MacBook/MacBook Pro Optical Drive Firmware Updates
Apple has released three firmware updates, all of which claim to “eliminate the noise made by the optical disk drive during system startup and wake from sleep on your Mac.” EFI firmware updates are available for recent releases of the MacBook (MacBook EFI Firmware Update 1.4) and MacBook Pro (MacBook Pro EFI Firmware Update 1.8), and once the Mac’s firmware has been updated, you must install the SuperDrive Firmware Update 3.0.
More information on EFI firmware updates, including installation instructions, is available on Apple’s Web site. Updates are available via Software Update or the Apple Support Downloads page. (Free, 18.35/3.14/3.36 MB)
There are some complaints, mine included, that the update does not eliminate the sound during startup. Only the sound made when waking from sleep was eliminated.
Yeah, but is that really worthy of a complaint? I thought this firmware update was kinda funny, because I always thought that the optical drive "noise" during startups and wake ups was perfectly normal and supposed to be there.
This noise was driving me crazy. If you were arriving in a quiet place (library or such) and opened up your Macbook people were turning their heads and not because it looked so good (although it does). Close it and open it a few times while doing stuff over time and it got worse. Infuriating. I started to *dread* that.
Talk about negative advertisement. You plop that Apple logo into view for all and the drive goes "brrzzeeeemzooom" with quite a bit of emphasis. Hateful. I was seriously thinking about ripping out that drive.
I'm more than happy that this is over now. Phew!
The EFI update to MacBook Pro is only applicable to some models of MacBook Pro. Not my non-unibody version (2.5 GHz Core 2 Duo).
Thanks, I've edited to clarify that it's only recent releases of the MacBook and MacBook Pro.
This is sort of an FYI-type comment:
Following the update, which I installed last night, I lost all trackpad gestures (though I could still scroll). It took me zapping the P-RAM before I regained the 3 & 4 finger swipes. I don't know if anyone else had this problem, but I thought that I would mention it just in case.