The Hackintosh thread - build a $3800 mac pro for $1100
- Thread starter starcentral
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starcentral
Veteran
I went with the gaming 3 version, and upon deciding on a board I think it was just what was in stock at the time at my local parts dealer. ASUS has a great reputation as well but I don't mind GigaByte and I also specifically went after a board with 4 memory slots, a ton of USB ports, and support for a ton of SATA drives. i.e. My board currently supports 7 SATA drives, 8 USB ports (although I counted 9) and the integrated Ethernet adapter is KillerE2200 which is sort of next generation in technology. This board also has RAID although I haven't really decided if I will use it.
To answer your question (which is also in the caution section I wrote in my long winded post #1) - it's not so much that hackintoshes require a specific model etc.. . it's that every board can more or less be made to work, but it becomes a lot of troubleshooting specific to the unique board when you are trying to do a simple install of the OSX. For example you will usually need to figure out which exact boot flags to use when doing an install so that the install doesn't fail. Before that you need specific settings in your bios, and if the board doesn't support UEFI then you might have to flash it, or figure out how to get a non-UEFI board to work.
Any component specific to the mother board like integrated sound, ethernet, and video will also have unique nuances which again may require you to specify boot flags just so that you can get the OSX to install. Worse, it can be different for a specific OSX version so in my case I has serious problems getting Mountain Lion to work but El Capitan worked much easier (but still pain in arse troubleshooting).
I don't want to overstate it, but this is very hard to do if you are not computer savy. I was probably angry and frustrated for a solid week, and my problems began early on just trying to figure out how to create a proper boot and install USB stick. Even that is tricky and somewhat hard. Especially if you don't know Linux, terminal and in general how MAC OS's work with plist files, etc.. this stuff will just seem very Greek.
The best thing you can do is go to tonymacx86.com and research other people's installs as much as possible so you know exactly how to do the configuration and boot flags specific to the model or honestly you will slit your wrists trying to get it working.
Having said that, it's so rewarding that I can not express how giddy and happy I am to be running it on a powerful PC parts machine…. and I saved almost $4000 in my local currency which can be put to far better use than a machine that will just end up obsolete in 6 months.
To answer your question (which is also in the caution section I wrote in my long winded post #1) - it's not so much that hackintoshes require a specific model etc.. . it's that every board can more or less be made to work, but it becomes a lot of troubleshooting specific to the unique board when you are trying to do a simple install of the OSX. For example you will usually need to figure out which exact boot flags to use when doing an install so that the install doesn't fail. Before that you need specific settings in your bios, and if the board doesn't support UEFI then you might have to flash it, or figure out how to get a non-UEFI board to work.
Any component specific to the mother board like integrated sound, ethernet, and video will also have unique nuances which again may require you to specify boot flags just so that you can get the OSX to install. Worse, it can be different for a specific OSX version so in my case I has serious problems getting Mountain Lion to work but El Capitan worked much easier (but still pain in arse troubleshooting).
I don't want to overstate it, but this is very hard to do if you are not computer savy. I was probably angry and frustrated for a solid week, and my problems began early on just trying to figure out how to create a proper boot and install USB stick. Even that is tricky and somewhat hard. Especially if you don't know Linux, terminal and in general how MAC OS's work with plist files, etc.. this stuff will just seem very Greek.
The best thing you can do is go to tonymacx86.com and research other people's installs as much as possible so you know exactly how to do the configuration and boot flags specific to the model or honestly you will slit your wrists trying to get it working.
Having said that, it's so rewarding that I can not express how giddy and happy I am to be running it on a powerful PC parts machine…. and I saved almost $4000 in my local currency which can be put to far better use than a machine that will just end up obsolete in 6 months.
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Matt Gottshalk
Resident Preditor
Tagged. I may have to look into this.
starcentral
Veteran
Update: With same processor as I used i4790k, similar motherboard, and 2 AMD 280 graphics cards this user scored 17 seconds with the BruceX test.
http://www.tonymacx86.com/buying-ad...-z97x-motherboard-i7-4790k-4.html#post1213778
Note that each one of these cards is said to draw 250 watts, so 500 watts for GPU alone - my non AMD GPU system build scored 26 seconds which is slower on the FCPX editing side of things, but very fast for Davinci, and other GPU driven software, and 26 seconds is still much faster than others have scored with other non AMD builds so I think the parts I managed to pick (by luck) are pretty good.
http://www.tonymacx86.com/buying-ad...-z97x-motherboard-i7-4790k-4.html#post1213778
Note that each one of these cards is said to draw 250 watts, so 500 watts for GPU alone - my non AMD GPU system build scored 26 seconds which is slower on the FCPX editing side of things, but very fast for Davinci, and other GPU driven software, and 26 seconds is still much faster than others have scored with other non AMD builds so I think the parts I managed to pick (by luck) are pretty good.
TheTrickster
Well-known member
Well..done a bunch of reading and as much as it pains me to say, it looks like Im going to have go for a topped out iMac with the M395X GPU
Comments like:
Makes me wonder if I would start regretting the home build option, if it randomly started crashing. The 3 macs I use have been solid. But boy the homebuild is so tempting on a price point
Comments like:
Makes me wonder if I would start regretting the home build option, if it randomly started crashing. The 3 macs I use have been solid. But boy the homebuild is so tempting on a price point
starcentral
Veteran
These seem to be from guys who area all running dual 280x AMD cards (3 year old cards now) because they want higher BruceX scores for FCPX, that and they did an upgrade of the OSX which in general causes a lot of problems when running a hackintosh system. i.e. the same issue with setting very specific boot flags according to the hardware, also applies to different OSX versions, so doing what sounds like a "simple OS upgrade" is not at all simple in the end.
One user figured out from log files it was his GPU causing the crashes, again, 280x are old cards but these guys run them dually just to get some extra performance. It's not worth it in my opinion, just get a modern supported card and you won't run into as many problems.
My hackintosh build has been super stable with El Capitan, I'm using Davinci Resolve, After Effects and FCPX all without any issues whatsoever. I may never setup that windows partition in the end… who needs it! :happy:
One user figured out from log files it was his GPU causing the crashes, again, 280x are old cards but these guys run them dually just to get some extra performance. It's not worth it in my opinion, just get a modern supported card and you won't run into as many problems.
My hackintosh build has been super stable with El Capitan, I'm using Davinci Resolve, After Effects and FCPX all without any issues whatsoever. I may never setup that windows partition in the end… who needs it! :happy:
TheTrickster
Well-known member
But isn't that the nub of the problem for FCPX users. The 280X card is probably the 'fastest' card for FCPX at the moment for a hackintosh - the 300 series don't work yet (or I am wrong?) - so you are left using a NVIDIA card, and although you can get a system super stable on a 980Ti (for example) and be blazing with CUDA/Premier etc, you are left with average (iMac) level FCPX performance and one you can't apply updates to?
Trying to find a solution to keeping that extra $1000 in my wallet!!!
The big question... Are you making money with your computer system? If yes then you really should go for stability. If no then you can play around. I've played with the hackintosh stuff, never was able to get the system stable enough for my tastes. The approved hardware is pretty narrow and I guess I never had stuff that was close enough. The legality of running OSX on non-Apple hardware is still somewhat questionable (even if Apple turns a blind eye to it). If I feel I need a non-Windows OS, I'll turn to free and open source Linux and just settle on Resolve, Lightworks, Blender, and Ardour for anything video and audio I need to get done.
starcentral
Veteran
@TheTrickster
I'm not too sure about the newest supported AMD card, but if you look at benchmarks I think BruceX number 50 or higher were considered "bad".
Now I can get 27 with Nvidia card where the dual 280x card people get 17… I think that is a reasonable compromise. These systems will fly through 4K footage so long as your hard drives are fast.
I guess do some more research, see what others are saying.
@Greg_E
Just my opinion, but if these guys were genuinely after stability, they wouldn't run 3 year old cards on the latest OSX, or be trying to shave 10 seconds off a benchmark. There are lots of ways to get a stable system running but sorry to hear it didn't work out for you.
All the known compatible boards and other parts are listed on tonymacx86.
I'm not too sure about the newest supported AMD card, but if you look at benchmarks I think BruceX number 50 or higher were considered "bad".
Now I can get 27 with Nvidia card where the dual 280x card people get 17… I think that is a reasonable compromise. These systems will fly through 4K footage so long as your hard drives are fast.
I guess do some more research, see what others are saying.
@Greg_E
Just my opinion, but if these guys were genuinely after stability, they wouldn't run 3 year old cards on the latest OSX, or be trying to shave 10 seconds off a benchmark. There are lots of ways to get a stable system running but sorry to hear it didn't work out for you.
All the known compatible boards and other parts are listed on tonymacx86.
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starcentral
Veteran
I read if you go for a nvidia titan card, then you are at around the same performance as dual 280x cards, but last time I checked a titan card was over $1000 and even higher. That's more than the rest of the parts cost.. yikes!
I've always had a certain amount of interest in hackintoshes, but never went ahead with building one. What really stopped me, was the idea that any time there is an update from Apple, the hackintosh is hosed, so your options are to stick with whatever OS point version and security updates you managed to get working on your hardware, or start all over again. Now - that is way WAY old information - back when hackintoshes were just starting after the Intel change. So my question is: is it still the case that you are limited to the exact hardware and OS version configuration and cannot update the software without major rebuilds/headaches, or is that all in the distant past, and you can update no sweat? That includes stuff like updates to FCPX and other apps.
starcentral
Veteran
I'm not exactly sure, small updates seem fine but big OS version update can cause you to have to do new configurations. Im not expert on it yet.
So far many mac running great, no issues.
So far many mac running great, no issues.
starcentral
Veteran
This weekend got my NEW AVID Artist Color surface panel working no problem with my build and Davinci Resolve 12. Running EUControl 3.3.2.
:happy:
:happy:
starcentral
Veteran
new benchmark score added to post #2 with others:
Novabench score: 1529
Novabench score: 1529
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Walter Hergt
Active member
Just noting earlier discussion of graphics cards and if anyone is considering a Hack build, wait until Sierra is fully released. Likely driver support for Pascal and the new 480X, which by all accounts, is a great performing card for a fraction of a Titan.
starcentral
Veteran
Update:
Running El capitan (10.11) for almost 2 years now has been fun but in the last week I've taken a new and empty SSD and performed an install of Sierra (10.12) on the same PC hardware as mentioned in post #1 of this thread. I've documented my steps in my guide here on tonymacx86 https://www.tonymacx86.com/threads/...k-gtx960-sc-e2200-ac1150.242977/#post-1669592
Unknown to me back then but the 4790K (also code named the "Devil's Canyon") gives the newer generation Intel chips a serious run for their money. The i7-4790k rivals many of the new processors on the market and in some cases at a fraction of the cost. If anyone is looking for either a powerful PC or PC to hack into a macintosh I can't recommend this CPU enough. It's LGA1150 socket and there are plenty of those older boards around for decent prices. A real interesting board I did not know about back then is the GA-z97-HD3 which features Thunderbolt v3. It would be a better choice then the board I am using for the thunderbolt port alone.
In other hacking news, my macbook pro late 2011 is pretty much fried so now I'm also looking at hacking a windows laptop to run OSX as well. Still researching.
Running El capitan (10.11) for almost 2 years now has been fun but in the last week I've taken a new and empty SSD and performed an install of Sierra (10.12) on the same PC hardware as mentioned in post #1 of this thread. I've documented my steps in my guide here on tonymacx86 https://www.tonymacx86.com/threads/...k-gtx960-sc-e2200-ac1150.242977/#post-1669592
Unknown to me back then but the 4790K (also code named the "Devil's Canyon") gives the newer generation Intel chips a serious run for their money. The i7-4790k rivals many of the new processors on the market and in some cases at a fraction of the cost. If anyone is looking for either a powerful PC or PC to hack into a macintosh I can't recommend this CPU enough. It's LGA1150 socket and there are plenty of those older boards around for decent prices. A real interesting board I did not know about back then is the GA-z97-HD3 which features Thunderbolt v3. It would be a better choice then the board I am using for the thunderbolt port alone.
In other hacking news, my macbook pro late 2011 is pretty much fried so now I'm also looking at hacking a windows laptop to run OSX as well. Still researching.
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AndreeOnline
Veteran
Cool that you've been able to maintain a stable build for so long—it seems to have worked well for you!
I also used to build PCs back in the day but at some point I moved to Mac. I might build a PC again, but I really wish Microsoft did a truly professional OS, or rather: a production OS that removed everything that isn't needed in a production machine. I think a slim Windows that removed all tied in consumer services would sell well.
Anyway, in the spirit of "being happy with the computer", I'm posting the following image. 8 years—and will easily run for a few more if I let it:
GeekBench Multicore: 24.753
LuxMark: 24.307
While there are faster computers around for sure, I do feel those numbers are still current 2018. And that, in itself, is truly amazing to me so many years later.
I also used to build PCs back in the day but at some point I moved to Mac. I might build a PC again, but I really wish Microsoft did a truly professional OS, or rather: a production OS that removed everything that isn't needed in a production machine. I think a slim Windows that removed all tied in consumer services would sell well.
Anyway, in the spirit of "being happy with the computer", I'm posting the following image. 8 years—and will easily run for a few more if I let it:
GeekBench Multicore: 24.753
LuxMark: 24.307
While there are faster computers around for sure, I do feel those numbers are still current 2018. And that, in itself, is truly amazing to me so many years later.
starcentral
Veteran
Yes thanks, I've managed to do a lot of grading jobs in DaVinci with my hackintosh and never had a single issue. I've filled & crashed the GPU a few times trying NR on 4K footage along with some additional filters, but that's the fault of my 960 card. I'd have to move up into something higher, perhaps even a dual setup.
That's a nice machine Andre, your tests are impressive indeed.
I wish I could run a 64 bit test but I only have the demo/free version of GeekBench. Another interesting test you can run is novobench. My score is above.
I agree with you about Windows. More CPU, more memory, faster disks - and most of that goes towards keeping up with the OS. Ridiculous.
That's a nice machine Andre, your tests are impressive indeed.
I wish I could run a 64 bit test but I only have the demo/free version of GeekBench. Another interesting test you can run is novobench. My score is above.
I agree with you about Windows. More CPU, more memory, faster disks - and most of that goes towards keeping up with the OS. Ridiculous.
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That is not true of Windows 10, it runs well on significantly low end hardware, something 7 or 8 never did very well. A clean install from a Microsoft disk doesn't have a lot of bloat, if you are building the machine and buying the OS it will be nice and clean without all the third party junk. But I didn't get too much junk on my Gigabyte laptop, not like buying an Acer which will be full of junk.
Just thought it was worth adding this info.
And if you want really clean, Resolve does run on Linux.
Just thought it was worth adding this info.
And if you want really clean, Resolve does run on Linux.