all bezel screws in tight/flush (I missed one, cracked the glass, GRR, who knows what that will cost). 3) you can just unscrew the 2 screws holding the drive to the "handle" and then pop it out, transfer the two metal tabs, and put the new one in - much like doing one in a MacBook Pro. 4) be careful of the EMI shield (silver-ish fabric stuff) down by the RAM slots - and also, put the outer bezel back on BOTTOM FIRST - I had to take it on/off 3 times to get it right, all for the want of some silly small things. 5) If you do have that 2nd-set of hands (or good 2 yourself) you can do it without taking out the "blue board" or unplugging the LCD in the 3rd step - but don't crush wires on the left or stretch the power ones!

Temperature sensor adhesive recommendation? - 2nd try
written by Ken, February 19, 2008

Does anyone know if ordinary Elmer's Rubber Cement work well enough or can anyone recommend a better adhesive that can be used to adhere a temperature sensor to a new hard drive?

...
written by axel Pfister, February 23, 2008

Wow this is exactly the instruction i'm looking for. Is it different when i only want to put s second drive in my 24 imac.

On the glue issue I would not use elmers glue in a computer period.
written by James McDonald, February 27, 2008

On the glue issue I would not use elmers glue in a computer period.

You might try Deacon Weld it. On my cloth dryer the rubber sealer ring on the door started coming off about 5 years ago. I Glued it back on and it's still fine. I fugue sustained high temperature might be around 150 F in the dryer. The strength in 900 LBS / IN SQ.

It work well with plastics and metal. Handling time is 5-6 minutes. Time to set is 1.5 to 3 hours. You might want to affix the temperature sensor to the HD with a drop of super glue if you can't get the sensor to lie in the right spot. Two coatings is probably best. Do the second coating perhaps 70 minutes after the first.

Devcon Weld-It

Weld-It User Review - Video

Thank you so very much!
written by Eric, March 17, 2008

This information is awesome. I have been searching EVERYWHERE for the answer to crack this case open. What a genious design! Thank you for leading the way. This was so helpful.
Eric

PC TECH
written by Mac Newbie, May 09, 2008

Gutsy my man, very gutsy. I have attempted this procedure myself but had to relinquish my only b/c it was way over my head. Thanks to your procedures, photos and pre-cautions as to what obstacle we may encounter, I now feel confidence I can conquer this objective. My hat is off to you....

Onsite I.T
written by Scottuk, May 13, 2008

Great instructions, worked a treat , added a 1tb Wd HDD to my Imac.
Extra pair of hands make a big difference when unplugging the last four cables under the LCD.

Only small things I noticed were ..
1) I found it easier to leave Isight camera plugged in and just put the ali lid above the main case while working on the system.
2) As "..." said , when reassembling , make sure you tuck in all cables or the LCD wont sit properly , also put the top lid back on from the bottom up (I also had to try this several times before getting it right.

Also small set of long nose pliers come in useful for various sections of this install (but not essential).

To whoever wrote this guide , THANK YOU , it saved a lot of guesswork.

YOU ARE BIG
written by MrDrap, May 22, 2008

Thanks a lot for the Photo-manual, it helps me a lot, thanks a lot

You made this a PIECE of CAKE
written by Bob, May 24, 2008

Took me all of about 30 minutes following your excellent tutorial to pop a 1TB into my iMAC 24 AL. Only thing that threw me was once the cover was removed there were 8 Torx Screws to be removed that held in the LCD frame before lifting it and detaching the 3 connectors.

I was surprised how easily the "glass" lifted. I used 2 x 2.5" suction hooks I found a Lowes. They have a hook that when turned down adds suction by puling up on the center of the suction cup. These are used for bathroom showers I think. Then the LCD come up so easy and was so light - plastic I'm pretty certain and I was expecting the weight of glass.

Anyway, hats off and Thank You.

extra screws?
written by Eric, June 15, 2008

I can't tell where the two longest screws go back in. Can someone help me out? The bezel is really loose and I'm afraid someone will be able to just pull it off one day.

Reply: extra screws
written by Danny, June 15, 2008

Eric,

All the screws holding the bezel are in front, around the frame and behind the glass - as shown in this photo. I remember those big screws going in the bezel's bottom part.

Good luck,

Danny

...
written by Claudio Dalla Vecchia, July 08, 2008

Hi all,

I just replaced the HD on my iMac AL 20", and this tutorial has been very useful. Just a few remarks:

1. it's not necessary to disconnect the iSight cable - just flip the frame over;

2. to remove the monitor one has to unscrew 8 more screws;

3. it doesn't matter which power cables you plug the monitor in;

4. I have a set of TORX T6-20 and didn't need the T4 at all - I mostly used T6 and T9;

5. when one installs Tiger, the HD is not found until it is partitioned with Disk Utils - I guess some HD are already formatted though.

Thanks a lot,
Claudio

...
written by chris , July 17, 2008

i found the isight camera connection easy to remove and the bottom plug to the screen fairly easy the left and right i looked both seemed so taped up so i changed the hard with those 2 still attached. putting everything back no problem. These instructions are just what i needed perfect if i had paid apple to upgrade my hard drive would of cost the earth, its shame they cant include this in their manuel especially with what they cost.

Perfect just perfect......

imac 24" 3.06ghz, 500gb h/d, 2gb mem

upgraded to;

1TB H/D & 4GB MEM

Cheers

...
written by chris, July 17, 2008

just fantastic this is great for those that need this upgrade info if only apple could afford a few extra pages in the manuel.

Velociraptor
written by david, July 26, 2008

Does anyone think the new velociraptor drives would be too hot to put in the IMAC?

I just saved $2,000
written by david, August 20, 2008

Wasn't sure I could do it - especially after reading about the person who broke their screen - but thanks to your detailed directions, I did. (And because mine is only 20," I was able to do it myself.)
Thanks for sharing your knowledge!

Great documentation
written by Michael, August 28, 2008

Whatever the Mac community may lack in numbers it sure makes up in quality

GOOD BOY!!!!
written by Roberto, September 05, 2008

THANK YOU!!!
You contributed to human kind progress!!!

Is it possible to upgrade the graphics card as well?
written by John, September 17, 2008

Hi, I have a 24 inch iMac with the Radeon 2600 HD and was wondering is it possible to upgrade the graphics card as well to the 8800?

CEO/Lead Instructor
written by Dee, September 18, 2008

Great instructions, I have a (white Imac) 24" Intel core2 CPU T7400 @2.16Ghz and was wondering if these instruction would also apply? I just want to do the hard drive upgrade to a terabyte drive since I allready have 4 Gb of ram and Is it still SATA or just ATA hard drive? your feedback would be much appreciated.

Thank you in advance.

Dee Clay

Upgrading iMac white
written by Danny, September 18, 2008

I believe a very good guide to upgrade the hard drive in previous generation iMac white was written by John Wood - it's not quite the same upgrade as with iMac aluminum, nevertheless not so hard DIY

iMac white also uses a SATA drive (and you can see that from John's photo of inside his iMac white).

You might want to consider the following drives for your upgrade (the prices have significantly dropped on 1TB drives compared to the last year when this article was originally written!):

Western Digital Caviar 500GB hard drive (SATA, 16 MB cache) - $84 on 18-Sep-2008

Segate Barracuda 1TB, 32 MB, 7200 RPM - $139 on 18-Sep-2008

Good luck upgrading!

Danny

PS: Please let us know on how successful was your iMac white upgrade to 1 TB hard drive!

Can the CPU be upgraded in iMac aluminum?
written by Danny, September 18, 2008

Unfortunately I believe it is not feasible to upgrade the CPU in iMac 2007 models above 2.8 Ghz - Apple's 2007 product line. The reason might not be in the actual upgrade (replacing the chip) but in the fact that Apple motherboard (BIOS issue) might not recognize the newer CPUs (for example 3.06 Ghz) in iMac 2007 models.

The only way to test this is through a trial and error - I don't have the time or motivation to do it at this time, perhaps some of the readers will try if newer 3.06 Ghz CPUs will work in iMac 2007 - please let us know?

On the other hand I believe iMac 2008 models will most likely have no trouble upgrading the CPU to 3.06 Ghz (subject to socket verification inside the iMac!) - as Apple uses the same motherboards for the entire product line (and there is a 3.06 Ghz product in 2008 line up).

Danny

PSU
written by Mike, September 19, 2008

I am hoping you can help me. I am very comfortable building PCs. (2) days after the iMac warranty was up on my sons mid 2007 20" iMac the PSU went out. I ordered a new one. However I see no easy way or online instructions on how to replace this PSU and hope you can help. My son loves his mac and I am thinking of getting one but this is the 3rd mac product we have bought that has failed one way or other shortly after warranty period. In any case this imac is beautiful and I hope to help me son. I look forwad to your response. Thanks Mike

RE: PSU
written by Danny, September 19, 2008

Mike,

You should be able to follow the above guide - steps 1-4 in order to get access to the iMac power supply. The power supply is of a modular type hence once you open up your iMac (and remove the display as in step 4), you should have access to the PSU - and you need to simply take out the old and plug in the new PSU module.

Follow the steps 10 and onwards to close your iMac.

Apple machines are usually quality build and very durable. PSU failure (especially if you've had several machines fail) might indicate a potential problem with the in house electricity installation, or simply a problem with the power stability on the part of the grid you are connected to.

I strongly recommend using an UPS battery backup as it protects your computer equipment from surges, brownouts and blackouts - my lesson was hard learned as I've lost some of my equipment several years ago due to a thunderstorm (lightning causes voltage surges - a severe surge fries your equipment without the proper protection).

Since that experience I'm always using an UPS with my system and I've never had a single PSU or power related failure on any of my equipment!

Investment into an UPS battery ranges from $80 - $140 and is well worth for the protection it provides for your $2000 iMac!!!

For iMac aluminum the minimum UPS size you would use would be APC Back-UPS 550VA, and for iMac and your accessories (e.g. AirPort, Time Capsule, external hard drive, etc), you would need to use a more serious unit APC Back-UPS 900 VA.

Good luck replacing the PSU in your iMac aluminum! Don't forget the UPS protection as well!

Danny

...
written by Harold, September 19, 2008

Must the HD be formatted before installing. Or does the software also provide the disk utillities?

Formatting the hard drive
written by Danny, September 19, 2008

Harold,

You do not need to format the hard drive prior to the upgrade as this step will be handled by OS X installation DVD.

Once you start the OS X installation you can choose the Disk Utility to custom partition and format the hard drive in any way you require.

You might want to check out this Apple web page on Leopard OS X installation.

Danny

1.5TB hard drive?
written by Toni, September 25, 2008

Can I replace my iMac 24" (late 2007) 320GB hard drive with Seagate Barracuda 1.5TB (ST31500341AS)?

Thanks,

Toni

Yes you can upgrade your iMac to 1.5 TB hard disk now!
written by Danny, September 25, 2008

Hi Tony!

Thank you for your question! As the hard drive capacities keep increasing, so do upgrade options for iMac!

It is my understanding that Seagate Barracuda 1.5TB was just announced - the product is to be available in couple of weeks. Nevertheless, I have reviewed the hard drive specifications at Seagate's web site and we have some good news - yes, you can now upgrade your iMac to 1.5 TB hard drive.

Therefore installing the Seagate Barracuda 1.5TB (ST31500341AS) following the instructions at this page is going to make your iMac one mean 1.5TB machine!

Please let us know how it went!?

Good luck upgrading

Danny

Upgrading iMac graphics card (?)
written by Danny, September 25, 2008

One of the readers above asked if graphics card can be upgraded on iMacs - I suppose you could use the more advanced 8800GTS graphics card from iMac 2008 and plug it into iMac 2007 and hence the upgrade graphics in iMac 2007 - this is due to standardized MXM PCI Express connector.

I've came across this graphics card upgrade for iMac white (not documented so well, but take a note of the last few photos of getting the GPU in).

Danny

Glue, heck no...but double-sided tape works great!
written by Hans, September 27, 2008

First, more accolades for the instructions. Clear as can be.

I just installed a Western Digital 1 Tb Black drive, without a hitch, replacing the 320 Gb on my 20" iMac. I would even say there is a marked performance increase, especially noticeable when suspend a VMWare fusion session. Awesome!

Anyway, I had some double sided scotch tape, and that worked great on the temp sensor. I just affixed a small piece on each "wing" of the mount. Sticks great!

I did this as well!
written by Piethein Strengholt, September 29, 2008

Thanks for this manual. I replaced my 320gb harddisk a couple of days ago. I was able to replace the disk without detaching the cables of the screen.

YaHoo!
written by archie bunker, October 06, 2008

Thanks for your effort in providing this info Danny, I just unpacked my 24" 2.8 today. I can now look forward to ripping the beast part when I fall out of love with the 320 GB WD, seagate should have the 2TB out by then!

A lifesaver
written by The MonT-SteR, October 08, 2008

Hello,

I bought an iMac used earlier this year, and took the liberty of not renewing the AppleCare -- I've used Macs for years now, and they're reliable, so I figured I'd spare the expense. Wouldn't ya know that my hard drive up and died within a few short weeks after the complimentary AppleCare ended? Grrr...

I was nervous about trying the repair myself, so I called the Apple store. "Sure," they said, "we'll fix it, but you have to buy Apple parts." Thanks, but no thanks -- my money doesn't grow on trees, fellas. Another local repair shop was just so rude to me on the phone that I wouldn't go within a mile of their store. So, this had to be a do-it-yourself project. Actually, I had a couple Mac nerds at work help me.

The process was a snap, thanks to your guide. The pictures are excellent references. We had the entire hard drive transplant operation done in about 45 min, and my iMac is happily humming along again. And so am I.

Thanks so much for this Danny
written by Randy , October 08, 2008

Danny, how has it been so far with the Hitachi? How does it compare to the stock WD hard drive in terms of how quite it is? Any heat issues at all?

Hard drive ratings and comparison
written by Danny, October 09, 2008

Hi Randy!

Thank you for your question! I’ve had experience with various hard drives within the last year I’ve used in upgrading several iMac machines – my original Hitachi is working *really* great, it’s quiet, however runs a bit hot (up to 60C-140F – this is in the upper limit of manufacturer’s specification)... I’ve also had experience with (lower price range) WD Caviar 1 TB (16 MB cache) – this drive is louder than Hitachi and you can hear it working, runs relatively warm at about 55C-131F. Probably the best drive thus far I’ve had experience with in iMac machines is the (upper price range) WD Black 1 TB (32 MB cache, SATA 3.0) – it runs very quiet and also much cooler at about 45C-113F! WD Black was not available at the time of my original upgrade, however it’s probably one of the best 1 TB drive on the market today.

Please note that temperature of your hard drive also depends on your ambient temperature (it really makes a difference if your room temperature is around 20C-68F or on the other hand around 30C-86F) – therefore your actual temperature results will wary

In conclusion, my hard drive rating on this day [10-Oct-2008] goes as follows:

#1 - WD Black 1TB – quiet, runs cool, , 32mb cache, SATA 3.0, 5yr warranty
#2 - Hitachi Deskstar 1TB – quiet, runs warm, 32mb cache, SATA 3.0, 5 yr warranty
#3 - all others

Please let us know on your upgrade experience

Danny

Please update the instructions
written by Chris, October 16, 2008

Hi,

Thanks a lot for this tutorial-I do have to say that I struggled a bit with the LCD removal on the 20" iMac. That is, until I read some comments that mentioned that I had to remove those screws on the side of the LCD. It wasn't mentioned in the instructions, so I wasn't sure, but after a struggle, I decided to try it, and lo and behold-the rest of the process went smoothly. I now have the WD Caviar 1 TB installed! I had hoped to use Carbon Copy Cloner to seamlessly copy my existing 320GB system disc on over, but it didn't seem to end up with a bootable drive. Luckily, I also have been using TimeMachine, and I am currently restoring from that!
All in all, not too hard a procedure-I had experience with iMacs in replacing the PSU and midplane assembly multiple times on a 17" G5 iMac, and this was about the same level of difficulty, ie, not too bad at all

Thanks!

Chris

...
written by Randy Walker, October 16, 2008

Thanks so much for the info on the WD Black Caviar drive; I went ahead and bought it the same day you responded

I was able to swap in the new drive in about a half hour thanks to your perfect step-by-step instructions! (thank you). Unfortunately, my Caviar drive runs no where near as cool as yours. As I'm typing this, I'm showing temps of 135F with an ambient temp of 81F. The room that I am in is showing 74F on the thermostat. The thing that is making me concerned is that I'm not even doing anything on the mac except responding to you, yet its still in the 130F range!!?? The mac has plenty of ventilation all the way around including the vents underneath.

What do you think? Should I take the drive back for a new one before I load it up with data? I'm sure it will fail rather quickly running at these temps, especially considering the max operating temp is 140F (according to the tech sheet).

Thanks in advance for any advice!!

-Randy

...
written by Doug, October 16, 2008

I just upgraded my 24" iMac to the 1.5TB Seagate mentioned above.

No more space worries.

Just take your time and be careful.

I noticed that the frame screws were of several different lengths. So that I didn't mix up where they belonged, I took a 8.5 x 11 sheet of paper and as I removed them from the frame I taped each one in the proper location on the paper with scotch tape. That way when I went to put them back I knew I was installing them in the correct location.

Thanks for the great article!

Reply to Randy
written by Danny, October 17, 2008

Hi Randy,

Good to hear you've managed to upgrade your iMac internal hard drive ))

Your drive does run a bit hot, however as you say still within manufacturers specs (up to 140F, 60C). I would try to load the drive (e.g. start copying gigs of stuff back and forth) and see if it goes over 140F. In case it does, please contact WD support (online chat, email or phone), inquire on the issue, and try replacing the drive (perhaps the issue in your case is with the particular batch of those drives).

I believe that any drive operating within manufacturer's specs will not fail at least within its warranty period - and that being 5 years for our drives hopefully means we'll get at least that much life out of them (afterward we'll need replacing our Macs anyhow). I would be concerned if the drive exceeds the operating temperature (you need to do some testing on this) -- in that case you need to look into replacing it.

Finally, all of my data is backed up on an external drive (I use 1 TB WD My Book Studio with firewire 800) through Time Machine - I would *highly* recommend having an external backup drive regardless of the type of drive you are installing internally as having data copied in two places is the only guarantee of possible data recovery in case of drive failure!

Please let us know how it went(?)

Danny

could you
written by Steven, October 17, 2008

Danny this guide is absolutely brilliant, i have yet to upgrade my aluminium 20" imac, the guide you linked to about replacing the graphics card wasn't exactly clear, but i hope to read it a couple of more times to better understand it, and again thank you for being so daring to do this on your own. Thanks!!

Cooling down the hard drive
written by Danny, October 18, 2008

In order to cool down the hard drive, you can use a really cool software utility called smcFanControl - use the utility to manually increase the minimum speed of the fan cooling the HDD (the utility also allows you to do the same for CPU and Optical Drive fan).

Standard system setting for HDD fan is 1100 RPMs - if you use the utility to increase this to 1800 RPMs (or even higher), the HDD temperature (as in my case) has dropped for about 9F (5C). You need to experiment a bit - increase the fan speed to various levels and measure how much your HDD temperature has dropped (you also need to allow the system at least 5-10 minutes to adjust to the new airflow - affecting the temperature reading). When you are happy with the effect (HDD temperature drop) leave the settings at that RPM level.

Another utility worth mentioning is iStatPro - a system monitoring tool you can use to view your HDD, OD, CPU temperatures (as well as other useful readings such as CPU utilization, memory utilization, network throughput, disk usage, average system load, battery capacity of your wireless mouse, etc.)

Danny

Great stuff !
written by Mathias, October 22, 2008

Thanks to your guide i was able to repair the Superrive who was stucked with a CD label inside !
You could just mention that there is 4 connectors under the screen, and that colors have to match (pink/gray and blue/gray)

Thanks Big time.
written by dorame, October 24, 2008

My machine is a year and one month old and was out of warranty when my 500GB HD went bad, Apple quoted me $350 to install a new 500GB HD and $450 for a Terra bite HD. Thanks to your guide I was done in 45 minutes. , lowes had a small TORX driver and bits for $6.00, I used a Pump Toilet Plunger, Don't fear It was NEW. The big precaution I took was to cover the screen when removing the screws. Comp USA had the seagate 1TB drive for $129.00. I had access to another computer and was able to reference the photo's, that helped also.

power connectors?
written by Samuel, October 30, 2008

First off, thanks for the great guide! Like many others my hard drive failed about a month after my warranty was up.

My only question is about what I can only assume are power connectors to the monitor. Mathias wrote about these but mine aren't color coded...well, the ones coming from the monitor are but not those in the computer.

I got my iMac like the day they came out(sept 07 i think), if that helps

faster superdrive
written by Lenry, November 15, 2008

It is possible to replace the superdrive with one that will write faster than 2x?

Lifting the glass with some tape adhesive
written by alex, November 25, 2008

I lifted the glass by putting 2 adhesive tapes in the upper corner. I used the stuff to seal packets, but simple tesa might be fine.

Overall great thanks for this article, it took me less than 30 minutes, the most difficult thing was to re-insert the display power adaptor...

great info!
written by Danimal, November 28, 2008

Thanks a lot for this guide!! I used it to install a 1 TB HD and a Ram in my new imac before ever even turning it on!! Great stuff!

...
written by eugenetech, December 03, 2008

Thanks a lot I have to do this tomorrow. This is grad for the beginner tech in mac computers

Other iMac Mod's?
written by MacD, December 05, 2008

A couple of questions off the HD replacement issue, but obviously this process of opening the iMac would be the same for accessing other "replaceable" items inside an iMac.

Questions:

Is the graphics card replaceable in the newer aluminum iMac's? I know the older (white) iMac's had the
graphics cards soldered to the logic board ... but I thought I read somewhere that the new iMacs (aluminum) have the graphics cards attached with plug-in connectors. That way Apple can simply fix a bad graphics card with out having to replace the entire logic board, as in the white iMac's. Considering the fact that the logic board replacements are costing around $800 - 900.00 (in the older white iMac's), this makes good sense to have redesigned the logic boards to accept "plug-in" replacements.

Has anyone replaced their graphics cards in the newer aluminum iMac's yet?

thanks!
written by Dave Brown, December 07, 2008

this is invaluable. i will use this tutorial when i do my upgrade. thanks!

Also graphics card.
written by Andy, December 07, 2008

I have the 2008 20"aluminum imac 2.66mhz 2gb ram model.
And I was wondering also if the graphics cards would be the same size if I decided to upgrade.
Is their a difference between the layout, piping connections between the 20" and thye 24" models?
I wonder if anyone has tried this yet.
Thanks and GREAT guide.

NEW Tutorials on the way - CPU and GPU upgrade!
written by Danny, December 11, 2008

I would like to thank all the readers for their continuous support throughout the last year

Exactly a year later since my original hard drive upgrade on iMac 2007, I have upgraded my new iMac 2008 with 1.5 TB hard drive, and I've swapped the CPU and GPU (graphics card) in my old iMac 2007 as well -- expanding yet new frontiers on iMac mods -- finally we have the answer - yes, it is possible to upgrade CPU and GPU in your iMacs! it is also possible to replace the superdrive I've taken lots of photos, the tutorials are on the way, I just need to find some time during the holidays to write it up, hopefully before this year runs out

Merry Christmas to everyone!

Worked like a charm. Didn't disconnect the display
written by Terral, December 11, 2008

We have the 24" model and only disconnected the cable with two tiny screws on the bottom of the panel. I had my son hold the LCD as we tipped it up from the right side. I could then replace the drive while he held it. It was easier than I thought. A new HD in our laptop was much harder. The only thing to really watch for is dust. It was coming from everywhere. I tried not to breathe but it took about 20-30 minutes to do the whole thing.

Also, the backside of the glass had a film that really showed up when we tried to clean it. Lint-free wipes with lens cleaning solution did the trick. I was wishing for canned air.

One last thing. We couldn't find any suction cups anywhere in the house and used an apple peeler that sucks down to the counter. It even acted like a handle. Now we just need a bigger external drive to back up to.

Good Stuff - CPU & GPU Tutorial
written by SAS, December 14, 2008

I can't wait to see your write-up on the CPU and GPU upgrades. Thanks in advance. Would you please include information on where you found the parts?

Merry Christmas

...
written by Edilberto, December 19, 2008

All I have to say is nothing but the thanks to the great work that you did for us Thanks again and keep up no the good beacsuse it wasn't just good it was fantastic!!!!!! You are the Man!!!!

Awesome guide
written by Peter, December 21, 2008

I have used your guide this weekend after a hardidsk failure and i managed to do it without any problem this is really great!!!
My Imac was 1 month over warranty and they charged me euro 300 for a replacement of the 320gb standard hdd.
I didn't agree and asked to send it back unrepaired.
I bought the WD 1TB caviar for euro 90 and replaced myself using this guide!

Awesome!
Peter, NL

Great Read!
written by Dallas Miller, December 24, 2008

I was really not wanting to get into the system and poke around unknowingly and decided to look into how difficult it would be to replace the drive. This helped me so well tat I was able to replace the whole thing in less that 30 minutes. Great find here!

Easy as Pie!!
written by 15yr PC Guy, December 27, 2008

Thank you for the great read and the awesome description for the drive replacement. I am a 15 year PC person who recently converted to MAC and this was as easy if not easier than a PC hard drive update. The only downside was all the removing of Torx screws. Other than that, following the tutorial, this upgrade can easily be accomplished by an amature.

The hard part is waiting for Time Machine to restore my HDD

...
written by rick, December 30, 2008

Great article and is there something going on here with the apple hard drives failing immediately after warranty? Mine failed 1 month and 10 days after expiration and I notice several other cases of that above....

...
written by Robert Guezen, January 04, 2009

Thanks. Great guide.

My iMac 24" is currently re-installing from a TimeMachine backup onto the newly fitted 1.5TB Seagate Barracuda.

Only hickup, there is PCB board on the spot where the temperature sensor was. So I had to move it a little bit. Hope this doesn't affect sensor accuracy to much?

Looks like I just had myself a new iMac 24"2.8GHz with 1.5TB & 4GB. Looking forward to performance gain from the faster harddrive.

Thanks again.

...
written by Robert Guezen, January 04, 2009

Up & Running.

-1.16 TB free after system restore.

-110 MB/s HD performance. (old HD did 52 MB/s)

I'm SO HAPPY.

Thanks again.

How do you clone you old hard to the new upgrade
written by Bruce, January 05, 2009

This all sounds good, but please someone talk about how to clone you new disk once with all your programs from the old drive. Also is there any way to get an external SATA connection for IMAC 24.

Cloning disk = SuperDuper
written by Ron C., January 06, 2009

Copying the data is pretty easy, but take it slowly. These directions are largely product-type independent, but I'll try to drop some hints appropriate for an Intel Aluminum iMac. The description of most of the steps are shortened; I'm expecting a certain amount of intelligence and capability. If it seems like you don't know what a step means, then it might mean the entire process is over your head. I'm not intending that to be snide, just a warning that this is not an easy updgrade...

0) Purchase a new hard drive (SATA) and an enclosure (FireWire or USB2) of an appropriate size (both the new drive and the old drive are 5.25"). Install the new drive in the enclosure.

1) Format the new disk with the appropriate format (using Disk Utility, since you're doing an Intel Mac it needs to be GUID Extended, Mac OS Extended (Journaled), but double check - whatever it is, it should be the same as the current drive).

Your new drive is now useful, but quite empty. Let's get something onto it.

2) Download SuperDuper (http://www.shirt-pocket.com/SuperDuper/SuperDuperDescription.html). You don't need to purchase it, but if it's helpful you might want to remember that...

3) Using SuperDuper, copy the old disk to the new disk.

At this point, you have cloned your disk onto the new drive.

4) Remove the new disk from the enclosure.

5) Install the new disk in the computer, using the above directions.

6) Take that old disk and install it into the enclosure. Voila, instant bonus storage.

Ron

CPU/GPU Upgrade Guide
written by Dominic Rivera, January 07, 2009

Looking forward to reading the GPU/CPU Upgrade guide. I've got a 2.0Ghz 2007 iMac that I'd like to upgrade, but I only want to dig around inside there once so I'd love to see how to upgrade the CPU/GPU and then do a massive warranty-voiding upgrade all at once.

Be careful with the screen cables
written by jean, January 11, 2009

After doing the hard drive change, my screen wasn't working as I've had difficulty with the third screen connector, so I checked there and I didn't push back correctly this connector (this connector is hard to reconnect correctly).

To help you, I suggest to remove 4 screws holding the power supply board (the board where you connect this hard-to-push-back-connector). With this board removed do not unplug any wires -- it's not necessary to lift up the board -- it will be really easy to remove and put back.

I put everything back and now it's working!!

My new Samsung spinpoint 1TB is working great! (it does not make more noise than my old 320GB, and the temp is about the same - 45 to 47 C).

-------
Now, where I can find these non-glossy screen protectors !?? :-)
--------

I copy the old drive to the new one (I put it in a USB enclosure) with Super Duper, and everything works like before, except my bootcamp partition -- I'll reinstall it, I only have Crysis on it....

iMac HD Replacement
written by Ajward, January 12, 2009

Excellent presentation!! I just bought a 20 inch, 2.4GHz and was wondering how difficult it might to swap the drives. Not a priority at the moment since I have about 800GB on external drives.
Nice to know the information is out there though.

24" iMac w/ 1.5TB HDD!
written by Brutus, January 13, 2009

Thank you so much for your detailed step-by-step guide. I wouldn't have had the confindence to upgrade the hard drive without your guide.

I successfully upgraded a refurbished 24" Aluminum iMac 2.8GHz (April 2008 model) to have 1.5TB HD & 4GB RAM! By buying refurbished, and doing the HD & RAM upgrades myself, I saved myself over $450 and have more storage capacity than is available through Apple!

Again, Thanks so much!
--Brutus--

3.06 Intel core 2 duo
written by Mike, January 13, 2009

Can upgrade be done with this?

3.06GHz Intel Core 2 Duo
2GB 800MHz DDR2 SDRAM - 2x1GB
500GB Serial ATA Drive
NVIDIA GeForce 8800 GS w/512MB GDDR3

I just bought it and haven't taken it out of the box yet.
I also found a certified mac tech who said he will install it and not void the warranty. I hope he's not BSn me because I bought the apple care plan.

Yes, you can upgrade hard drive in - 3.06 Intel core 2 duo
written by Danny, January 13, 2009

Hi there,

Yes, you can upgrade the hard drive in 3.06 Intel core 2 duo, the instructions are 100% the same. Actually, I've upgraded one of those just the last month to 1.5 TB Seagate, works very well.

Danny

installing OSX to new HD
written by Mike, January 14, 2009

Thanks for your quick reply to my previous question. I will be buying the WD Caviar black 1 TB and the Kingston 4gb 800 MZH memory. I've heard about some problems with the Seagate 1.5 TB so I'll pass on that one.

Anyhow, I'm new to mac so I don't really understand the OS yet. As I said earlier I haven't even taken it out of the box yet and don't plan to until I have the new HD and memory ready to install.The OS reinstallation part of it is what scares me the most.

Since my Imac is new I would assume the latest version of OS X would be on the install disc. So would the following apply?

On the other hand, if you have the full version of Leopard OS X, just go ahead and pop in the DVD, turn on your iMac and it will boot from the DVD - just follow the instructions on the screen to install the operating system.

Please note that once you are booted to OS X Leopard installation you will need to start the Disk Utility in order to partition and format your new 1TB hard drive.

Is there a default setting during the install that creates partitions the way it came from apple?
Any replies welcome.
Thanks

osX install
written by thinkdunson, January 15, 2009

first of all, relax. there is absolutely nothing to be afraid of. it's all extremely easy.

the install disk is also a boot disk. it was the latest version of osX when they packed it to ship, but there could have been an update since then.

the way it came from apple is with only one partition. so all you need to do is
open disk utility from the menu bar,
select your disk from the list on the left,
name it,
select HFS extended and journaled,
then just click the "erase disk..." button and confirm.
(i'm on a pc at work right now, so don't freak if the names of things i just mentioned aren't exact.)
then install osX.
the installation is also extremely easy. just do the default or easy install.

when you see it, you'll see how simple it is. apple did all the worrying for you, before hand.

One little screw lost.... take care
written by Josh, January 16, 2009

Just upgraded my 20" iMac (Late 2007) with a Samsung Spinpoint 1TB. Works great.

One warning to everyone: The two teeny screws holding that display connector are very tricky. I lost one in the guts of the machine when removing it! Now there's only one screw holding that connector in. I don't think (at least I hope) that this should be a big deal. Can a microscopic little screws just sitting somewhere in there cause any electrical shorts or anything like that? Do any more savvy users know?

Strange sound Hitachi 1TB?
written by Rick, January 17, 2009

Hi all,

I followed this great guide to install a Hitachi 1TB in my late 2007 iMac 2GHz. Everything seems to work fine, but I keep hearing this strange sound. It's a constant 'tick tack' sound coming from the harddrive every second. Like it's being accessed, even when I'm not using the computer. The drive has been in my G5 and I didn't notice the sound then.

It even happens when I just boot up the machine so I don't think it has something to do with heath.

Any ideas on this? Is there a diagnostic softwaretool I can use to check if the disk is still ok?

Thanks in advance and thanks again from this great guide!

Hard drive clicking
written by Danny, January 17, 2009

Usually when drives start making loud clicking sounds it is time to backup your data and look into replacing the drive as soon as possible. Not sure on the type of the clicking sound you have and how old is your drive (you say it has been used in your earlier G5) - in any case, you might want to consider backing up your data (if you don't have your time machine backup that is) and use some of the Mac diagnostic tools described in this article:

http://www.peachpit.com/articles/article.aspx?p=693649&seqNum=3

Danny

Hard drive clicking
written by Rick, January 17, 2009

Thanks for your reply Danny!

I just bought two of those drives 3 months ago. They were brand new. Unfortunately no warranty because they are HP spare parts and are normally not sold without a machine.

Could the problem be caused by installing the drive on its side? When I had it in my G5 it was lying flat.

Something else: the disk is not slowing down my machine, that's also strange. And I also noticed that the ticking is less loud and less often in Windows XP (I have a 900GB partition for OS X and 100GB for XP).

Going to check the site you suggested right now! If the problem cannot be solved I might install my other 1TB that's still in my G5. Maybe this will solve the problem.

Thanks again!

Noisy HDD
written by Danny, January 17, 2009

Hi Rick,

It also could just be that the drive you are using is simply loud - if using one of the utilities I've told you about earlier shows that everything is OK with your drive. Again, I cannot distinguish the type of clicking you have - usually *very loud* clicking and grinding means the drive is about to go bad, on the other hand a quieter clicking and moving is attributed to a normal operation of the drive - whereas the sound levels depend on the drive quality and type used (please have a look at the recommended drives at the top of this page and user feedback in the comment section).

It shouldn't matter if the drive is installed on the side. However, if you noticed it while installing the drive, the pins on the drive's side go into a round shaped rubber holders that are in fact providing shock absorbing (hence reducing the noise). Perhaps something didn't go right during the upgrade and pins are in direct contact with the chassis transferring the vibrations - again just a hypothesis.

If the problem persists, and if everything is OK with your drive once checked with the disk utility tools, you might revise the installation steps and perhaps consider installing another (quieter) drive.

Good luck,

Danny

...
written by AJ, January 18, 2009

Has anyone considered the Western Digital Green for the iMac?

reportedly runs cool, quiet an low power consumption. Sounds good for this application. Performance is less but approaches the Western Digital Black.

CPU VS Bus speed
written by Donald McHose, January 18, 2009

Looking at the offering for a CPU upgrade in the future it looks like that anything over 2.8 MHz ( what I have ) is for a 1333 bus since our macs run on a 800 bus would this be an issue or is it just CPU bus speed by what ever the cpu is clocked at ? I have read were the E8600 was clocked at 3.8 with no issues ;-) WoW!

Works like charm!
written by Gsa700, January 19, 2009

I just upgrades my 2.4 C2D to 4 GB and 1 TB HDD!

I used kingston hyper-X 800 mhz and WD Black 32 MB 1 TB drive.

I am restoring from TIme Capsule as I write this.

Thanks.

Replacing Optical Drive
written by Moshe Braun, January 19, 2009

I purchased the 20 inch imac Aluminium 14 months ago. Last week my optical drive went crazy and is onow out of commission. I bought a replacement (Matsia UJ 875). Is it terribly dificult to replace this part. Also, I noticed there was some silver tape attached to the drive. Is this of any significance?

...
written by David, January 20, 2009

After reading your article I decided to take the challenge and build the ultimate iMac on a budget. Today my refurbed iMac 3.06 24", 500gig HD, 2gig RAM. arrived $1,900, along with a Seagate 1.5TB drive from Amazon $140, and 4 gigs of RAM from Crucial about $50. Right out of the box I upgraded the drive and the memory with no real problems. I am now installing the operating system.

1. The glass was easy to pop out with only two large bathroom hook suction cups.

2. It was easy to disconnect the camera wire.

3. It took me awhile to locate the two lower display connectors.

4. I never could disconnect the display power connector, so I just rotated and laid the display carefully to one side. I then exchanged the drive.

5. It took me awhile to figure out how to format the drive (being new to Mac) and install the OS.

Just take it slow and read all the notes several times before you go for it. I could never have done this without this website. Thanks so much.

......and now what can I do with this souped up machine?????

Reply to questions
written by Danny, January 20, 2009

Hi everyone!

Thank you for your awesome interest in this page! Here are my answers to couple of your questions above:

- Can you use WD green 1TB hard drive? Yes, by all means, it runs cooler than all other drives and uses the least power -- however you trade in the performance as this drive will perform slower than all other recommended at the top of this page. If you are the type of user that does not require peek performance from your machine, you might consider having this drive. In terms of noise, I don't think other drives (WD Black, Hitachi, Seagate) are all that noisy in iMacs (also a matter of individual perception), so you might not have a lot of gain there.

- In terms of CPU upgrade - higher CPU bus speeds are backward compatible, so if you use a CPU with high freq. bus on a lower bus motherboard, it will work, however you won't be getting the performance gain. Actually the bus and CPU frequency is automatically being determined by iMac boot loader (we'd call this BIOS in PCs). iMac hardware is the same as used in laptops - hence you'd find Mobile CPU socket in there, an optical drive used in laptops, a MXM graphics card used in laptops - it seems Apple uses the same components in all of its product lines (they are all mobile platforms) - it sure saves the manufacturing cost. Having said that, iMac uses "M" (mobile) socket for its Intel CPUs, hence if the CPU you are putting in fits the socket (being M socket), it is most likely it will work and be automatically recognized by the boot loader. I've actually experimented with several CPUs back and forth between iMac 2007 and 2008 (the difference being 800 Mhz and 1333 Mhz bus speed), and they worked well back and forth. The only thing that didn't show up properly was the CPU type in "About this Mac" if you use other Intel Mobile CPUs than the ones used by Apple -- you do get the performance of the CPU though, its just not being recognized properly in About this Mac - but I suppose most of us can live with that for the additional performance gain. I didn't have the time as of yet to write a page on my CPU upgrade experience in iMac -- thanks everyone on the patience though

- Upgrading the Optical drive - it requires you to take the right hand side speaker out and to unplug quite a few connectors from the motherboard in order to reach the optical drive. I've actually replaced an optical drive for a friend of mine, it was a bit more complex than upgrading the hard drive, but not too much. Please take a note of all connectors you are pulling out, they must go back where you pulled them from. Luckily they're all different sizes, so you won't be able to mix them up, they're even color coded. The silver part is just a shielding (connected to the ground), and at the end of the day you can live without it. What's important is that drive is connected to its connector at the back giving it power as well as communication with the motherboard - and putting it all back nicely so it fits. Don't forget to plug back all the connectors too! Once I've forgot to plug in a connector, and when I've powered up the machine, the cooling fan was spinning at its max! Had to open the machine again and locate the connector that wasn't plugged in. I took some photos of my optical drive upgrade, hopefully I'll have some time to make a page on this upgrade too.

Thank you everyone for posting your upgrade experiences and issues at this page!

Danny

optical drive
written by OddyOh, January 20, 2009

I've got a 20" Aluminum iMac, and there's a DVD stuck in the optical drive. I'll try opening up the iMac tomorrow, thanks to this great tutorial! I don't even care if I can't get it out, I just want to disconnect the power to the drive so it'll stop spinning everytime I open an app. I've got a faster external drive anyway.

Optical drive - stuck DVD disc
written by Danny, January 21, 2009

If you have the patience you might be successful extracting the stuck DVD disc with a pair of tweezers...

Ultimately you can take the drive apart (you will need precision screwdrivers) and extract the stuck disc that way. The extent of damage will determine if the optical drive is reusable (e.g. if the laser head or some of the moving mechanisms got damaged).

If your optical drive is beyond the repair, you can look for a replacement optical drive online - 8X DVD-RW drives that would go in there are UJ-875, UJ-857 or UJ-85.

You can actually fit any laptop-style slot loading parallel connection (ATA) optical drive in there, even older models UJ-825, UJ-846 and others (these drives are less capable, slower or no DVD recording, you need to check the specs).

Danny

Seagate 1.5 TB drive in iMac 2007, 2008 (hard drive firmware update)
written by Danny, January 24, 2009

The gear I use daily is iMac 2008 with Seagate 1.5 TB hard dive - I didn't have any problems at all with it, however in some *very rare* cases (and with the very first models) manufacturer notes that these drives might experience data inaccessibility problems -- Seagate is also claiming this can be easily fixed with a firmware update. Here is a great article on the subject:

http://www.tuaw.com/2009/01/23/take-two-of-the-seagate-saga/

Although everything was great with my Seagate 1.5 TB, I've went and ran the hard drive firmware update - in my case I've went from version SD17 to SD1B. You need to locate your HDD model - click on the Apple logo, then About This Mac, then More Info, and finally on Serial-ATA tab - there you will see hard drive model and revision - which is the firmware version. Look for the model number and match it at Seagate's web site and download the ISO file, burn onto a CD and boot from it, follow the instructions and the firmware in your iMac's with 1.5 TB will be updated, reboot and you are all set.

Danny

PS: you are doing this at your own risk, make sure you have all of your important data backed up!!!

Another upgraded 24" IMAC to 1TB HDD & 4GB SDRAM done by a rookie
written by Mike, February 01, 2009

DID IT!

I had no experience working on computers before this. I bought a WD Caviar 1TB HDD and the Kingston 4GB Apple upgrade kit.

I had my wife help me (extra hands) and together we upgraded our new IMAC in about 45 minutes. It was very nerve racking opening up a brand new (refurbished) IMAC, but taking our time and referring to the illustrations gave us the confidence to do this upgrade.

After pulling the plastic screen with 2 suction cups on each corner, unscrewing the bezel and flipping it over leaving the camera connector alone (it came unconnected by itself after flipping the bezel over), unscrewing the 8 screws that hold the LCD, removing the 2 screws on the LCD connector on the right bottom of LCD (be extra careful not to drop those tiny screws) I did not disconnect anything else (wire on the left side or the connector under the LCD) to access the HD. I had my wife hold the right side of the LCD up and I was able to reach in and remove and install the new HD.

Reapplying the temp sensor was a little tricky trying to locate it in what you think is the right spot. We put it exactly where it was on the old HD. Just off the center right next to but not on the aluminum circle. I was lucky enough to still have enough adhesive on the sensor holder and foam to stick it back on the new HD.

Putting everything back was easy except for getting the suction cups to release from the screen cover. It took about 10 minutes to gently get them off with the only casualty being one of the guide pins (alignment post) breaking off.

Thank you for for these easy to use instructions for this huge upgrade!

--Mike

home user
written by brian, February 03, 2009

thanks for the great directions. I changed my 20" aluminum mac hard drive in about 15 minutes. I didn't disconnect the lcd cables either. It lifted up with enough room to get the drive out.

Unfortunately, something is misaligned with the optical drive. I had a disc in there which wouldn't eject after reassembly. I had to take the aluminum bezel off to get the disc out.

any tips on proper alignment of the optical drive before I put the bezel back on?

Success! Thanks for saving me lots of money!
written by Brian Talbot, February 06, 2009

I just successfully replaced my 500GB Hard Drive in my 24" iMac 2.8GHz Core 2 Extreme (which failed after 13 months... figures), with a 1.5 tb Seagate. It was simple with these clear and useful directions and it only took me 20 min. When I booted it up for the first time it wouldn't load the CD, so I started it in Target Drive mode by holding "T" as it started, then used my macbook connected with firewire to reformat and install the Mac OS Disk Drivers. Then I booted it up with the leopard disk and restored my system from time machine. Such a relief, after a week of hassle trying to figure out what went wrong, to see my computer restored.

I read up on the Seagate 1.5TB Firmware issue, and if you go to Seagate's website, you can enter your model and serial number and it will tell you if your drive is affected, and needs a firmware update. The steps to find out if your dirve needs a firmware update are located here:

http://seagate.custkb.com/seagate/crm/selfservice/search.jsp?DocId=207931

My drive was not affected by the firmware issues.

Thanks for the great tutorial!

Worked! Thanks!
written by Brian Juskiewicz, February 07, 2009

I managed to do this switch without removing the power cable for the LCD screen. I just simply had a friend keep it vertical while I did the work on switching the hard drive. My hard drive catty was very hard to remove and took many times more force than I thought it would have. I would recommend unscrewing the handle if yours screen is off - it will make you less nervous. The only other thing with my change was that my glass had some kind of coating on it, and streaked when I placed it on bed. Took many many nervous cleaning of the inside of glass. I cannot stress enough how thin the glass is, and that it will actually bend if you are not careful. In the end, my 1TB WD hard drive works like a champ and I am happy I did it. Thanks for the guide!

Really easy, thks!!!
written by Patrice Juillard, February 09, 2009

Just did it after crash disk. Under the screen 4 small connectors. IMac bought in Switzerland perhaps different than yours. But with patience and calm (my 3 chidren at school) it was a pleasure to do this. Thanks very much.

...
written by Mike , February 16, 2009

WOW!!! Thanks for posting this!!! My 24" Mac silver is better than ever. I had the stock WD 300 gig and it was full, the system had slowed down. I followed your walkthrough putting in a WD 1 TB drive, all went as you said, there were 8 side screws that had to be removed in order to lift up the screen, but other than that it was quick and easy. Thanks.

Some finer points of the hard drive installation
written by Vincent, March 03, 2009

I just upgraded to a 1.5Tb Seagate, and while I still remember them here are some issues I encountered.

I used suction cups from a car sun shield. I'd never used the cups as the sun visors hold the sun shield adequately anyway.

Don't tilt the glass too much, it can bend the locating pins. Try to lift it off evenly.

That little connector on the left with the four fine wires going to it is quite tricky to remove. Don't pull the wires or they will come out of the connector, and don't use pliers like I did because they can damage it also. If you can, I think the best thing to use is your fingernails each side of it.

I found it easier to lever off the connector with the two screws than to pull on the tab. It's quite tight.

There's a little piece of plastic with a hole in it, about 5mm x 15mm, directly in the centre at the bottom of the lcd screen. When I lifted the screen it got lifted off where it was mounted. Just be aware of that and don't lose it.

I disconnected the camera connection, but it would be easier not too. I didn't disconnect the main lcd cable, I just tilted it up to get access inside.

Take care removing the cables to the hard drive, the plastic connectors are very soft and seem to mark easily. I undid the screws but still levered the handle with one handle of a pair of pliers.

I put a piece of thin aluminium on the locating pegs of the hard drive and then gripped them with pliers to get the pegs out. I noticed they'd been loctited in, but didn't worry about putting loctite on when I installed them on the new HD. I can't really imagine them vibrating loose.

Replacing the temperature sensor is tricky as the drive was different and I couldn't get it on the exact same spot. Just took an educated guess on that one.

If the lcd doesn't sit evenly when you reinstal it check for wires, especially the camera one if you've disconnected it.

When installing the front cover, it pays to poke that silver conductive tape or whatever it is around the RAM slot in. If it's not tucked in it's hard to get the RAM back in properly.

I cleaned the glass and lcd screen with the cloth from my glasses case. There was a lot of screen removal and replacement as I kept spotting dust on the inside of the glass and on the screen, but I got it pretty good finally.

I only needed a T8 and a T6.

And now that it's all up and running I've just noticed on the underside of the Western Digital HD I removed there's a SMALL PIECE OF FOAM WITH THAT SILVER CONDUCTING STUFF AROUND IT, STICKING TO IT. I assume this gets the static electricity off the drive, so tomorrow I'm going to have to go through this exercise again and put it on the Seagate. Wish I'd known about that . . .

Delving into the iMac's innards was an intense experience. Only damage I did was to the lcd connector on the left, but it still seems to work fine. My advice is to be patient and not force anything. Good luck to you all.

Connectors
written by Danny, March 03, 2009

Hi Vincent,

Thank you for describing your experience so vividly to us.

I would like to state for everyone here that all connectors are to be handled with your fingers (as shown in photos), there is absolutely no need to use pliers to remove any connector in iMac (and risk the damage).

In terms of the temp. sensor for the hard drive, if the drive is different, you can put the sensor anywhere it fits on the drive as this is an external temp. sensor whose readings are used to calculate the RPMs speed of the cooling fan (the temperature will also dissipate almost evenly through the drive's metal casing), so no worries as to where exactly you put it on the drive.

The foam with the conducting stuff around it, if we're thinking of the same thing, is the EM shielding, and your iMac will work just fine without it (the drive is already grounded when connected) - there is no need to go through the experience again just to put back in that little piece as you won't notice any significant gain or change in performance.

Thank you for that comment on tucking back the silver piece around the RAM slot in order to make the front panel go back easily - I remember I've experienced the same issue and I've updated the above instructions with this info!

Danny

iMac Problems
written by fatalfred, March 03, 2009

First of all, I would like to thank Danny for your awesome DIY!!! And all the others who have commented and shared their experiences. It was and still is a great read!
I am slowly building up the courage to do this soon, but waiting on your other tutorial concerning CPU and Graphics Card.
The reason for this is that I recently had some problems with my late 2007 iMac screen (irregular coloring from left to right, vertical lines etc...) After reading on online what causes it, or possible fixes, I seem to have corrected the vertical line by increasing the internal fans but not the irregular coloring....

Did you notice any of these problems with your model?
Will a Graphic card update solve the problem?
Any insights to this would be great.

Screen problems
written by Danny, March 03, 2009

Hi fatalfred,

Thank you for your post.

It is a well known fact that iMac 2007 LCD screens have discoloration problems (uneven colors, especially at the screen edges) - I've actually had the same discoloration issues with my iMac 2007. Since then I've replaced my computer with iMac 2008 and they have *much* better LCD screens, brighter, stronger colors, fewer discoloration problems.

The only thing you can really do is replace the LCD screen (the issue has nothing to do with the graphics card). If you still have the Apple warranty (or extended warranty), you might want to contact Apple for replacement. Other than that you're out of luck, or couple hundred bucks out of your pocket if you really want to pay for the new LCD screen replacement. It actually might not be that expensive if you purchase one directly from China (Shenzen) and replace it yourself (easy to do, just plug it in). However you'll need to research the Chinese suppliers on your own. Another solution (arguably economically more feasible) might be to sell your iMac 2007 on eBay and buy a new one.

The new iMacs 2009 are available as of today with 4GB RAM and 1TB hard drives built in (however still no 1.5 TB models).

Danny

Plastic?
written by Barry, March 04, 2009

Hi all,
This has been a fascinating read and I've been thinking about tackling it for a couple of weeks. Anyway, I've just done a "dress rehearsal" by taking of the front panel and was surprised at just how EASY it popped up. That excersise has given me the final confidence to give it a go - I'll go buy a Seagate 1.5T drive tomorrow.

Anyway, the exercise has also lead to a question/comment. You keep referring all the way thru to the "front glass panel". My iMac was bought in late (December) 2007 and I'm pretty certain the panel is plastic - or it definately feels that way. VERY light, VERY easy to remove and sounds like plastic if tapped - could this be right?

Anyway, let you know how I go after tomorrow.

Glass or plastic? (acrylic glass)
written by Danny, March 04, 2009

Hi Barry,

I believe the front panel is made of the actual glass and not "plastic" (acrylic glass or plexiglas) as I don't believe plexiglas could be that much reflective (glossy) - on the other hand I might be wrong. What's your opinion?

Danny

...
written by Salmacis, March 12, 2009

Thanks for the guide, helped a lot. I managed to upgrade a 2008 iMac to 1TB now. However, it went not as smoothly as it should - The LED Temp cable came in the way of a screw when assembling the whole thing again. Yes, the screw was a bit tighter than usual, but I didn't realize I was screwing in a wire actually! Well, after starting the Mac, all fans were at full speed, which was unusual. So disassembled again and saw that the tape around the four wires of LED temp was damaged. Now everything was clear... probably there was a short circuit there (caused by the Torx screw) and so the Mac believed the LED temperature to be at Maximum, that's why the fans rotated at full speed. Well I was fortunately lucky, the cable was not that damaged, so after taking care there was no screw in its way, the Mac started normally *Phew*.

Kind of unlucky here though, as the wire must have moved over the hole for the torx screw (actually, it was the second of the long 4 bottom screws seen from the left) while I put the frame back to its place... So maybe the guide should have that caveat... Apart from that, all went well, but 1 or 2 helping hands are a good advice (especially for the LCD connectors...)

...
written by Barry, March 13, 2009

Hi Danny,
I wrote a few days ago about whether it was a glass or plastic front. Now I've upgraded my HDD and am wondering whether there are different models for different countries as I've found some other differences which I'll outline. I live in Australia and my AL iMac was bought in December 2007.

First difference is, as I've stated, the "glass" panel definately feels like plastic - it is VERY light, sounds like plastic when you tap it and came out with no real effort at all.

Next, there are a different number of torx screws around the aluminium frame. There are 4 across the bottom and top and another 2 down each side. I read notes stating that they were all different sizes - I actually found that the 4 along the bottom were all the same size as each other and were longer than all the others which were also the same as each other - ie only 2 sizes total. (Hope that made sense)

Next, and this confused and stopped me in my tracks for some time - the 2 cables to the LCD are not the same as your photos. I eventually found one at the lower left of the board and only by blowing up your photo and noticing the "pull" tab on the other was I able to see something similar high up on the upper edge of the board approximately 8-10cm from the right. It's almost directly connected to the LCD panel.

Having got that out of the way, I lifted the LCD panel and found, instead of a single power cable to the left, there was 2 pairs of paired cables on the right. One pair at the top and one at the bottom. They had small connectors each to matching cables on the LCD so were easy to remove.

After that, everything else was as you've outlined. I've now got 1.5T of storage up and running beautifully - that tip about booting straight into the Leopard upgrade disc was great and certainly saved some time!

I downloaded and installed some temp monitoring software you suggested and the Seagate drive runs consistently at 49C.

So, it would be interesting to see if there are differences according to the country the unit is sold in. Great article though and for anyone contemplating, very easy - PROVIDED your comfortable with getting into the insides of a PC/MAC and you know how to take care and patience.

Thanks,
Yours

Be careful...
written by Salmacis, March 13, 2009

Hi Barry,

I can confirm that my 20" iMac also had only 2 torx sizes for the frame (not 3) and I also found the same cables as you connecting the LCD panel. I live in Austria (not Australia

The lower one of the paired cables (LCD power) also made troubles after assembling. It somehow got in the way of the fan for the optical drive, which made a weird sound. So I had to open the Mac again (for the 3rd time now - getting an expert in the meantime and move the cable a bit. Now everything is fine, but take care, there are a lot of pitfalls here (see also my previous comment here on the LCD temp cable).

Happy tweaking,
Salmacis

Snap!
written by Daniel Reilly, March 15, 2009

No that was not the sound I heard when I pulled off the screen. But the sound I made when I finished this project. It was really one of he easiest swaps I ever did. I only had to remove the video clip on the lower right and the little plug on the left. Then if you carefully pick up the screen you can slide it back and tilt it u to remove the HD. I was by myself so I used my trusty OSX DVD box to hold up the screen. The hardest part was trying to get that damn clip the holds the HD in. I finally unscrewed it and pulled it out. I put in a brand new Seagate Barracuda 1TB that was manufactured on 2/17/2009. I'll still check to see if it needs a firmware update by I don't think so/.

Thanks for this grand guide.

Dan Reilly

An easier approach
written by DOBM, March 15, 2009

Many thanks for your guide and photographs. I don't think I would have attempted the hard disc upgrade without it. I did however find a few differences to the described for my 2008 iMac. There are Torx screws in the frame of the LCD which need removing once the from Bezel is removed. I didn't need to unplug the camera or the LCD connectors. I hinged up the top of the LCD with a can of compressed air, but anything would do, perhaps a couple of bits of wood would have been better. This gave ample room to remove the drive. I found a T9 screwdriver fitted every screw I needed to remove, even including the locating PINS on the original drive. I didn't want to risk the bathroom sucker approach and purchased a professional suction handle (which consists of two large suckers with air clamps attached to a handle). This cost just under 50 Euro but gives great piece of mind. The compressed air is also VERY worthwhile, in fact I managed to reassemble first time with no dust between the glass and the LCD.

So thanks again and well done!

thank you
written by Eric Peirce, March 15, 2009

just got done replacing the drive on my son's mid 2007 20" iMac. a few steps were different than your DIY but nothing too hard to figure out. there is actually four small connectors under the display rather than one bigger one. installed leopard now, everything smooth so far.
thank you again!

Thank You!
written by Chris, March 23, 2009

I was weary about tackling this project until I game across this awesome guide! The detailed photos and write up convinced me to give it a go. I picked up the tools necessary and had everything done in probably 45 minutes or so.

I got a little hung up on which cables were the LCD cables. I ended up unscrewing the LCD (8 screws - 4 on each side) and gently lifting it up and seeing which ones you were talking about. Like another commenter, I ended up just removing the bottom left and right connectors and letting the LCD rest on its side in a towel against the wall. The third "connector" seemed like there were 4 of them? A couple on the bottom and the top, but I didn't need to remove them.

Thanks again for the detailed writeup! I'm going to pass this guide along to some friends that also have iMacs. I'm restoring from Time Machine as we speak!!

It was the tape on the back of the LCD...
written by Salmacis, March 24, 2009

BTW, it was not the LCD power cable that made a strange sound. There is some tape on the back of the LCD around the DVI connector - this tape went off a bit during the procedure and touched the optical drive fan on its top! Put the tape back and now it's silent (Now I opened the iMac for the 5th time or so So be careful...

HDD
written by Christian, March 24, 2009

Can you recommend the

Western Digital WD15EADS 1,5 TB (Caviar Green)

or is this one better?

Maxtor STM31000340AS

HDD choice
written by Danny, March 24, 2009

WD Caviar Green has slower data throughput (5400rpm), uses less power (hence less heat), and is very, very quiet, whereas with Maxtor you will have a better performance - faster data throughput (7200rpm), it will use more power (higher temperature dissipation) and won't be totally silent. Your choice is between performance in data transfer rates vs heat and noise.

Good luck!

Danny

Screen Fuzziness/ interference?
written by Migsy, March 31, 2009

Hi all:

Without sounding like i'm beating a dead horse--KUDOS, Danny, for taking the time to put this together. Like many other commenters here, i was skeptical about replacing the HD to my 20" aluminum Imac as it was the first of the newer Imacs that i hadn't touched yet. G5, powerbooks, macbooks are all cake to me...

But my situation is slightly different. I was prompted to change my internal HD after it seemed to have failed out of nowhere (and 2 months after my warranty was up!) I was playing world of warcraft when the machine seemed to have frozen and an open-apple, Alt, escape would not get me to force quit the applications. So a hard restart was in order, but upon restart--the computer couldn't find a start up disk and it wasn't recognizable if i started up as a firewire drive.

I ordered a seagate HD as a replacement and started the process of replacing the drives using your tutorial and getting visual aid from someone who made a video on youtube. IT wasn't as scary as I thought, and the process took me no more than 10 mins to replace.

I reassemble the imac and close everything up, start up the machine, install Leopard, do the updates--all of them--and then continue to install World of Warcraft and do all of their updates.

Now, here's the problem i'm experiencing. The imac restarts fine--looks and works like a beauty--but, whenever the machine's GPU is 'challenged' and heated up (like, after playing WoW for an hour), i start to notice this fuzziness appearing on the screen. it's an interference like when we used to watch TV and our moms would put on the blender--except its not that heavily 'noisy' and it seems to happen gradually; a few lines here and there--but then gets progressively worse with continued use.

it's been very hard to pinpoint this issue as it appeared to have started as a failing HD issue. But now that everythings up and running again, I'm almost pointing towards the fact that it could be a failing Graphics card (I experienced a similar issue with my old G5 where the graphics card was so overheated that before it failed, it would draw up the screen withi crazy geometric shapes and colors. o.O)

So it's very comforting to hear that i may be able to swap the GPU (i'm very patiently waiting that tutorial), but i'm wondering if maybe there's a cable that I unplugged--but didn't replug. or if there's some shielding that i'm over looking that may allow for interference. I'm also hoping that someone else out there has experienced something similar only because its so tricky to explain. I can tell you that all I detached was the camera at the top of the bezel, and the wire that plugged into the motherboard that read the LCD temperature. When preparing to remove the drive(or reinstall it) there were two sets of wires that run on the right side of the imac connecting the LCD to the motherboard. I detached both of those--but reattached them before closeing up the machine... Those were the only things i detached/unplugged during this installation.

Anyone experience anything similar? Anyone know if there's a snapshot of the inside of these newer imacs with some information as to what wires/parts/sections do what?

looking forward to hearing from this community. Thanks in advance!

-Migsy

Re: Screen Fuzziness/ interference?
written by Danny, March 31, 2009

Migsy,

Thank you for sharing your experience with us and congratulations on your success with iMac hard drive upgrade

I believe in your case the *heat* might be your enemy. Driving GPU to the max for prolonged periods of time will certainly impact the performance of the cooling system, it will also most certainly reduce HDD life and it is possible this is also related to your screen fuzziness issue.

Please let me know if your screen fuzziness is localized at the same place where the HDD is placed inside the machine (upper middle of the screen)?

Also please install iStat widget in order to monitor your iMac temperature readings. When the screen fuzziness appears, quit WoW and open the Dashboard in order and tell us what the readings for HDD, CPU, CPU Heatsink, GPU, GPU Diode, GPU Heatsink and Ambient are?

Danny

re: Screen Fuzziness/interference?
written by Migsy, March 31, 2009

Hi Danny,

Thanks for the quick response! I agree that the heat is my demon. The computer is on my desk and has decent ventilation around it. But it does tend to get hot when i'm playign the game and i'm not exactly sure what else I can do to reduce the heat. I may have used the smfancontrol app--but that didnt' really help.
I've used the machine to play WoW for a lil over a year and it crashed maybe 4 times--and graphically locked up maybe twice. One time, after a lock up--i kept hearing this beep beep noise and i couldn't get it to stop unless i took the AC adapter out of the outlet. I Restarted the computer and it was working fine. Initially, I thought this was an error on Apples part--this imac is actually refurbished...but i feel like if it was faulty--it wouldn't have performed so well for a year.

OK, back on topic though. If i recall correctly, it looked like the GPU may have been located at the top-left of the imac, where the HDD may be somewhat more in the center, but the screen fuzziness appears all over the screen. It starts on the upper portion of the screen in a very subtle way, but i noticed the more i use it/the more it gets hot, the more fuzziness i see. Also, when the screen attempts to draw out something in light colors, you can really notice the fuzziness there. I will have to pay more attention to notice if the fuzziness starts within the immediate vicinity of the HDD. Also, I ihave installed Istats widget (which i'll have to reinstall since i've reinitalized the Imac again last night--still has fuzzies!) and I think it took about a 20 degree (c) temp hike before the fuzzies appeared. But I will re-install the widget and i will try to replicate the issue again tonight so that I can include the iStat reports, as well as where the fuzzies start.

More on this when I arrive home from work. Please stand by

I have returned!
written by Migsy, April 01, 2009

hello Danny, et al:

I have reinstalled the iStats and began to replicate the problem. I have taken screen shots of the iStats utility upon start up, and then took another screenshot when the graphical stuff started to happen.

Below, should be a link to the screenshots which basically compare the two states. Looks like my GPU gets annoyed and begins to act up once it gains another 25 Degrees. Also, what else I noticed is that this fuzziness happens on the top and bottom portions of the screen. I hadn't noticed that in the middle of the screen. Hopefully the image tag below worked. if not, i will try a hard link to it.



-Migs

Won't go back together all the way...
written by Jeffrey, April 01, 2009

Hi--

I just tried this with my new 20" 2009. Everything seemed to go smoothly, but when I tried to put the cover back on the ram slot, it wouldn't go in. I looked, and it seems like the silver part isn't closing far enough down over the case to completely close. I've taken it off and tried several times, but with the same result. Obviously I've screwed up somewhere. Any ideas?

Thanks.

Re: Screen Fuzziness/ interference?
written by Danny, April 01, 2009

Hi there Migsy,

The ultimate question now is when you let the machine cool down - (leave it on, just don't force the GPU) - does the problem go away?

Thanks!

Danny

Are iMacs designed for heavy gaming at all?
written by Migsy, April 01, 2009

Good morning ya'll.

Danny, Its definitely an issue that happens after the machine warms up. So, for the first hour of gameplay, its perfectly fine--a flawless screen viewing experience. After an hour or so, then the artifact appear. I could still play thru them--and i'm sure i could use the machine for other tasks while the artifacts are there, but as the machine cools down so does the fuzziness/artifacts.

I am banking on a failing graphics card at this point. Not sure what else to do at this point...
-Migsy

Are iMacs designed for heavy gaming at all?
written by Danny, April 01, 2009

Hi there Migsy,

I was just wondering if this is iMac design flaw (e.g. do other people have the same screen fuzziness experience when driving their GPUs hard) and what are the heat dissipation specs for GPU?

What you should try doing, as a next step, is to install utility such is SMC Fan control and manually set the speed of all three fans to 80-90% of the scale. Your machine will be noisy, however play WoW and see if the screen fuzziness issue reappears - what is your GPU temperature reading at that point? It's a shame that iMac GPUs do not have their own cooling fan, however the theory that we need to put to the test here is if these three other fans will contribute to additional GPU cool down?

Other than that, replacing GPU might not provide the result if iMacs are really not made for extensive gaming (in order to assess this we need to see if other people have the same issue). iMac GPU is a standard MXM graphics card found in most of the modern laptops (being a plug and play card which can be easily replaced), however it is very difficult to find an original Apple GPU MXM card on the market and it will cost you an arm and a leg.

On the other hand, one could install a non-Apple MXM GPU card with even higher performances - such as for example ATI HD 3650 - however it would require graphics KEXT strings modification in order to make the hardware recognized by OS X (similar mod as in making sure the third party graphics cards work in Hackintosh builds - PCs running OS X). This is perhaps one of those cool projects one might consider doing - however they require lots of tech knowledge.



Your other alternative is also to contact Apple support and check with their technicians what do they think of the issue (providing them with particular details, GPU temperature readings, etc).

Finally, an adventurous user might try improving the GPU cooling system in iMacs - for the time being the GPU is cooled only with a passive heat pipe system. Adding a GPU fan or some other crazy approach (water cooling system) might be a cool mod to do as well (however still requiring significant skills and I'm not sure if it will pay off in terms of cost vs benefits).

At this point I would be really interested in finding out if this is happening to other iMac users and if iMac are designed for heavy gaming at all?

Danny

Are iMacs designed for heavy gaming at all?
written by Migsy, April 01, 2009

Danny, Great input.

I have to say i've thought the same thing--especially when my g5 tower seemed to have had its Graphics card burn out (it was the top of the line card for the G5's--nvidia 1600xt maybe?) and that was under moderate-heavy game play. For the design for a tower--mysterious. But in the case of portables or compact designs--was it even well thought out?

The first thing i noticed about these laptops and imacs (or compact computing systems) is that they tend to get very hot. My imac and macbook pro can both fry an egg if i've used them to play WoW for 2 hours. But I also figured that these things would be taken into consideration by the engineers who though of putting these things into tinier packages. /shrug

But the reasoning for me leaving this comment was to see if any other person has experienced this. The imac--though working flawlessly for over a year until this blip--is a refurbished machine I bought from Apple. While these problems did not happen until recently, i'm wondering if they can be attributed to the machine being refurbished? Was this the initially problem that caused the machine to be refurbished?

I'm not completely sure, but I will give the smc fan control a shot. I had it installed before--and didn't really set the fans to 80-90%--but that was because i was afraid of burning out something else! LOL

More on this a little later. And thanks, Danny, for giving this particularly *interesting* topic some attention and decent advice!

-Migsy

Are iMacs designed for heavy gaming at all?
written by Danny, April 01, 2009

Migsy, can you take a photo of your iMac fuzziness issue and post it here? Thanks! Danny

Imac update v3.0
written by Migsy, April 02, 2009

Hello Danny/ All.

So i've downloaded and set up the smc fan control and set the fans to around 80% scale. That revved up the fans to an average of 3800-4100 rpms. The imac was noticeably louder, though not annoyingly louder, and the machine felt much much cooler. I couldnt' replicate the artifacts.

So i shut off the fans to get the machine to operate as it normally does. And after about 1 hour (and or - a 20 degree increase ) I started to get the artifacts. The only problem is Its very hard to get a shot of it because its very subtle. So a picture from a digi-cam doesn't necessarily grab the artifacts. and as we know, a snapshot from the computer doesn't actually reveal the artifacts. I'm going to have to devote some time to burning this machine up again and seeing if i can get a clear shot of what it is i'm talking about.

Anyone know if there's a windows equivalent to this Smc fan control? Also, how safe is it? would that blow out the fans in sn overclocking-kind-of-way?

tx!

-migsy

Solution
written by Danny, April 02, 2009

Hi there Migsy,

It seems the solution to your problem is to use SMCFanControl. You'll need to experimentally determine the settings for the fans, if the trick worked while running fans at 3000-4000rpm, then work your way down and decrease rpms until you find the optimal speed that cools down your GPU without showing the screen artifacts. I'm sure it will take you couple of days and some patience in order to determine the optimal fan speeds in your case.

Running fans that high won't damage your machine, but you're certainly shortening the life span of those fans - hence the need to have them running at a lower speed (you'll experimentally determine) that solves your issue. If you look at it the long term, even if you burn out the fans (and I believe it will take couple years to truly do that), replacing them is way less costly then replacing the GPU.

Another approach is to leave the fans running normally (at their factory setting) and rev them up just before you play games (also revert the settings once you're done playing).

Good luck!

Danny

Let me add more thanks!!!!
written by Dave, April 04, 2009

"Invalid node structure" error on my original 250GB HD; Apple wanted $400 to put in an identical drive, and they didn't think they could do any data recovery. $100 for Disk Warrior to get the data off the failing drive and then finding this guide was like finding the holy grail. Hadn't swapped out an internal HD in almost 10 years, but using this guide, the installation of my new 1TB drive was easier than that old Gateway computer of the last decade. Since the data recovery folks were talking $1,000-3,000, I figure I'm a couple of grand ahead right now.

Thanks ever so much for not only a terrific guide, but also the constant updates and tips. Really good stuff. And my 7-year old daughter was impressed to see the inside of the iMac, too!

Thank You!...
written by Chris, April 14, 2009

I had the "no" symbol and the "gray folder with the ? mark" on it and that was the end of my original 320GB HD, only 13 months after I bought it. Fortunately I had lots of backups with Time Machine.

I bought and installed a new 1TB HD from Western Digital, and had it back up and running in two hours, looking just like it did before the drive died.

The entire operation was not difficult at all. I took my time and it paid off. The HD carrier is a "quick release" type of set up, not at all hard to figure out how to remove. I pushed the drive itself towards the "pins" side of the mounting bracket, then pushed on the black plastic snap in lock and the drive popped right out. I did all of this without taking the screen out, just levering it up some with one hand and removing the drive with the other.

Thanks again for your advice on the replacement of the HD. I love do-it-yourself computer fixing, proving once again that old labeling of "No user serviceable parts inside".....dead wrong! LOL

iMac Drive Noise
written by Jada855, April 18, 2009

Excellent tutorial! I did have a few questions about drive noise coming from the iMac. I originally wanted to upgrade because of a gargling noise coming from my iMac with the default 250GB drive so I installed a segate barracuda 1TB drive to find out the gargling noise was still there but a bit quiter when data was been accessed I also noticed a constant humming coming from the drive.

I put back the original Western Digital drive and no humming sound. I took back the seagate barracuda and got a western digital black caviar 1TB drive installed to find a loud gargling noise when data is accessed and also humming coming from the drive if you touch the base of the iMac you can feel the vibration funny thing is if I lift the iMac in the air the humming stops open to any ideas suggestions. Is it possible the temp sensor wires on the hard drive could be causing some type of interferance? Thanks again for this awesome tutorial.

iMac Drive Noise
written by Danny, April 18, 2009

Hi Jada855,

Please reference the earlier post on the hdd noise above "Noisy HDD as of January 17, 2009".

The drive has to produce a noise, it just depends on what do you consider to be normal or loud. There are three things you need to look into that can relate to this problem:

1. The drive type itself. Some are louder than others. Also, what is your personal criteria of "loud"(?). The absolutely quiet drive (in comparison with all others) is WD Green 1 TB mentioned at the top of this page (however spinning at a lower 5400 RPMs and has a bit slower performance than regular hard drives spinning at 7400 RPM).

I've personally had a HDD noise problem in my other computer (its a PC Hackintosh) and I've had a Seagate 1 TB and Seagate 1.5 TB installed. The 1 TB drive was way much noisier than 1.5 TB drive (I suppose older vs newer technology), although the same manufacturer. Nothing was wrong with the drives, it is just a fact that some drives are louder than the others.

If the minimum noise is your criteria, the only drive I can recommend that will meet the noise criteria of the most demanding is 1 TB WD Green.

2. In terms of the installation, wires or temp sensor are certainly not affecting the noise. The only relevant part are the HDD rubber shocks as in the earlier mentioned post (if there is a problem with them, the vibrations are being carried to iMac's metallic bezel).

3. Now, here is a funny thing - perhaps there is nothing wrong with your iMac or the hard drive, but your desk is picking up the resonance (influence of the external environment in relationship with the normal drive spinning resonance, hence amplifying the drive's native resonance). I've had an external HDD sitting on my desk (1 TB WD My Book Studio with Firewire 800) that was normally vibrating, however while in direct contact with the desk surface, it had its resonance amplified and produced a relatively loud humming noise. Since then I've put my external hard drive an a cheap standard mouse pad, and it solved all issues - no resonance is being transferred or amplified as it is not in direct contact with the desk's surface. I'm mentioning this as you've said when you lift up your iMac in the air, the noise stops. Well, perhaps its a $5 mouse pad solution in your case too It would be very interesting to know if this solved your issue

Good luck,

Danny

PS: In terms of hard drives, I believe that 1.5 TB Seagate is the best deal for the money vs performance and the noise. I have 6 of these drives in all of my systems, and I'm very happy with them. Highly recommended!

iMac Drive Noise
written by Jada855, April 18, 2009

Hello Again Danny,

First off thanks so much for you reply it helped a great deal! I am a designer and my original reason for trying this was the noise coming from the default WD drive inside the iMac. I have tried the following drives WD Black Caviar 1TB 32mb cache was the loudest of them all with a grinding noise for everything even window resizing. I also tried the seagate barracuda 1TB this drive was a bit quieter but I could still hear a grinding noise when data was being accessed. Upside about the segate 1TB it was SUPER FAST! like my desktop loaded fully 5 seconds fast I was really impressed but the noise was still and annoyance I exchanded this drive for the WD Black Caviar but it was a let down things were starting to look pretty bad at this point one last try enter your suggestion seagate barracuda 1.5 TB unpack open iMac install did a clean leopard install all was ready testing windows opening,applications etc not a sound tears of joy began to spread this could be it currently now doing a time machine restore and really put the data accessing to test I will let you know how it goes.

As for the humming coming from the iMac I beleive it's caused by the terabyte drives with the original 250GB no humming at all so it maybe safe to say I did not tweak anything when opening. But again I did what you suggested put a small pad between the desk and iMac and no humming noise. It seemed like the humming noise was going right through the desk once again thanks for the help on that part. If all is quiet after time machine restore that would be awesome. I may try and tackle the GPU next once the tutorial is complete I would not mind a 256 or 512 card thanks again for the help and reply much appreciated.

iMac Drive Noise
written by Danny, April 18, 2009

Hi Jada855 - I'm glad that 1.5 TB Seagate and the small pad resolved your issue. Enjoy! Danny

Watch that temp sensor.
written by Pinky, April 19, 2009

If the temperature sensor is damaged, that can result in a lot of additional fan noise. I had a drive die in a late white plastic iMac and the sensor went bad somehow. I got it back and it sounded like a plane waiting to take off. The noise was impressive for its volume...

I got a replacement and all was well.

I found this post while contemplating a DIY drive upgrade and will put more thought into it before I risk my system and Applecare. I did however wonder how to get the blasted thing open. Who knew that the glass was only held on by magnets... Something so simple, so elegant...

Thanks Danny - you're a life-saver
written by Hanna, April 30, 2009

Hi Danny, I just wanted to leave you a quick note and thank you for the excellent tutorial. My HD died yesterday, so I read your guide and went out and bought myself a 1.5TB Seagate Barracuda, a set of Torx screwdrivers, and some bathroom suction cups. Got some extra RAM while I was at it.

I followed your tutorial to the letter, and it worked out brilliantly. It took me less than a half hour to take it apart, install the drive, and put it back together. I had a full Time Machine backup, so I'm currently in the process of restoring my system.

Without your guide, I wouldn't have had a clue how to do this. So thank you, truly. You've made this Apple fangirl and her iMac really really happy.

Hanna

Some Questions before I start
written by fatalfred, May 11, 2009

Im about to finally do this awesome DIY. Bought everything I needed today, but before I start. I have some questions (Maybe a stupid questions)
But anyways....
1) I have a 320GB HD on my iMac at the moment and a 1 TB seagate HD which needs Firmware update on an external. I also bought I Seagate 1.5 TB HD (not affected model) and was wondering if I should replace my current 320 with the 1 TB and update the firmware or use my unaffected 1.5 TB.

2) When restoring, should I use my original install disks which has Tiger and a separate Leopard Disk or will I be able to use my friends newer install disks which he got with his new Macbook Pro?

Thanks in advance!

Fatalfred

RE: Some Questions before I start
written by Danny, May 11, 2009

Hi there Fred,

1) The decision is really yours. Do you have any issues with 1TB external drive? The Seagate drive issue with old firmwares is really one in thousands that you'll have problems (data loss in very rare occasions) - so the question is do you really have problems with the external drive? do you have any critical data on the external drive that would require extra precaution and firmware upgrade?

In my personal opinion, I think it would be prudent to put the 1.5 TB in your iMac (also because this is a quieter drive than 1 TB Seagate and a newer technology), and in case you have problems with your external 1TB, it shouldn't be too difficult to find a friend with a PC to upgrade the firmware (and also if you experience problems with it - if not you just might leave it as it is)

2) This is my experience on this one - I've tried using newer Leopard 10.5 discs on an iMac 2007 and it didn't work - it detected the machine type and said that the discs are not compatible with this model. On the other hand the new discs worked on iMac 2008. So you should try with the new discs and see how it works out for you. You can always execute the plan B) installing Tiger and then Leo. Also, if you have Leo upgrade disk - the one you used to upgrade Tiger - then you are all set, because if you look at some of the early posts above, you can install straight away (without installing Tiger first) from the Leo upgrade disc, however the trick is to tell it not to do the install, but a recovery from the Time Machine -- when you get to that screen, just click back and do a normal install (this way the upgrade disc will think it is restoring a previous install, rather than installing from scratch and looking for Tiger).

Please let us know how it worked out for you!

Take care,

Danny

...
written by fatalfred, May 11, 2009

Thanks for the quick reply Danny!

I am in the process of Backing up at the moment using Super Duper not Time Machine. Any experience with restoring from Super Duper.

Need help with HD replacement
written by Vince , May 12, 2009

Hey guys I have a 24" Imac with a failing drive and need help installing the new one I bought (640gb western digital caviar blue). Does anyone know anybody in the Boca or Fort lauderdale area who can help me out with this for a small fee?

I have been told to stay away from geek squad

Seagate 7200.12 1TB
written by Kired, May 13, 2009

Just finished installing a Seagate 1TB 7200.12 drive in my 2007 24" iMac. So far so good! Thanks for posting this tutorial it made things much much easier. I'll post if I run across any issues with these new Seagate drives.

XBench Results for Segate 7200.12 1TB in 2007 24" iMac
written by Kired, May 13, 2009

Forgot to add this to my other post for those who are interested:

Results58.23
System Info
Xbench Version1.3
System Version10.5.6 (9G55)
Physical RAM4096 MB
ModeliMac7,1
Drive TypeST31000528AS
Disk Test58.23
Sequential164.43
Uncached Write203.16124.74 MB/sec [4K blocks]
Uncached Write203.79115.31 MB/sec [256K blocks]
Uncached Read96.4028.21 MB/sec [4K blocks]
Uncached Read242.46121.86 MB/sec [256K blocks]
Random35.38
Uncached Write10.451.11 MB/sec [4K blocks]
Uncached Write283.3790.72 MB/sec [256K blocks]
Uncached Read116.670.83 MB/sec [4K blocks]
Uncached Read188.2634.93 MB/sec [256K blocks]

It is also sitting around 50c temp wise while copying some data back too it.

...
written by Vince, May 14, 2009

Ok here we go. About 2 months ago my computer crashed and I got the white screen. Every thought it was a hardware problem with the hard drive. Finally I took it to genius bar (no warranty) and they fixed it with Disk Warrior. I then bought a Lacie 1TB external so that I could back up my system just in case they didn't fix it for good.

After I set up the external hard drive, I partitioned it. Half for time machine the other half for my ps3 (movies, music, photos) and everything worked great. I erased and re installed leopard just in case and then booted with time machine and everything restored and was running better than ever.

Now 2 weeks ago my iMac crashed again, (white screen with ? folder). I unplugged everything and went to bed. This morning it started up so I hooked up my external (which wasn't and hasn't been hooked up to the iMac since initial back-up) in order to back up all my new stuff, however I noticed that the iMac didn't recognize the time machine partition, only the PS3 partition. I ran disk utility and it could not repair the time machine partition which was now named disk01 or something like that. A few minutes later it froze and crashed.

any advice?

I bought a new internal (640 WD Caviar Blue) but have not installed it yet.

Re: Crashing Problem
written by Danny, May 14, 2009

Hi there Vince,

From what you are saying it sounds your internal hard drive is failing. While Disk Warrior might have seem to repair it, this software utility (nor any other software as a matter of fact) can repair a failing disk. HDDs are mechanical devices and sooner or later they will fail (more info on HDD failures). When they start to fail bad sectors start showing up (irreparable areas on the disk's data platter). What Disk Warrior (and other utilities) do is they mark these bad sectors as unusable and they move data around (Disk Rebuilding process). Therefore, it might seem disk is software repaired, however its mechanical failures are not and disk has just been "patched up" with software (being only a *temporary* solution to the problem). Once bad sectors (mechanical failures) start showing up on the disk, they are very likely to spread very fast causing additional data damage - which might very well explain your second HDD crash in two weeks.

What I would recommend is that you install your new HDD in your iMac and install Leo OS X. Do not worry about not being able to access your backup at the boot or DVD install time, just do an install without Time Machine recovery. Make sure Leo is running. Then you can start Migration Assistant (located in Applications then Utilities) and recover your data from the external drive (it will provide you with Time Machine or external HDD drive data migration option) - I'm sure that at this point the system will be able to recognize the appropriate partition.

Save the old drive - just in case your data backup from the external drive doesn't work. You can attempt to reconnect your old failing drive through an external enclosure and run DiskWarrior to try to fix it and use Migration Assistant to import data onto the new hard drive.

Please let us know how it worked out for you.

Danny

RE: Crashing problem
written by Vince, May 15, 2009

Thanks Danny. I will do that as soon as I can. A couple questions though if you dont mind.

How hard is this (installing HD) to do it myself? The only thing I am nervous about is the LCD screen (dead pixels, dust etc..)

Also, are you confident that migration assistant will find the TM partition even though it came up bad when I ran disk utility on it?

Even if it did find it shouldn't I stay away from putting it on the new internal since it messed up my external, won't it mess up my new internal??

What do you think? Thanks

RE: Crashing problem
written by Danny, May 15, 2009

Vince,

1. Your decision if you'd like to proceed with the upgrade very much depends on your previous experience and skill set - for some people this is a breeze, for others its hard to do. DIY is available at this page, many readers have reported successful installs, however you're fully responsible for the consequences yourself in case something goes wrong. On the brighter side, if you are very very careful in handling the display and other components, the likely hood of everything going well is pretty high. If in doubt, perhaps it's a good idea to have a friend assist you, and finally you might opt to hire professional assistance locally.

2. It was only my best guess, that's why I've recommended you to keep the old drive.

3. This shouldn't be an issue in your case as the reason for "messing up" is very much different than what might really "mess up" the current Leo installation - and that is various erroneous settings in "Preferences" folder and other system files. If in doubt, when using Migration Assistant don't tell it to transfer all user settings, just files, and you should be 100% OK.

Good luck.

Danny

Thanks so much!
written by Mac, May 15, 2009

Hey, I have a 20" Core 2 Duo that I was given by a friend. It wouldn't start up past just turning on. I would get the question mark in the folder icon. After purchasing a new HD and using your install instructions it works great!!!!!. A lot of it I could have figured out but I probably would have broken a few things first. First time's a charm. Now I can do it again.

Thanks to the good suggestions from the responders as they came in handy too.

Thanks again!

Mac

Temperature sensor??
written by Vince, May 16, 2009

Hey guys I just got done doing the install and I am alittle scared. I am installing mac os x right now but I have a question with the Temp sensor. I noticed on the original internal HD there was a Thermistor clip for the sensor to go in. However I did not take that clip off. I just placed the sensor on the new drive and put the adhesive over it. Is that ok?? Was I suppose to do that? or is something going to go wrong now??

Re: Temperature sensor
written by Danny, May 16, 2009

You should be OK, as long as the sensor is securely affixed to the drive (the function of the clip was to make sure of this). Hopefully you've glued it well

Use iStat menus to get the readout of the HDD temp. If its within the standard range (~55C or 130F) it should indicate the temp. sensor is working OK.

Danny

imac no dvd drive
written by will, May 18, 2009

I have a alum 20" imac 2007 2 ghz.
I'am having optical dvd drive problems the finder doesn't see it.nor does toast.
I put in a dvd and finder nor toast will not see it .
In toast it says no drive .
Please tell me what need to do.
Thanks
Will

Optical Drive help
written by emi, May 19, 2009

Hi Danny,
Thank You so much for the great tutorial! You are the MAN!!
I have a 20" 2008 iMac that desperately needs the optical drive replaced.
You gave some great info already about this in the discussion above but just fell short of what I need to attempt the replacement. If possible, please post or send me the pics you took and info of what I need to replace the optical drive. I'm not sure of all those connections you talked about above.
Thank you, Thank you Thank you!!! :-)
-Emi

Partitioning a 1,5TB disk
written by Bob, May 20, 2009

Hi, I've just bought the Seagate Barracuda 1,5TB (ST31500341AS) and will install it during the weekend. I have a question about how I should partition the disk. Do I use just one big partition of 1,5TB or do I create 1 partition for the OS and another partition for data? In the last case, do I move the users home folder to the second partition?

Any advice on this?

Thanks, Bob.

RE: Partitioning a 1.5TB disk
written by Danny, May 20, 2009

You should be fine with a single partition only. Splitting partitions to OS and Data is something people would usually do on a PC - in case when (not if) your Windows partition crashes you still have your data saved on the data partition - not necessary for Mac. The whole deal with data protection for Mac is to have an external hard drive for automated Time Machine backups.

Danny

Re: Replacing iMac Optical DVD-RW
written by Danny, May 20, 2009

For you guys asking on how to replace the optical drive, here is a quick tutorial:

You need to take your iMac apart - same as with the HDD upgrade - however in addition you need to take apart the right hand side speaker and cooling fan assembly



Then you'll arrive to something like this:



I've marked the cable leading to DVD-RW, unplug, unscrew, install the new drive, and follow the reverse logic to close everything up.

Replacement optical DVD-RW going into iMacs are:

UJ 875

UJ 857

Good luck!

Danny

RE: Partitioning a 1.5TB disk
written by Bob, May 20, 2009

Hi Danny,

thanks a lot for the info. I'll create a single partition on my 1.5TB disk ... indeed I switched from a PC to a Mac and there I used separate partitions for the OS and data. In case of a crash I could easily put back a ghost image.

No experience yet with time machine ... I'll set it up now to experiment with it.

Thanks again and continue the good work,

Bob.

Re: Time Machine
written by Danny, May 20, 2009

Hi Bob,

I was a switcher as well, now it seems so long ago Time Machine is like an automated ghost image - it does everything automatically for you, no need to manually start it up and wait for it as with PCs - it just runs in the background without you even noticing. If you have a crash - and I've never had a Mac crash, the only reason I was recovering files from Time Machine was when swapping hard drives - there is Migration Assistant in Applications, Utilities - it allows for recovery of Time Machine data with a single click - almost the same as with the ghost image - just built into the OS. The Time Machine is also unbelievably useful when you delete or lose files you need - just click on the Time Machine icon at the dock and you can recover your files for as long in the past as there was hard disk storage...

In order for Time Machine to work you need an external hard drive. You can go with USB (480 mpbs) or Firewire 400 or 800 (mpbs) -- so it is really a choice between USB or Firewire 800 (as firewire 400 is the same speed as USB, just more expensive). I myself have Western Digital My Book Studio Edition 1 TB - and I'm using it with Firewire 800 port - it is so much faster than an USB drive - works like a charm.

Good luck exploring your new Mac and welcome to the Mac community

Danny

Thanks for the Optical Info!
written by Emi, May 24, 2009

Danny,

Many thanks again for replying to my optical question so quickly, and posting the pics!
Now I have the incentive to do this and plan to try this as soon as I can find a replacement drive.

Hope this also helped some others too! You are the MAN!!
I'll let you know the outcome...thanks!

-Emi

...
written by Emi, May 24, 2009

Hi Danny,

One last quick optical replacement question I forgot to ask you previously...
My Early 2008 20" iMac (now running OS 10.5.7) has an Optiarc AD-5630A optical drive.
Can I just replace it with your suggested Panasonic/Matshita UJ-875 cleanly, or will I run into firmware problems, etc.? I'd like to go with the UJ-875, but don't want to run into some incompatibility problems due to being different manufacturers. I'm assuming it should just be recognized upon boot up and read by Disk Utility with no prob.

Should a clean swap out just work?

In any case, you went above and beyond already. Much appreciated!
Thanks for any info you can provide.

-Emi

...
written by Danny, May 24, 2009

Emi,

The optical is just plug'n'play - no software update, firmware or otherwise is needed - just a clean swap - I can confirm it from my experience. UJ875 and UJ857 are actually used in some Apple notebooks.

Danny

Done!
written by fatalfred, May 25, 2009

Sorry for late update....I just didn't know what to do with over a terabyte of free space!

Seriously, Big thanks Danny, and to all guys & gals who contributed to this DIY. Your tips, comments and experiences were invaluable. I am now official upgraded!
So for all, who like me were doubting that you could do it yourself, believe me you can cos I am the least tech- savvy person I know.

Just somethings that I'd to share:
I upgrade my 2007 iMac with a 1.5TB seagate drive.
Used 2 bathroom suction thingys.
I didn't disconnect all connectors, just the first 2 and flipped the screen over and leaned it on the wall. (the third connector was giving me a hard time so I left it)
On reinstalling, I tried to re-install with the new install discs from a 15in MacBook Pro, but it wouldnt accept them, so had to use the originals which came with the machine.

Other than that, it was a snap!

Thanks again!!!!

Till next the DIY

fatalfred

Optical Face Plate
written by Emi, May 29, 2009

Hi Danny,

I just received the UJ-875 optical replacement drive for my iMac 20" 2008 and to my surprise it has a black face plate, button, and LED that I didn't expect. I was all ready to do the surgery...LOL.

Can I still use this model and if so, how do I remove the faceplate?
Any info would be much appreciated.

Thanks!
-Emi

Optical Plate Just Popped Off
written by Emi, May 29, 2009

Hi Danny,
Fiddling around with the face plate, I was able to easily pop it off with my fingernail...LOL
Nothing much holding it on but 6 plastic grabs that luckily didn't bread off. Looks like I'm back in business. :-)

Thanks much, and I'll let'cha know how it all turned out.
-Emi

You guys rock!
written by ndtwc, June 01, 2009

I've never thought of those photographs can be that useful until I'm really getting my hands dirty! Big thanks to Danny and all commenters for building up such a great guide!

My old hard drive in my early 2008 24" iMac got problems for quite some time already, and the warranty is over, and yeah I don't have AppleCare! Now with this guide I've successful installed a new Seagate Barracuda 1.5TB hard drive in just about an hour!

One more thing, for step 6, the alternative way is definitely better, at least for me...

And I didn't unplug the iSight cable, and also the third cable of the display, I just flipped the silver frame and the entire LCD screen over.

Big big thanks again to all contributors of this guide! You guys and gals rock!

Thank you Thank you Thank you!!!
written by Jon, June 06, 2009

Danny,
Thank you for taking the time to write up this tutorial. My hard drive crashed less than 1month after my warranty expired and I am in the process of launching a site for a client. I thought I was SOL but I was able to get the drive replaced on my own and I'm waiting for time machine to restore.

CPU Fan issues?
written by Dave, June 08, 2009

First off, thanks so much for such a detailed guide! I purchased an new 2008 imac on clearance about a month ago. I replaced the factory hard drive on a 24 (200 imac right out of the box, with a WD Black 1TB drive. Everything was going so well, until a few days ago, when I noticed the iStat reading for the CPU Fan was 000RPM.... I tried an SMC Reset and a PMU Reset to no avail. Even tried "Fan Control" and SMC Fan Control... nothing can startup the CPU fan. Couldn't find any similar @ Apple support or via Google. Anyone have similar issues after a hard drive upgrade?

Has anyone who has replaced their HD try to submit their imac to apple for repair? Would they accept it under Apple Care? I was told by one of the Apple retail staff that for the factory warranty to be applied, other than ram, the imac needs to have all its original factory parts. Any thoughts?

RAM 667 versus 800
written by Don Borleis, June 10, 2009

Danny,

Great stuff here. I have a llate model 2007 24 Imac. I bought it in 2008 but am assuming it is a late 2007 becase my 2 RAM cards ar 1G each at 667. my question is can I repleace these with 2 2G 800s ?

RAM 6700 versus 8000
written by Don Borleis, June 10, 2009

a little more info- I have a late 2007 2.8 GHz According this this website:

http://eshop.macsales.com/item/Other World Computing/5300DDR2S6GP/

They say I can go up to 6 GM (4 2) Is this correct? even thoug I have 667 can I use 800 ?

Thanks for this!
written by Nathan Nitzky, June 14, 2009

I came across this article several months ago and contemplated increasing my internal HDD in my '07 24" iMac from the 320GB, but never got around to it. Yesterday my HDD died and forced the issue. I went to Frys and bought the WD Black 1TB. With this guide and my Time Machine backup to restore with the Migration Assistant, I was back up and running in just a few hours with virtually nothing lost.... Awesome!!! I am now a firm believer in Time Machine.... Only issue was that my password didn't work on restart. Had to boot from the CD and use the password utility to reset. Everything fine now- THANKS A MILLION!!!!

Sweeeeeet!
written by Brent Jackson, June 15, 2009

So I went to the Apple store thinking I could just upgrade my drive in iMac from 2007. Sadly, they said it can't be done. They are not built to be upgraded as far as hard drive is concerned. So they pretty much said I was stuck with it, even though I'm out of space.

So I found this post, followed directions, and within 1/2 hour I have a new Terabyte iMac. AWESOME!

smcFanControl vs. iStat Menus HD Temp reading
written by MoabBC, June 16, 2009

I dumbluckily bought an external backup drive and turned on Time Machine about 3 weeks before my original HD died. First HD failure in 12 years of apple ownership. My iMac G3 is still humming along downstairs serving up FTP and DVD's for my kids. Never a day's worry with that old mac. I always back up important stuff but never had a "backup system" in place at home. The good luck of having Time Machine running far exceeded the bad luck of HD failure. Time Machine is sweet.

This guide is fantastic. Pulled off an HD replacement in 30 min. Didn't disconnect any cables. For a non-user modifiable machine, it sure was easy to pull apart and put back together with this guide. With all the plastic iMacs in the past I could never quite put them back together. They never looked quite right after. This aluminum model went back together with the same ease of pulling it apart. Thanks. Wouldn't have dared without this guide.

Replaced my failed WD 500GB with WD Black 1TB. Restore went smooth. The problem I have now is TEMPS and wondering if TEMP played a role in my original HD failure. Machine just feels hot. More so than other iMacs (G5 and other Intels I frequent).

I installed smcFanControl and iStat Menues. They display different TEMP readings for the HD. Whats this all about? smcFanContorl says 51C. iStat Menu says 60C. What temp sensor is smcFanContorl using? None of the temps in iStat Menu read 51C. I can't tell where the smcFanContorl temp readings are coming from. One of the readings has to be wrong.

I tend to believe the 60C. Should my WD Black 1TB HD be running at 60C all the time? I installed last week and it runs at 60C pretty much no matter what I am doing on my machine. Says 61C right now. That is hot! smcFanControl doesn't seem to cool it down. I worry about fan failure running it at high RPM. Should I worry about fan failure?

Should I expect this new HD to fail because of the heat? Or is it just an over achieving, high performance super disk that likes to run at higher temps? It was fun digging into the iMac and fixing it but I don't really want to do it again.

Re: smcFanControl vs. iStat Menus HD Temp reading
written by Danny, June 16, 2009

Hi there,

One of the sensors is measuring temperature external to the drive (that is the sensor you've glued onto the drive) and the other sensor is internal within the drive itself. Therefore, I believe that the external temperature of your drive is 51C and the drive's internal temp is 61C. That is hot! It should also be interesting to see what is your environment temperature like. Most of the drives specify 60C as the upper max. operational temperature. The solution is to rev the fans higher to compensate with additional cooling. Sure, you can run them down, however in couple of years, so I wouldn't be that much worried about it. Another alternative if you really have HDD temp problems is to go with the WD Green drive which produces the lowest temp of them all. Other than that, just make sure you use that Time Machine of yours

All the best,

Danny

High FAN rpm
written by panrobal, June 19, 2009

Hi Guys!

Has anyone experienced High HD Fan RPM after upgrading?
In iStat Pro I see that the HD has only 34 deg. Celsius but the Fan runs at 5500 rpm!
I run
The optical drive fan runs at 4600 rpm and CPU Fan at 3500 rpm.
Maybe I've reattached the temperature sensor into the wrong place? But there was a spot right there on the drive with circles and and degree mark so it should be ok..

Any ideas?

BTW I ran a Mid-2007 iMac 20" with 2.4 GHz CPU and standard 2GB of RAM. I replaced the original drive (because it failed) with a Seagate Barracuda 500 GB ST3500410AS - unfortunately higher capacities are still very expensive in my country.

Regards,
Max

High FAN rpm
written by Danny, June 19, 2009

Hi Max,

Thanks for writing. It actually happened to me - in my case I've had a fan connector unplugged. Most likely you've forgot to plug something back in - meaning you'll most likely need to go into your computer again and verify all connectors and cables are hooked up where they're supposed to be.

Danny

High Fan rpm
written by panrobal, June 20, 2009

Hi Danny,

Thanks for your quick response and of course for the amazing article.
Thanks to you opening an iMac has become a pretty simple task. I've already opened it today and reattached the HD temperature sensor in a different location but still the fan runs like crazy.

As you wrote in one of your updates I managed to replace the HD without removing the display - I used another pair of hands to hold it for me and just detached the two connectors on the back of the display. Is it possible that those connectors below the monitor cause the fan to run so fast if they are attached inproperly - you didn't exactly specify how those should be attached and I didn't remember that after detaching them. But the display works fine - so I guess the mistake isn't here..

This time I'll remove the display and take a look if there's nothing missing - I hope it will finally work. Otherwise I'll have to manage with the fan running so fast (although I think it might shorten its life a lot)..

Thanks,
Max

LCD temperature sensor - literally screwed up
written by panrobal, June 20, 2009

Hi Guys,

Finally I know what caused the fans running so fast - a screw going through the cable which is attached to the LCD temperature sensor. I realized that after completely removing the display I only hope that it will work with the cable somewhat damaged.. Or maybe there is a way to have that cable replaced? I'd appreciate any help.

I pity that I haven't read all the comments before replacing the drive because Salmacis had the same problem.. Well learn from our mistakes guys!

Max

Temp sensor cable
written by Danny, June 20, 2009

Max,

You should be able to fix the temp sensor cable with some soldering, or just take the cable to any electronics repair shop and ask them to solder it for you -- should work good as new.

Danny

Temp sensor cable
written by panrobal, June 24, 2009

Hi Danny,

Thanks for all the help. After removing the screw from the temp sensor cable the computer is running fine - more than that actually
I'll take your advice on taking the cable to an electronic repair shop for soldering.
Again help for your help and great tips.

Best regards,
Max

Dont remove the 3rd monitor cable! Too difficult.
written by stu, June 29, 2009

Prop up the TFT panel against a wall with some foam packing in between. Don't worry it will stretch far enough without pulling too much.

Otherwise, well done mate. EXCELLENT GUIDE.

Duo upgrade
written by Harold, June 29, 2009

Hello Danny,

This evening me and a friend of mine installed two 1.5 TB seagate drive's in a 20 and 24 inch imac from 2008. We found out that there is a difference in between the power cable of the 24 and the 20 inch screen.
The 20 inch is easier with the four connectors on the right side as the 24 inch model has only one flat cable on the left side. We did not disconnect this one.

After a time machine recovery everything runs perfect.

Thanx again for the great DIY.

Harold and Richard

my two cents
written by Thierry, July 02, 2009

Very helpful guide !
I just replaced my hard drive after a crash… Thanks a lot !

My two cents :

1- On my iMac (beginning 200 there are 2x2 connectors behind the screen at the right side (middle and top) instead of the one you describe in the top left corner ( Step 4 )

2- Be aware of the two little screw for the screen connector at the bottom right side (Step 3) when you want to replace these. As they are very small (and if like me you have big fingers…) you can loose them in you iMac. So, you can touch one of the magnet on the front panel with your screwdriver. You have now a magnetic screwdriver for few minutes
Have fun !

Replaced 2007 IMac hard drive with 1.5T drive
written by T2, July 03, 2009

Perfect instructions from your site. The hardest part was keeping the dust off the glass once trying to replace it. Also, time machine restore worked like a champ. Thank you for this site.

Apple certified. Good as new. Save on a certified refurbished Mac. Free Shipping.
written by Apple, December 31, 2009

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