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Howdy, recently my late-2011 MacBook Pro suffered some water damage and ceased functioning (does not turn on, etc.). Luckily my brother had an old mid-2012 MacBook Pro I could use, however I would like to recover some of my old files off the broken MacBook. What is the right way to go about transferring the files from the old Mac? Is it as simple as plugging the old hard drive into my current one or is there something else I'll have to do?
Shouldn't be super hard, cdgodin
The connection in the late-2011 MacBook Pro is SATA. So you'd have to physically remove the old hard drive from it and use a SATA to usb plugin adapter. That could work. I believe the case screws are either #0 or #1 Phillips (cross point) and the hard drive itself is held in with Torx screws. After you have removed the drive, I'm assuming you didn't have a backup of the broken MacBook here.
Then you could plug it into your mid 2012 MacBook Pro. I was gonna suggest Target Mode, as your mid-2012 supports that, even though the late-2011 macbook Pro you had is gone. Shut down mid-2012 MacBook Pro, hold down the "T" key and plug in the late-2011 MacBook Pro's hard drive with the adapter into one of the USB sockets. , and while holding down the "T" key, press power switch to start it up. If sucessful, both your main startup disk and the 2011 hard drive should appear on the Desktop of your 2012 MacBook Pro, and you can use the 2011's hard drive same as any other one, including transferring files from it.
of course, I could be wrong, too. Maybe just shut 'er down, get the hard drive out of the dead macbook pro, plug in the adapter to it, plug it into your newer macBook pro, and start it up with the other hard drive attached and see what happens
john b
Shouldn't be super hard, cdgodin
The connection in the late-2011 MacBook Pro is SATA. So you'd have to physically remove the old hard drive from it and use a SATA to usb plugin adapter. That could work. I believe the case screws are either #0 or #1 Phillips (cross point) and the hard drive itself is held in with Torx screws. After you have removed the drive, I'm assuming you didn't have a backup of the broken MacBook here.
Then you could plug it into your mid 2012 MacBook Pro. I was gonna suggest Target Mode, as your mid-2012 supports that, even though the late-2011 macbook Pro you had is gone. Shut down mid-2012 MacBook Pro, hold down the "T" key and plug in the late-2011 MacBook Pro's hard drive with the adapter into one of the USB sockets. , and while holding down the "T" key, press power switch to start it up. If sucessful, both your main startup disk and the 2011 hard drive should appear on the Desktop of your 2012 MacBook Pro, and you can use the 2011's hard drive same as any other one, including transferring files from it.
of course, I could be wrong, too. Maybe just shut 'er down, get the hard drive out of the dead macbook pro, plug in the adapter to it, plug it into your newer macBook pro, and start it up with the other hard drive attached and see what happens
john b
Moving files from broken Mac to new Mac
