Apple Hard Drives?

[melloyellowaz]

For laptop 2.5" hard disks, does it matter if it was used originally on a Mac laptop? I have a Dell laptop and recently my hard disk crapped out on me. I saw an Apple hard drive (Seagate just like mine) for sale for pretty cheap so I'm wondering if it will be compatible. Thanks.

 

[Lord Evermore]

It "should" work, if it's an IDE drive. You'd have to remove whatever partitioning is already on the drive, might have to use a utility to zero-wipe it, or the installer for your OS may be able to do it for you.

The "should" is in quotes because there's always the possibility they put some odd firmware on the drive that looks for a Mac BIOS/Firmware or something.

Of course, if the model number is the same, then it's the same drive.

 

[Bobthelost]

It'll work fine, ever since apple moved over to IDE in the 90s you can just redo the formatting (which you will have to for an XP system).

 

[n0cmonkey]

IDE is IDE is IDE

 

[archcommus]

It's a Seagate, not an Apple, so yes it's the same.

 

[Aluvus]

Do check whether it's ATA ("IDE") or SATA first. And check which your Dell needs. Older laptops generally use ATA, some newer laptops (including the Macbook Pro, it seems) use SATA.

Other than that, it should be no problem.