Upgrade HDD for my Macbook (early 2008)

Look over this link....it's the one I used to upgrade my hard drive...should help get you going...
http://www.macinstruct.com/node/130

PS....Welcome to Apple Discussions....

I agree with dave...

I would suggest using SuperDuper or CCC to clone you old drive to the new drive then once the clone is created install it into the Mac and you are done! That is if you are just upgrading and not trying to fix a problem with your Mac.

You'll need:

1) The new drive.

SATA I or II, 2.5 inch form factor, 5400 or 7200rpm

2) An enclosure for the new drive.

USB or Firewire (I recommend an enclosure that supports both), SATA I/II, f

3) SuperDuper or Carbon Copy Clone (both Free)

Install the new drive into the enclosure run SuperDuper to clone your internal drive to the ext drive. This will create bootable duplicate of your data and OS.

Once the clone is done boot from the external drive to verify that it boots ok and everything is there. Then take the new drive out of the enclosure and install into the Mac and boot... And your done.

Put the old drive into the enclosure and use it as a portable or external drive.

the link for Carbon Copy Cloner (CCC)...
http://www.macupdate.com/info.php/id/7032/carbon-copy-cloner

I performed why iyacyas did a few months after owning my MacBook. I used SuperDuper & my MacBook has been perfectly fine. Plus my old hard drive is still in-use as an external. Very much worth it, saves you all the trouble of having to reinstall any applications you have. :}

The are both free...

Dave gotcha the link to CCC, so here is the link to SuperDuper:

http://www.shirt-pocket.com/SuperDuper/SuperDuperDescription.html

SuperDuper is free unless you want to unlock I believe the sandbox features. But just for cloning, it's free. I purchased it myself as it was not that expensive and I was so impressed with the program I felt the developer should get compensated for it. SuperDuper has been a great asset in the Mac community for years.

Now I've not ever used CCC but I here nothing but great things about it. It's a great solid competitor or equivalent to SuperDuper and I believe it may offer a few more backup options.

It shouldn't void the Apple Care but if they fail (the RAM or HDD) Apple will not cover it.

Or, if Apple determines a different failure in the system is the result of a defect in the RAM/HDD, then they won't cover it either. In this situation they may void your Apple Care.

The only way, possibly, I foresee around this is to have a local Apple store/service center install Apple-certified RAM and/or HDD for you. But that's a maybe; ask Apple or one of the more knowledgable folks on here in regards to that specifically.

It will not break the warranty as stated by the other poster. Here is the best thing to do.

When upgrading a Mac that is under Apple Care always hold on to the original parts. Why? Well if you do have a problem with the Mac you want to swap them out before sending it to Apple for repair, this is especially true for HDD's. It has been reported from users that sent their Macs in for repair with a 3rd party drive that the Mac came back with an original drive drive installed excluding all the users data and their 3rd party drive now gone. So never send a Mac with a 3rd party drive to Apple for repair.

It's always good to get the most information you can before tackling something new, so no problem with the questions.

a) As my few external HDD are formatted with FAT32 and NTFS,does the external HDD used for cloning need to be formatted by Apple HFS?

Absolutely... The external drive that it to be used as the Mac clone will need to be formatted using OSX Extended (Journaled) with GUID partition table. This can be done with Disk Utilities in OSX.

b) can the external HDD contained cloned used as normal HDD or can only be used as backup?

Not exact sure what you are asking but the External HDD that is or will be a clone can be booted from and used as a boot drive in which you can then perform all your normal computing duties, creating files save them to the disk. All from the external drive.

Post back if you have any other concerns...

Let us know how it works out!

Glad to here you and the Mac survived!

It not just saving money, it's just a great feeling to it yourself...