The First Steps

Before you get started, you may consider backing up your data. using an external hard drive and a recent version of OS X, Apple's Time Machine software is the easiest way to go ... for more information google Time Machine tips. Time Machine probably already working for you. if not check out SuperDuper to make backups of your whole hard disk.

Consider you've secured your data, upgrade process could be the next step. to make it short it's safer even if you wish to do the memory upgrade! as it happen because of unsuccessful upgrade Mac not willing to start. what you'll need to do may differs depends on the time you purchased your Macbook. click on the links below to go to the page for your particular model. If you're not sure when you purchased your MacBook / MacBook Pro, turn it over and use the descriptions below to help you figure it out. below is some info about MacBook Pro generations.

First generation (January 2006–October 2008): The battery cover opens with two tabs.

Second generation (October 2008–June 2009): This model is the first to have unibody construction. It's also the easiest to upgrade. this model only has one latch to pull open the case. you can also google "how to upgrade second generation hard drive / memory".

Third generation (June 2009-Present): In terms of difficulty, this model something between the other two model. You can identify it by the single panel held on by ten screws. Once you're inside it's only a snap to swap out the hard drives.

Price guide:

As explained upgrading Mac is not a very complicated process, even most of today's hard drives and memory that mainly made for PC works at the same speed and quality on MacBook and MacBook Pro laptops. usually hard drive upgrade labour could be around NZ$125.00 + GST plus the parts (Sep. 2010 price for 500GB is around NZ$150.00 + GST).

Memory upgrade is much easier and you should not be charged more than NZ$45 + GST for labour. prices on Sep. 2010 for 2GB DDR2 is $69 + GST

Upgrade Time:

The process for upgrading memory normally takes less than 30 minutes. Hard drive upgrade is a bit of time consuming process consider reloading the backup, stress test etc.