Just built first Hackintosh!

[Don Vito Corleone]

So I have lately been wanting a desktop computer (I have been using my 13" MacBook Pro and its predecessor laptops for about 7 years), sparked partly by how deficient my MBP is for Diablo 3. I really prefer OSX as at least an option, so I did some research into building a Hackintosh and concluded I might as well get a Hackintosh-capable system. I bought the parts this week on Amazon and assembled it yesterday.

What a pleasure it has been to build and enjoy this machine! It's very fun to have a nice PC (I haven't used a PC at home for years), and it's also by far the best Mac I've ever used. Everything works smoothly and there are only the slightest indications in use that it isn't a full-blown Mac (obviously in booting it shows the BIOS splash screen, and I am using a wireless N adaptor that works great in Lion, but it requires using the manufacturer's software rather than built-in Mac drivers). For some reason I am getting very poor wifi performance both in Mac and PC - will have to figure that out.

My build is as follows:

Corsair Carbide 400R case
Corsair TX750 power supply
Corsair H100 hydro CPU cooler
Gigabyte GA-Z68XP-UD3 mobo
Intel i7-2700k CPU (seems to run all day long at 4.5GHz without a hiccup on the H100)
16 GB Corsair Vengeance DDR3 SDRAM
XFX Radeon HD 6870 2GB video card
Seagate Momentus XT 500GB HD (OSX Lion)
Seagate Barracuda 1TB HD (Windows 7 Pro)
Sony DVD-RW
Edimax EW-7811Un wi-fi adaptor
Old Logitech cordless keyboard/mouse
Old Klipsch Promedia 4.1 speakers

I am using a mediocre old Samsung 204b monitor, and am toying with getting an Apple Cinema Display with, if necessary, a second XFX 6870 for Crossfire. Also weighing getting a small MSATA drive to use Smart Response Technology, as well as mouse/keyboard options.

 

[Nizzzlle]

Awesome man! I've always wanted to build a hackintosh specific machine for Xcode but I've never gotten around to it (suck with using a ~2011 MBP), do you have the tutorials and resources that you used by any chance?

 

[SKORPI0]

do you have the tutorials and resources that you used by any chance?

Probably used this as a guide based on OP mobo. Gigabyte mobos are probably one of the easiest to install OS X.

Gigabyte GA-Z68X-UD5-B3 perfect Lion install / also Fermi

Another popular source to install Lion (Intel based mobos)

http://tonymacx86.com/viewforum.php?f=169
http://forum.osxlatitude.com/index.php?/forum/19-intel/

 

[Miramonti]

I don't know about the a hackintosh, but rock on for 1600x1200.

 

[Don Vito Corleone]

Awesome man! I've always wanted to build a hackintosh specific machine for Xcode but I've never gotten around to it (suck with using a ~2011 MBP), do you have the tutorials and resources that you used by any chance?

I used unibeast, at http://tonymacx86.blogspot.com/2011/10/unibeast-install-mac-os-x-lion-using.html, and a custom DSDT file for my motherboard, from the same site. This installed the Chimera bootloader, which is fantastic - when you boot it puts up a friendly Mac-looking OS load screen - it defaults to starting the Lion drive but you can hit a key to interrupt and it brings up a screen where you choose between Lion and Windows 7.

I actually built a slight variation on his recommended high-end build, at http://tonymacx86.blogspot.com/search/label/CustoMac. I think it's a great setup - really I wouldn't have done much differently if I'd been building it as a PC only (I would probably have sprung for a higher-end video card). It seems the Gigabyte motherboards are just the easiest to get going, and the Z68 one has a nice feature set for the money IMO.

Yesterday I Paypaled a donation to the tonymacx86 people because I was so pleased with their software and assistance - it basically worked perfectly on the first try, with no issues. VERY impressive.

 

[mmntech]

Been awhile since I did a hackintosh setup. Last one was running Tiger briefly on an AMD setup. Had it on my venerable ASRock 939Dual-Sata2. Everything worked except sound and ethernet.

I've been mulling over making a budget HTPC build. Was going to run Linux but maybe it's time for a stab at a hackintosh again. Any parts recommendations?

 

[Nizzzlle]

I used unibeast, at http://tonymacx86.blogspot.com/2011/10/unibeast-install-mac-os-x-lion-using.html, and a custom DSDT file for my motherboard, from the same site. This installed the Chimera bootloader, which is fantastic - when you boot it puts up a friendly Mac-looking OS load screen - it defaults to starting the Lion drive but you can hit a key to interrupt and it brings up a screen where you choose between Lion and Windows 7.

I actually built a slight variation on his recommended high-end build, at http://tonymacx86.blogspot.com/search/label/CustoMac. I think it's a great setup - really I wouldn't have done much differently if I'd been building it as a PC only (I would probably have sprung for a higher-end video card). It seems the Gigabyte motherboards are just the easiest to get going, and the Z68 one has a nice feature set for the money IMO.

Yesterday I Paypaled a donation to the tonymacx86 people because I was so pleased with their software and assistance - it basically worked perfectly on the first try, with no issues. VERY impressive.

Thanks man, bookmarked for a future weekend project ^_^

 

[Don Vito Corleone]

Been awhile since I did a hackintosh setup. Last one was running Tiger briefly on an AMD setup. Had it on my venerable ASRock 939Dual-Sata2. Everything worked except sound and ethernet.

I've been mulling over making a budget HTPC build. Was going to run Linux but maybe it's time for a stab at a hackintosh again. Any parts recommendations?

Check out the parts recommendations at http://tonymacx86.blogspot.com/search/label/CustoMac.

 

[Zaap]

Nice system! Consider getting an SSD to use as a boot drive and to run critical software from.

I finally overhauled my own Hack that I'd been using for the past 4 years (with several motherboard, CPU and graphic card swaps since then). Similar to yours, just I went with the Z68X-UD3H-B3 board since I'd already built a bunch of systems for others with that board. This system kicks ass. Fastest machine I've ever owned. Boot up from the SSD is about 14 seconds.

One thing that gave me more trouble than any other component in just about any Hack I've ever built (and that list is LONG!) was the HD6870 card and dual monitors. (I have the 1GB version, dual DVI, HDMI and DisplayPort).

Whatever your future plans are for monitors, if I were you I'd brush up on Framebuffer personalities for that card. (If you haven't looked into this already, that is.) One monitor seemed to work fine, but nothing I was trying on my own would make it output to dual. And as it turned out, it wasn't fully enabled even on one monitor.

Basically, your About This Mac should read the full name of the card, IE: AMD Radeon HD 6870 Series). DVD player should work and not crash at launch. If ATM reads Radeon 6xxx Series -literally with the xxx's- then it's likely not fully enabled.

Anyway, long story short, I got it sorted by trying different Framebuffer personalities inserted into my Boot.plist file- a very easy fix, just required figuring out exactly which to use for my specific card.


This thread was invaluable for the list of all possible 6xxx series personalities:

http://www.tonymacx86.com/viewtopic.php?f=15&t=46392

(By the way, ignore the Graphics Enabler=No at the start of the lists, all of these are meant to work with GE=yes for full function.)

Finally, using the right framebuffer and a custom ATI6000 kext from this thread:

http://www.insanelymac.com/forum/index.php?showtopic=275546

My 6070 is now fully enabled. Dual monitors work on DVI 1 and HDMI, DVD player doesn't crash, Steam games work, and the ATM profile is correct. Just a heads up if you haven't already delved into this.

 

[Don Vito Corleone]

My video card seems to have been detected correctly, and shows up as a 6870. I am currently perplexed that the computer runs very fast as a PC, but not as a Mac. Geekbench has it at just south of 13K as a PC, but only about 6,100 as a Mac. Will have to research what's going on.

 

[Ns1]

marked, thanks

 

[Koing]

Sounds like a beast

Koing

 

[Zaap]

My video card seems to have been detected correctly, and shows up as a 6870. I am currently perplexed that the computer runs very fast as a PC, but not as a Mac. Geekbench has it at just south of 13K as a PC, but only about 6,100 as a Mac. Will have to research what's going on.

Glad your card is working right.

Something's definitely off with that Geekbench score. Mine is 12,700 and I have a slightly lesser CPU than you, and not overclocked. Of course that's also with an SSD. Is your hard drive a 6Gb/s drive, and plugged into the 6Gb/s SATA ports?

 

[Don Vito Corleone]

Glad your card is working right.

Something's definitely off with that Geekbench score. Mine is 12,700 and I have a slightly lesser CPU than you, and not overclocked. Of course that's also with an SSD. Is your hard drive a 6Gb/s drive, and plugged into the 6Gb/s SATA ports?

My Lion drive (Momentus XT) is a 3Gb/S drive, plugged into one of the 3Gb/S ports. The Windows 7 Barracuda is a 6 Gb/S which I have plugged into that port (honestly I haven't built an SATA system before and didn't know I had two different speed ports until you told me). I just re-ran Geekbench and I'm getting 6125 Mac, and 16171 PC, at the stock CPU speed. Weird. I may have to try drive options. Actually I just bought a 512GB Crucial M4 and I may make that my Hackintosh main drive and swap the Momentus XT back into my laptop.

 

[Don Vito Corleone]

Glad your card is working right.

Something's definitely off with that Geekbench score. Mine is 12,700 and I have a slightly lesser CPU than you, and not overclocked. Of course that's also with an SSD. Is your hard drive a 6Gb/s drive, and plugged into the 6Gb/s SATA ports?

Some guy on the tonymacx86 forum is saying this is a power management issue that will be resolved by using an SSD main drive. Not sure I see the connection, but it may be worth a try . . .

 

[Zaap]

Some guy on the tonymacx86 forum is saying this is a power management issue that will be resolved by using an SSD main drive. Not sure I see the connection, but it may be worth a try . . .

I don't get the power management connection either. But to my understanding a hard drive can definitely drag down a benchmark as it's usually the slowest component. That'd always be my guess. Definitely try another hard drive and see if the bench improves.

I don't put too much faith in Geekbench anyway- the scores vary all over the place for reasons I really don't understand and never seem very reliable. Mine is around the 8 core MacPro range which sounds about right to me. All I care about is Final Cut screams and my render times are practically nil. 3D performance is stellar, etc.