Hackintosh

dickmedd

Anyone ever made one?

Now that my days of university scholarship cash have come to an end and the latest Macs are getting less modifiable/repairable, I'm looking to have a machine that I can upgrade on my own schedule, and save a little money in the process.

I'm also looking to triple boot Ubuntu, Windows 7, and OS X, which should be fun.

I'd love to hear any stories of past experience. A friend of mine had one once, but that was ages ago so I imagine the 'scene' has expanded since.

Niemann

I have built one, in fact my primary machine at home is a hackintosh and has been for about two years. It's a great way to save some money and get some cutting edge hardware, but you will burn lots and lots and lots of time tweaking it, getting frustrated, rebuilding, and reinstalling. After three months (being a high school teacher I had a bit of free time two summers ago) I was able to get my machine very nearly 100%. There are still some oddities with audio from the hackintosh mobo, which I've since replaced with a USB dongle.

My biggest recommendation is to do lots and lots of research. The best place I've found is tonymacx86, although there are some other good resources and some people dislike tonymacx86. They have some excellent Golden Build articles throughout the site and in the forums.

My current build is approaching two years old, here are the specs:

Asus P8P67 Pro mobo
Intel i7 2600K (3.4 GHz)
16GB RAM
Dual Radeon 6870s

I've upgraded the video cards to:

Dual GTX 680s

I've been very happy with the machine, overall cost initially was around $1000. I've probably put an additional $800 testing out various pieces and upgrading the video cards.

One note is that I needed the dual video cards to support my three Apple LED Displays, evening out the mini-displayport and DVI-mini-displayport connectors. You can probably save lots by scaling down to just one video card.

I have saving up for a new Mac Pro instead of going through the whole Hackintosh experience again, but this only because I've saved up enough to buy a Mac Pro (now if Apple would just update them). I may build some nice hackintosh media centers in the future (Plex is great for this), but probably shy away from building a new primary computer.

And since I'm ranting at this point; one of the pieces of my hackintosh I am most proud about is the following case:

http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16811352005

Which I believe you can still find in some small retailers. Absolutely beautiful, simple, well-designed, and well-organized case. Highly recommend it.

dickmedd

Thanks for the response, that sounds promising.

This guide looks like it's got things covered fairly well, which I guess is a good starting point. In fact, looking at the spec to price ratio is quite surprising (I guess I've been paying Apple tax for too long). I'm very much going to tread the 'this definitely works' line here, I can't avoid to pump too much cash into it.

Software-wise, it seems easier than when I last checked. The UniBeast/MultiBeast method seems too good be true, which I guess means it's not as easy as it sounds.

Niemann

Absolutely, constructing a hackintosh is definitely possible (and I would even venture to say "easy" with the proper investment of research and patience). But you will inevitably stretch your time commitment to the max.

In the end, is it worth it? Oh yeah.

If you have a lot of money, would you ever do a hackintosh? No.

IUG

I also did the Hackintosh route a while back. However, I was getting sick of "will this software update work with my hardware" and playing that game, then eventually bought a Macbook Pro. Yes it saves you a ton of money, and I suppose it's easier now than when I first started. But every time that Apple releases something you start to worry if you have your restore disks, will this update break your sound/ethernet/video compatibility, bring on more kernel panics, etc. And no one has 100% your setup.

Niemann

IUG has a very good point, and something I neglected. I always hesitate on software updates. I've started using Super Duper to backup my primary disk to make sure I don't end up nuking my system, but even this runs the risk of causing a complete failure. My solution has always been to just have lots and lots of disks. My current setup has ten hard drives (combination or SSDs and HDs).

dickmedd

Thanks for the heads up, I'll keep it in mind. I'm fairly hesitant with any kind of updates as it is (especially since I first upgraded to 10.6 and had to look up a bunch of tweaks to ensure all of Logic Studio 8 worked) so I'll maintain that cautious mentality if/when I proceed with this project.

Thanks again for your input, I'll keep my eyes peeled for more advice.

menace690

I'm in the process right now. Waiting on my video card.

I'm doing the Socket 2011 CustoMac Pro Build from http://tonymacx86.blogspot.com/2012/08/building-customac-buyers-guide-2012.html

This is to replace my aging 2008 Mac Pro.

I'll let you know how the install goes next week I assume

Headrush69

I'd had OS X running on both my Dell XPS420 and a Atom based WindPC as an iTunes server.

The only issues I had with both (which different hardware likely wouldn't have) was a minor issue with networking.
The networking itself worked fine, but for some reason when the machine went to power saving mode, my Airport Extreme router didn't seem to be able to properly wake them using Bonjour. At times the Bonjour service seem to disappear from the network for those machines though they were still running fine.

Eventually I sold the XPS 420 and bought a refurbished 27" iMac directly from Apple.
Saved a few hundred bucks and got the same warranty as a new machine (it was flawless quality), and I'm more pleased with the huge screen and no update worrying.

The kicker for me was I was just tired of a dusty, wired mess that most desktop cases are.
Even with 3rd party upgraded fans, no PC was as clean and quiet as my iMac has been.

(Even upgraded and added my own SSD inside ;) )

dickmedd

I look forward to hearing how your project goes, meance690.

IUG and Headrush69: I've always been very happy with my Macs, apart from a few issues. My iMac G5 ended up with a few display problems - which righted themselves - shortly before the motherboard gave up (I think). My latest iMac (a mid-2011, which I'm not looking to replace for a while) seemed to have out of the box wifi issues, which didn't surface until after my warranty expired.

It's events like these, coupled with the fact that I won't be getting anymore 'free' university money that are prompting me to consider a cheaper, modifiable option in the future. I can't say I'm too jazzed about the design of more recent Macs or the direction of OS X, but there's a handful of Mac-exclusive software that I won't be walking away from anytime soon.

menace690

So far I can say the install went extremely smoothly. I have it ready on a bench to get up to usable standards. (ie install all the software I need to do my job) I should have all that done today. So tomorrow will probably be my first day using it as my daily machine.

menace690

Ok not so good.

Issues:
No audio
Geforce 660Ti only supports 2 monitors, I have 4. Onboard video not working in tandem. Need another video card...
Need to have usb key in to boot.

THEN:
In trying to fix the issues, I installed Chimera and the audio drivers... Computer now won't boot.
Also, needed to do the boot1h fix for boot 0. That was easy enough to get rid of.

Starting from scratch. The speed when it was working was so nice though, that I am definitely gonna keep playing until I get a working OS.

menace690

Ok been making some good progress.

After a few reformats, firmware changes, MultiBeast settings, etc., I finally have a machine that boots from the hard drive to the desktop with audio and networking.

Now I need to figure out how to get 4 monitor support, or add a second video card.

menace690

SUCCESS!!!!!

4 Monitors. 1 video card. One VERY fast Hackintosh

Specs:
Motherboard: Gigabyte Z77X-UD5H
Processor: Intel i7-3770K
Video Card: Geforce 660Ti
Ram: 16 GB
HD: Seagate 1 TB (Caused some issues with install, but VERY easy workaround)
PSU: Corsair 650 W

To do it from install to completion- about a week.
To do it again knowing what I know now - 1-2 hours.

Headrush69

Of all the things that could cause issues, I'm surprised the HD was/could be an issue?

What exactly was the issue? Or do you just mean setting up the bootloader on the HD?

dickmedd

Glad to hear that it's okay and that you found a workaround soon enough. It sounds like enough hassle for me to handle whenever I get around to it.

menace690

I am very happy now. It was a bit frustrating but it worked. One recommendation... get TWO thumb drives. One for OS install, and one for all the tools you'll be using (Multibeast, etc). It will make any retries happen much faster.

menace690

HD bootloader, needed to be set to boot1h, but that was minor. It was the DSDT Free installation that did not work as everyone said it would.

After piecing together information, I needed nullcpu on and graphicsenabled=no. Also, I needed to change the BIOS firmware to a specific version (upgrading to newest didnt work, but version f8 worked perfectly)

If someone happens to get the same specs as I did, I'd be happy to help with my settings. This baby is FAST!

Niemann

While we're discussing hackintosh (I feel it's directly related to the pursuit of building them), how would your new machine fare as an emulation box? I've always wanted to do a tutorial on the "Ultimate Emulation Rig", including custom hackintosh, peripherals, etc. I'll create a new thread if it gets too far off the hackintosh topic.

menace690

As for mine, I would consider it the nearly one of the best Macs available for emulation. That being said, the PC world is still ahead of us. I don't dual boot. I could, but that probably would take some extra work. I have Parallels which will allow for some extra emulation, should I choose to use it. But I won't realistically use Parallels for emulation (its virtualization, not emulation jic anyone doesn't realize that). My 2008 Mac Pro could run every emulated game I threw at it at full speed (topped off at BSNES).

As for peripherals, this cpu has a Logitech Precision which is great for 16 bit and earlier games. At home, I have a PS3 bluetooth controller and a Wii Remote hooked up for when I play emulated games, but its rare. I thought I would, but it just hasn't really happened. I used to do this a lot. I have a Mac Mini hooked up to a 47 inch TV. Its just cumbersome to use. Hopefully OpenEmu will change this for the better :)

EDIT: If anyone wants, I have 2 USB adapters I no longer use at all. The will hook up one xbox (original, not 360), one gamecube, and one ps2 controller to a mac or pc (yes all can be used at the same time). I have a few xbox controllers that can go with them.