Chosen Solution

I have purchased a 1TB 2.5" Hybrid Seagate HDD (ST1000LM014) for my Early-2011 MBP, so I have several questions regarding the replacement of the hard drive by myself:

  1. Do I need to purchase a tray for the HDD?
  2. Is there any way in which I could replace the hard drive without having to restore the operating system to 10.6.7? I have a 2.5" external case for HDDs and thought of cloning the hard drive before installing it on my laptop.
  3. Or as an alternative, can I restore the OS using Time Machine back ups? Macbook Pro specs: Macbook Pro 8,1 Core i7, 2,7Ghz 4GB RAM (2x 2GB) Toshiba 500GB serial-ATA 5400-rpm

Put a system on your Time Machine backup. Download the OS X you want to install onto it. You do not want to clone as you will lose the repair partition. Now install the new drive and boot from the TimeMachine system. Use Disk Utility to format the drive GUID. Now install the new system. Next boot from the new system (hold the option key down start up and select the new drive). It will ask during the set up if you want to transfer from a Tome Machine backup, do it. Second method. Install the drive and do an internet install, This will generally install the original operating system. If you Time Machine backup is from a higher system, it will not move over. MacBook Pro 13" Unibody Early 2011 Hard Drive Replacement

You don’t need to purchase a tray for the HDD, and you can either clone the hard drive using your enclosure, or by time machine backup!