‘This kind of work blows my mind’: An Apple fan saved $2,200 by manually upgrading their Mac’s storage — but admitted the process ‘was really hell’ | Tech Radar
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‘This kind of work blows my mind’: An Apple fan saved $2,200 by manually upgrading their Mac’s storage — but admitted the process ‘was really hell’
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A Reddit user manually upgraded their Mac Book’s storage chips
The process involved soldering, 12 hours and ‘some nerves’
The move saved them $2,200 after Apple recently increased its prices
How much is too much to pay for laptop storage? After Apple’s shocking price rises, things might feel so bad that you’re tempted to roll up your sleeves and perform an emergency DIY upgrade job on your Mac Book. That’s exactly what one Apple fan did — and they saved themselves a cool $2,200 in the process.
Posting on Reddit, user arduino RPi 4 explained how they took their Mac Book Pro with 2TB of storage and boosted it all the way to 8TB, quadrupling their available storage with a serious improvement that means they can “store anything I want.” They spent “around
Of course, this being Apple, opening a Mac Book Pro and increasing its storage yourself is far from straightforward. The post revealed that it took them 12 hours “and some nerves” to make the change — and no wonder, as doing so requires removing the existing storage modules from the Mac Book Pro’s mainboard and soldering alternative chips in their place.
As well as that, the poster indicated that they had to “fill in the power components on the other side as well” in order to complete the upgrade. “That was really hell,” they admitted, adding that these parts “are TINY packages.”
All the work was done while they were on vacation in Shenzhen, China, where they “borrowed a lab from a friend who does component level repair.” They used a hot air station and microscope soldering and stencils to do the work, which involved soldering power management integrated circuits into place, followed by 4TB of NAND storage chips on each side of the laptop for a total of 8TB.
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If you’ve got the resolve, patience and skill for a spot of laptop surgery like this, the savings can be enormous. A 14-inch Mac Book Pro with M5 Max chip and 2TB of storage will set you back
The difference is even starker when you apply this change to Apple’s entry-level Mac Book Pro. A 14-inch Mac Book Pro with M5 chip and 2TB of storage currently costs
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Most posters in the thread were highly impressed with their work, with comments like “very impressive, I could never” being typical. One user was especially effusive in their praise, saying “This kind of work blows my mind.”
That said, other users weren’t happy that a task like this is even needed at all. “Crazy that you have to go this level of modifying just to upgrade your storage,” said one, indicating that Apple’s increased storage prices are not exactly the most popular move it’s ever made.
But with the artificial intelligence (AI) goldrush pushing up component prices worldwide and Apple unwilling to compromise its famously high margins, increased costs are here to stay, at least for the time being. And while that’s still the case, there will probably be plenty more people willing to take on the considerable task of upgrading their laptop’s storage with a few off-the-shelf components and a soldering iron to hand.
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➡️ Read our full guide to the best Mac Books and Macs
- Best Mac Book overall: Mac Book Air 13-inch M5
- Best budget Mac Book: Mac Book Neo
- Best Mac: Mac mini (M4)
- Best Mac Book Pro Mac Book Pro 14-inch M5
- Best Mac for professionals Mac Studio M4 Max
Alex Blake has been fooling around with computers since the early 1990s, and since that time he's learned a thing or two about tech. No more than two things, though. That's all his brain can hold. As well as Tech Radar, Alex writes for i More, Digital Trends and Creative Bloq, among others. He was previously commissioning editor at Mac Format magazine. That means he mostly covers the world of Apple and its latest products, but also Windows, computer peripherals, mobile apps, and much more beyond. When not writing, you can find him hiking the English countryside and gaming on his PC.
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