Hey guys I know this is a little off topic, but considering I had to do a good bit of research to replace a hard drive in my own 12 inch PowerBook G4, I figured someone searching for this will find it quite useful. In my search for answers I came across some opposing views and conflicting information, so here’s what works:
My Powerbook G4 12 inch configuration:
1.5 Ghz, 512 Mb RAM, 60 GB Hard Drive
Original Hard Drive:
Hitachi Travelstar HTS541060G9AT00, 5400RPM, 60GB
New Hard Drive:
Samsung Spinpoint M5 HM160HC, 5400RPM, 160GB
The new hard drive worked with no problems, I picked Samsung over Western Digital. Your hard drive choices are somewhat limited since you have to get one with an ATA connector NOT SATA!
Reinstalling the OS:
Power up and pop in the Mac OS CD. Next turn off the computer. Press and hold the “C” key and power up again. Keep holding the “C” key until your mac boots up from the CD.
Now you can use the Disk Utility to partition and format the hard drive and then install the OS. I split my drive into ~70 and ~80 GB partitions.
Below is by far the best video walk though I found on youtube, along with a step by step image slideshow from ifixit.com. Notice on my picture I have a piece of paper with a diagram of where some of the screws go – there’s plenty of them, make sure you don’t lose any!
httpv://www.youtube.com/watch?v=8b1NGfenAqY
