Building a Hackintosh

[Griffolion]

Hi all,

I personally am not part of the dark side, however my friend is.

He is totally sold out to Apple, but for the first time in four years, he's decided to take me up on an offer for me to show him that i can build him an equivalent or better Mac (the tower) for significantly cheaper.

This is a very novel venture for me and i have heard that the Mac OS software does not gel with the potential billions of hardware combinations as nicely as Windows does. Therefore, before picking my parts, i want to get any advice about what to go for and what to avoid in terms of hardware.

For the sake of argument, we decided to go for the bottom rung single CPU quad core Mac coming in at just over £2000. For the Mac towers, they use Xeons and what i assume to be server grade RAM (ECC Registered) so i just need to keep that in mind.

I estimate that i could do this for about £1200 at most, but advice on what brands/parts to go for that will gel with Mac OS is much appreciated.

I would just like to point out, the build i will give to him is entirely theoretical, we may or may not go ahead with this depending on how wise with his money he's feeling.

Thanks a lot

PS - If i am in the wrong forum, please direct me to the correct one!

 

[hunter315]

I would suggest basing it more around what you find inside an iMac with the graphics card of a mac pro, iMacs use mid/high end stuff compared to the Mac Pro which uses workstation class boards and memory which makes it cost quite a bit more.

The iMacs use i3s, i5s, and i7s so they will be easier to replicate on the hardware side. Im not sure who's boards apple uses, but im sure someone else does.

 

[Griffolion]

Best answer selected by Griffolion.

 

[Griffolion]

Thanks very much. I'm sure the Intel platform won't give much trouble but every motherboard vendor is slightly different in the end, i've heard Gigabyte boards are stable but they don't do any workstation class boards (which is needed for ECC RAM) unfortunately!

But thank you for your advice.

 

[ashertech]

I realize you are trying to do this with a desktop. I am trying to do something similar with a netbook and set up a Dual Boot system. Everything I've read says the netbook I picked out and have on hand should work but I don't know what to do next.

I am setting this up for my teenage daughter. The hardware I've picked out is a MSI U-100 netbook 10.1" upgraded with 2 GB RAM, 320 GB Hard Drive, 9 Cell Battery, and Windows 7 Home Premium 32 Bit. Now what do I do next to make this a Hackintosh system? Which version of OSX do I want to get? Leopard or Snow Leopard and version number? Where do I begin?

 

[mr_sausage]

I am also presently making a Hackintosh and have spent the last couple of weeks trying to get my PC to run OS X.

When I brought the hardware components, I foolishly thought that if I brought components that are in the present build Mac's then I shouldn't have too much trouble with getting the thing to work.

I was mistaken, as although the Graphics card I brought was included in one of the present iMac models, i didn't realise that each manufacturers version of the same card would need different drivers and when I plugged everything in and tried to install the software given that would make the system boot without the aid of a special bootloader (iboot) my mac would not boot.

Therefore, before buying the components, I would recommend a trip to www.tonymacx86.com/
as this probably one of the best sources of information on how to create a good Hackintosh.

The people behind the site are generally really helpful and have spent a great deal of time producing software to help people create their own Hackintosh.
There is also a really good forum that has many members that are happy to help by offering advice.

Generally speaking with regards to Hardware compatibilty, some hardware works better than others and some hardware needs to be tailored for in the OS.

A number of Gigabyte Motherboards are considered to be the most suitable boards to use, and several of users have created or adapted drivers specifically for these boards, which they offer to new Hackintosh creators in order to help them make their Hackintosh's work without the hard work that they put in.

Some models of Gigabyte Motherboards are more popular than others and some have had their support more developed than others.

As for CPU's. Generally, Intel i series chips seem to be the most popular. However, I would again recommend that you choose the same model as one that is used in a Apple line mac, as this will enable the Operating System to identify the CPU without too much trouble.
I believe that it is possible to fit other CPU's. however, the Operating System may not be able to work out what the CPU is exactly. I am not sure as to how much this will effect the stability of the system.
I personally brought an i3 550 CPU which isn't used in any model of Apple Mac, however, I choose it as it offered good value for money in its price range.

I think that if I had known that OS X works better with the specific models of CPU, I would have chosen a different CPU. I now know for the next one I make.

As for Graphics Card, most Nvidia cards seem to work with less adjustment than others.
As I said earlier, I brought a graphics card that I thought would work out of the box due to it being included in the present build of iMac's.
I was wrong. I brought an xfx radeon 5750 single slot. This card did not work out of the box with OS X, and requires some techincal tinkering to be done to several aspects of the Operating System before it will function properly and allow OS to boot up normally.

Because I am not experienced in programming or hackintosh building, I decided to buy another cheap Nvidia Graphics card, one that I know works straight out of the box.
This is mainly because I want to use the Mac for music, and do not require any thing too exotic with regards to multi screen, faster rendering etc.

This card should fix the problems I was having with the other graphics card and I will probably use the other card in another PC used for a media server, or retry to get it working with my hackintosh at a later date, once I have everything else working.

I think your budget for a hackingtosh sounds pretty reasonable.
If anything, you may even be able to reduce this amount to even less.

I recently went through the tonymacx86 recommended hardware list and priced up the main component parts.
I calculated that it was possible to make a basic Hackintosh for about £250 plus tax. Using prices from a UK retailer.

Now, if you want to add more powerful hardware and a more asthetically pleasing enclosure, then the price will rise. However, I imagine the price will still be a lot less than a real mac.

Anyway, for a more detailed view of the Hackintosh genre and compatible hardware, checkout the link below:

http://www.tonymacx86.com/wiki/index.php?title=Category:Hardware

If you want more information with regards to hackintosh compatibility, then go see tonymacx86.com/
Otherwise, good luck.
Cheers

 

[mr_sausage]

I realize you are trying to do this with a desktop. I am trying to do something similar with a netbook and set up a Dual Boot system. Everything I've read says the netbook I picked out and have on hand should work but I don't know what to do next.

I am setting this up for my teenage daughter. The hardware I've picked out is a MSI U-100 netbook 10.1" upgraded with 2 GB RAM, 320 GB Hard Drive, 9 Cell Battery, and Windows 7 Home Premium 32 Bit. Now what do I do next to make this a Hackintosh system? Which version of OSX do I want to get? Leopard or Snow Leopard and version number? Where do I begin?

Go check www.tonymacx86.com and his wiki pages, these will give you good directions in order for you to achieve your directions.
Cheers

 

[mr_sausage]

PS> Get the latest version of Snow Leopard. 10.6.6
Has to be official copy.
Then go to the www.tonymacx86.com and the wiki site link and read lots,
download iboot, multibeast.
And follow the forum instructions. Ask the people on the forum if you need advice.
Some of them are really nice.

 

[mr_sausage]

http://www.nvidia.com/page/apple.html
http://store.apple.com/us/browse/home/shop_mac/mac_accessories/displays?n=graphic_cards&mco=MTM3ODkxMDQ&s=topSellers

2 links to graphics cards made for OS X.