Hi, All:
My cousin wants a Mac; he's switching from a PC. I decided to upgrade and give him my 17" 2.4GHz Santa Rosa MacBook Pro that I hadn't used for a while. Here's what I did:
1. Purchased a Crucial M500 240GB SSD from Amazon.com
2. Purchased a NewerTech MacBook Pro 17" High-Capacity Battery from Other World Computing
3. Purchased an Apple MacBook Pro 85W Magsafe Adapter from Other World Computing
4. Installed the Crucial M500 240GB SSD using the Other World Computing Tech Support video
5. I kept the RAM at 4GB (2GB+2GB).
6. Started the Santa Rosa MacBook Pro in FireWire target disk mode
7. Using a FireWire 800 cable, I connected the Santa Rosa MacBook Pro to my newer 17" MacBook Pro with an OS X Mavericks installer on the desktop
8. I initialized the Crucial M500 240GB SSD inside the Santa Rosa MacBook Pro with Disk Utility
9. I ran the OS X Mavericks installer, selecting the Santa Rosa MacBook Pro's hard drive as the destination
10. After the installer finished, I disconnected the FireWire 800 cable and restarted the Santa Rosa MacBook Pro
11. I ran Software Update on the Santa Rosa MacBook Pro to update the software to the latest versions
It runs like a charm. I wouldn't say the Santa Rosa MacBook Pro screams, but it's snappy. I can run several applications at once. The only limitation I've noticed on the upgraded Santa Rosa MacBook Pro is that when I play some large .MKV files (10GB to 15GB) the playback with VLC is choppy.
I hope this helps.