So I got a MacBook.

My mom wanted my old Fujitsu tablet so she offered to get me another laptop for it. I took it. I’ve been wanting to try out Mac OS X and get into iPhone development. So I ended up ordering a MacBook ‘cause those things are only available on Macs, well at least legally.

Its Refurbished

I got a refurbished MacBook. 2.4GHz, 2GB, 250GB. Yeah, it’s used but most of the MacBooks that are refurbished were probably returned for minor cosmetic defects. Those returned Macs go through Apples refurbishing process where the computer is fixed up and tested. Anything that’s wrong with it gets replaced so it’s almost like getting a brand new computer. Plus it was $250 dollars cheaper than with the education discount and $300 cheaper than a new one. Too bad there isn’t an education discount on refurbished Macs. That would kick ass.

The Package

I got the package yesterday and was super excited to open it. I’ve opened up a MacBook package before and I’ve gotta say, the refurbished one is much less epic. It comes in a larger, uglier, white box and just lacks the niceness of a new MacBook package. Inside is a long box with only the words “Apple Certified” written on it that contains the discs, papers, power brick, and cables.

Under the box is the actual MacBook wrapped in plastic and encased in foam inserts to protect it from shipment damage. The computer looks brand new despite it being refurbished and all. There aren’t any scratches or defects to be found, looks and feels really study. I booted it up and tested that it was working okay.

Then turned it off.

What?

Here’s where the Newegg package comes in. I took the $250 I saved and bought a 500GB hard drive and 4GB of ram with $100 left over. Take those parts, stick that in my refurbished Mac and I end up with a MacBook that is cheaper and better than a brand new one. Replacing the parts took a measly 5-10 minutes.

Installing the Hard Drive

Opening the latch allowed me to remove part of the back cover and gave me access to the battery and hard drive. The picture on the left is actually the laptop after I finished installing everything cause I forgot to take a picture beforehand. I removed the battery by pulling the tab attached to it. The hard drive is held by a retaining bar with a screw. Unscrewed that, removed the hard drive, and transferred the four Torx T6 screws and plastic tab over to the new hard drive. If you’ve never heard of Torx T6 screws, its okay, neither have I. Luckily I had this little screw driver kit on me that had a screw bit that fit (that’s a lot of “it”s).

Installing the Ram

Now for the RAM. This part was a little more annoying, lots of little screws to deal with. There were 8 of them. After removing them, the whole back panel comes off, exposing the internal components of the MacBook. Fancy. The two 1GB sticks are located right above where the battery should be and are held in by retention clips. The sticks are easily removed. I replaced them with the two 2GB sticks that I got from Newegg.

Screw the back plate back on, put the hard drive, battery, and cover back on and it’s done.

Next Post

This is getting kinda long and boring so I think I’ll split it into multiple posts. Next time:

• WTF is “Mac OS Extended Journaled”?
• BOOT CAMP BITCHES
• WTF 2 DVD-Rs for $5!?
• Why is my spacebar obnoxiously loud?
• Parallels & VMware
• OS X isn’t thaaat great
• I wonder if this can run L4D
• and more sheet.