Apple working on software fix for MacBook Pro hard drives

Owners of Apple MacBook Pro notebooks with 7200rpm 500GB hard drives have been complaining for months of clicking sounds followed by temporary stalling. According to Apple, a fix is in the works.


"We are aware of the issue and are working on a software update," Apple representative Bill Evans, told CNET News on Monday. He gave no time frame for the release of the software update.

People have been reporting that they hear a beep from the computer shortly before the hard drive clicks and then the computer stops responding. The computer is unresponsive for 10 seconds or so and then begins to work normally again.

The hard drive issue does not require the user to force-reboot the computer, which would cause any unsaved work to be lost. Simply waiting out the unresponsive system apparently works every time.

There doesn't appear to be any specific task that triggers the hard drive to enter its unresponsive state. Users on Apple's support forums are reporting that it seems to be completely random and doesn't matter where they are or what they are doing when it happens.

It does appear that the issue only affects the 500GB hard drives that run at 7200rpm.



Jim Dalrymple has followed Apple and the Mac industry for the last 15 years, first as part of MacCentral and then in various positions at Macworld. A guitar player for 20 years, Jim also writes about the professional audio market, examining the best ways to write and record songs on a Macintosh with Logic Pro and Pro Tools. Jim is a member of the CNET Blog Network and is not an employee of CNET.

Acronis launches Backup & Recovery 10

Staff Writers | Jul 8, 2009
The disaster recovery solution combines data deduplication, support for virtual environments, and centralised management features.


Acronis Backup & Recovery 10 is the next generation of the Acronis True Image solutions and supports virtual environments from VMware, Microsoft Hyper-V, Citrix Xensource and Parallels.

The product includes a host-based Virtual Machine (VM) backup agent, enabling backup and restore of live VMs through VMware ESX and Microsoft Hyper-V APIs without installing a client in each VM.

"Acronis Backup & Recovery 10 is introduced as a comprehensive, feature-rich enterprise-level solution but priced for SMBs, which fits nicely in the A/NZ market where majority of the businesses are SMBs," said Bill Taylor-Mountford, general manager Acronis A/NZ (pictured).

"They can now take advantage of an enterprise-class service, an affordable price point and significant cost savings in an easy-to-use package."

Taylor-Mountford said some of his regional customers were involved in the beta testing process.

"The feedback was exceptionally positive. We are very confident our partners will have an even stronger second half of the year with this new offering," he said.

The solution can scale thousands of machines, enabling an IT administrator to design and execute a backup strategy to match the growth of a business.