
Building my $1,200 Hackintosh - flyosity
https://medium.com/@flyosity/building-my-1-200-hackintosh-49a1a186241e#.nkj8h04zt
======
chx
The i7-6700k is an utter waste of money, just get the non-K version. There is
so little to be gained by overclocking a Skylake CPU, there's just no point.
Overclocking Sandy Bridge CPUs made sense, the i7 2600k went from 3.4GHz to
5GHz often, 5.1GHz wasn't unheard of -- 50% gain in CPU frequency does
translate to measurable and feelable (is that a word?) gain. But the i7-6700k
can go to about 4.8GHz -- 20% tops but of course the CPU can turbo itself to
4.2GHz in many tasks so 14% typically. Now you are entering pointless
territory, your real world gains will be vanishingly small.

An all-in-one liquid cooler will always be noisier than quality air cooling,
for example the Noctua NH-D14. Especially in a great case like that. You'd
need to build a very costly loop to have a quiet one and these days CPUs have
dropped their TDP so much that there's absolutely no reason to liquid cool
them. When you CrossFire/SLI and especially triple CF/SLI top video cards only
then you need to begin to think because there's so little space between the
cards for air to move. EKWB have special parts to help with watercooling such
setups.

~~~
kalleboo
> feelable (is that a word?)

tangible

~~~
GrumpyYoungMan
I think "perceptible" would be closer to the desired meaning.

------
toomanybeersies
Personally, I've never seen the appeal of Hackintoshes.

The primary reason for using a Mac is that you get a unix-like environment,
which works without having to piss around with drivers and compatibility.
Macbooks also have the advantage of having very nice design and battery life.

A hackintosh takes away the only advantage macOS has over Linux, in my
opinion. You now have the same OS, which is more closed and harder to change
to suit your needs than Linux, and you will have the same driver problems that
Linux users face.

~~~
cocotino
OS X is so much more stable than any other Linux desktop I've ever used. Also,
apps are much better. Then there's the better design, proper QA, etc.

If you're lucky you won't have driver problems so that might not be an issue
for you.

~~~
rbanffy
> OS X is so much more stable than any other Linux desktop I've ever used

> I agree that OS X is way more stable than Ubuntu, Fedora and any of their
> derivatives

You guys are doing something seriously wrong. I've been using Debian, Ubuntu
CentOS and Fedora for years with no issue whatsoever, from puny Celeron-based
laptops to multi-socket Xeon boxes.

I love my Macs, but to say they are in any way more stable than the Linux
machines is indicative of something odd. To me, the biggest advantage of the
Mac is being able to run iTunes and sync my phone.

~~~
guitarbill
On headless servers, yeah Linux is king. From our helpdesk stats at $work, OS
X is stabler than Linux for (developer) laptops/desktops. The graphics
drivers, while better than they used to be still suck. Apt-get still breaks
stuff.

Taking into account the larger number of tickets from Linux machines plus not
having a single vendor for hardware + software means it can actually be
cheaper to support Apple MacBooks vs. Thinkpads + RHEL (not to mention that
most of the devs don't want to use RHEL).

~~~
rbanffy
I really don't know what you are doing, but I can tell you apt hasn't broken
anything here since the mid-2000's and all machines in my office are multi-
headed and all of them use their GPUs. Even the laptops connect to big
monitors when used on the desk.

Graphics card drivers are reasonable these days, even though manufacturers
still tend to drag their feet. You have to understand these are computers, not
gaming consoles. If I wanted to play games, I'd buy a Playstation.

Few developers want to use RHEL as their desktops, but that's what VMs and
containers are for. My Mac development relies on VMs running Linux.

~~~
guitarbill
I suspect it's highly hardware dependant. Most of the time laptops are made to
run Windows or Mac OS, and Linux is an afterthought. So to me it's a miracle
that it even works.

But quite frankly, half of the problem is people telling others that it's
somehow their fault when it doesn't work. It's not, e.g. NVIDIA Optimus [0]
[1]. There are even jokes about ACPI support on Linux [2]. It only takes a few
bad experiences for people to shy away from a platform, which is a shame.

[0] [http://www.thelinuxrain.com/articles/the-state-of-nvidia-
opt...](http://www.thelinuxrain.com/articles/the-state-of-nvidia-optimus-on-
linux) [1]
[https://wiki.archlinux.org/index.php/NVIDIA_Optimus](https://wiki.archlinux.org/index.php/NVIDIA_Optimus)
[2]
[https://twitter.com/sadserver/status/721134795938357248](https://twitter.com/sadserver/status/721134795938357248)

------
grecy
I ran a hackintosh for a few years - a Dell Mini 9. At the time, it was the
most compatible mini laptop that would run OS X, and still maybe is one of the
best of all time.

It was great, I loved it and used it every single day for years.

That being said, the longer I owned it, the more I realized it's shortcomings.
Sometimes it wouldn't wake from sleep. It's trackpad was crap. The keyboard
keys had a crappy feel. I couldn't update OS X. Ironically a friend tripped
over the power cord, pulling it onto concrete and smashing the screen - if I
had a real Apple laptop the magsafe connector would have saved it. (though I
replaced it for $35)

After years of use, that hackintosh taught me one thing - I really wanted a
genuine Apple laptop, so I went and bought my first one - a 2012 MBA, which
I'm using right now.

Hacktoshes are close, but not the real thing.

~~~
tdkl
This ain't a laptop though and the shortcomings you're talking about aren't
apparent in usage of a desktop (except the update which author referred to).

Stating your hackintosh and this hackintosh as the same isn't fair.

~~~
grecy
Actually, I think it's an excellent comparison.

The part that makes OSX and Apple in general so good is that it just works. It
really does. It never crashes, never locks up and works year after year.

A hackintosh does not do that, and is only a close second.

------
tdkl
> By the way, Apple charges $1,200 to configure a Mac Pro with 64GB of RAM,
> and those are slower DDR3 sticks. That’s almost as much as this entire
> system.

This should be somewhere near the top of the article.

While I respect Apple for their stance on privacy, this side disgusts me. I
understand profits, but this is pure greed.

~~~
yuhong
Yea, Apple memory is often overpriced. Today, you can buy 128GB based on quad
rank 32GB DDR3 RDIMMs from for example OWC for a similar price for example.
And the Mac Pro is now outdated too (Xeon E5 v2) which is why it is using
DDR3.

------
marmaladedukes
The driver installation & building these now is infinitely easier since Clover
became the default method of installation. When I built mine a year ago, I
wouldnt have recommended it. BTW, I got iMessage working, and the process
wasn't too shady :). Great tutorial! Also, think about switching to Clover
ASAP, updates from the App Store work flawlessly.

------
rcarmo
I've been considering building a hackintosh again given the anemic status of
Apple's desktops (the current Mini is lousy value for money). Only thing
really stopping me is the rather bulky form factor (my current mini fits
snugly under the shelf that holds my monitors).

All in all, things are vastly improved these days. Apple tends to use more
off-the-shelf hardware, which means there's a lot less hacking going on if you
hand-pick components (like a few others here, I ran OS X on a Dell Mini 9, but
I also did that on Toshiba laptops, Dell desktops and a number of 'near-Macs'
which had compatible motherboards and video cards). You can keep such a
machine stable for years if you know what you're doing, but yes, things can go
spectacularly wrong.

Then again, considering that I mostly did nuke & pave upgrades of most of my
Linux machines due to accumulation of various kinds of cruft, a couple of
those hacks were probably easier to maintain.

~~~
arthurfm
> Only thing really stopping me is the rather bulky form factor (my current
> mini fits snugly under the shelf that holds my monitors).

Problem solved...

[http://snazzylabs.com/article/skylake-mac-mini-
hackintosh/](http://snazzylabs.com/article/skylake-mac-mini-hackintosh/)

~~~
rcarmo
Yeah, well, no. My friends sent me that very same link (and the YouTube video
of the build), but that box doesn't fit under the shelf by an inch.

~~~
throwanem
Have you considered adjusting the height of the shelf? It seems like a curious
thing to optimize for when deciding which computer to use.

~~~
rcarmo
I use an IKEA wall shelf to lift my monitors off my desk. The thing has just
enough clearance to have the Mini under it and an inch and a half clear above
it for airflow, and was a pain to place at the right height at the time
(concrete walls).

~~~
throwanem
Maybe you could use something like the rail-and-cantilever shelving scheme you
find in a lot of stores. That way, you only have to install it once and the
height is easy to adjust thereafter.

------
jkot
My 2600k died recently after 5 years @ 5 GHz.

I think Intel desktop CPUs are overpriced and do not offer some important
features (ECC). Haswell Xeons are pretty cheap, only downside is lack of NVMe
and higher electricity bill.

I will probably go with this:

\- 2 x 12 core Xeon based on Haswell

\- dual CPU motherboard

\- 256GB ECC DDR2 RAM

~~~
dogma1138
Some desktop CPU's do support ECC
[http://ark.intel.com/search/advanced?ECCMemory=true&MarketSe...](http://ark.intel.com/search/advanced?ECCMemory=true&MarketSegment=DT)
But good luck finding a motherboard for that socket that supports ECC memory.

That said entry level Xeons are not that expensive an E3-1220 v5 costs 200$...

But if you are going for your machine it doesn't look like money is an issue.
But that said if you need that much computing power why even bother building a
machine? You can get used rackmount servers on the cheap these days, and if
you live near a place that does foreclosure auctions you can get them
ridiculously cheaply even if they are new in box.

Here is a server with 2 x 8 core CPU's and 192GB RAM for 1200$ and with B/O
you can probably get it closer to 1000....
[http://www.ebay.com/itm/Supermicro-2-x-E5-2670-CPU-192GB-
RAM...](http://www.ebay.com/itm/Supermicro-2-x-E5-2670-CPU-192GB-RAM-X9DRI-
LNF4-CSE-815-1U-server-r620-gen8-/291768459602?hash=item43eec16152:g:Q8MAAOSwrb5XPhsZ)

If you don't want to stick it in a closet then a 10-15U rack is also 100-150$.

And just remote to the server from anywhere you want....

~~~
jkot
I already have an old rack server. It is very noisy, heavy and does not fit
some graphic cards. I need normal desktop with quiet fans, multiple displays.
Mainly for programming but I might play some game as well.

~~~
dogma1138
What programming do you do that you need 256GB? There are plenty of server
that fit GPU's get a 4U server and it's fine.

The fans can easily be sorted out either replaced or undervolted....

------
smegel
Looks like a NeXT workstation.

[http://www.cs.cornell.edu/wya/AcademicComputing/images/next....](http://www.cs.cornell.edu/wya/AcademicComputing/images/next.jpg)

------
mcv
It seems to be mostly focused on building a desktop or buying a ready-made
laptop. What I'm actually hoping for is the ability to upgrade my old 2011
Macbook Pro. I don't think Apple is ever going to make a Macbook that good,
but I'd really like some more memory and a more powerful processor. I suspect
that means a new motherboard.

Is there such a thing as a mobile, macbook-compatible motherboard that you can
buy? Or is that a really ridiculous thing to ask? I rather suspect the latter
actually.

------
rbanffy
I can imagine the thrill of building the coolest Hackintosh ever, with, say, a
quad E7 and a terabyte of ram attached to a quad 5K screen arrangement, but it
quickly loses appeal when you need a Mac to actually get things done.

Let's say having the ability to run Mac software enables you to increase your
monthly revenue by $5K (and that is a _very_ generous overestimation), how
much of your time is worth assembling and fixing your own versus buying a
reasonable iMac or a MacPro?

~~~
Svenskunganka
Unless you're building apps for iOS or designing things in
Photoshop/Illustrator, any form of computer running Linux will do. Bash on
Windows might also become a thing once it gets stable, at which point you can
choose any form of hardware you want because Windows supports literally
everything.

I'm curious why you need a Mac to get things done? Unless your work involves
iOS development or a lot of Photoshopping, a standard Ubuntu Desktop
installation should do just fine.

~~~
tdy721
"Bash on Windows might also become a thing" \- I've been dreaming about this
for months. It really looks like a huge threat to Apple: Creative Cloud, BASH,
and I don't have to piss around with Bootcamp when I want to play _that_ game.

~~~
rbanffy
Cygwin has been there since ever (since, at least, Windows 2000) and it
provides a very reasonable unix-like environment on top of Windows. This
Ubuntu on Windows play may be faster and more efficient (and, with apt, more
convenient) but that's it. It doesn't make possible something that wasn't
before.

------
lewisl9029
I really wish Apple would relax the restrictions on where you can install
macOS. I understand that they don't want to commit the resources to support
running macOS on any arbitrary number of hardware combinations out there today
for physical machines, but as far as I can tell, there doesn't seem to be any
technical grounds for restricting its use in VMs outside of macOS hosts
(please correct me if I'm mistaken).

~~~
thomasfl
If apple would allow hackintosh, then they would probably face competition
from companies producing hackintosh laptops. It would be like rolex started
allowing fake watches.

~~~
Keyframe
We do have a precedent
[https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Macintosh_clone](https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Macintosh_clone)
Radius machines were great!

~~~
rdsnsca
And tha clones almost killed Apple, which is why it was the first thing Steve
Jobs killed after his return to Apple.

~~~
Keyframe
Clones weren't the ones that almost killed Apple. Apple was the one that
almost killed Apple. Ran itself into a ground by a guy whose previous
experience was selling flavoured sugar water.

------
labrador
I didn't have the right hardware for a Hacintosh but I needed to do some
testing. I followed these instructions to run El Capitan on Virtualbox. By
giving it 4 cpus, I was able to get reasonable performance.

[http://techsviewer.com/how-to-install-mac-os-x-el-capitan-
on...](http://techsviewer.com/how-to-install-mac-os-x-el-capitan-on-pc-on-
virtualbox/)

------
Keyframe
I wonder how/if usb 3.x works and if has thunderbolt?

------
jomamaxx
Fuggin eh.

This is 'king maker' stuff.

Love it.

------
aavotins
You do realize that you are breaking the license terms of Apple by installing
OS X on non-Apple hardware, right? What the author did is a nice read and a
cool tech gig, but it's illegal.

I have thought about building a Hackintosh multiple times over, but the
continuity (I'm not referring to the marketing term of one specific feature)
is something that most Hackintosh builds lack. In the end I realized that if I
want a Hackintosh, I want it to be the same as a real Mac. If not, I can just
stick with Linux and not be constrained in any way.

edit: I am being downvoted for pointing out a blatant license terms violation?
Really?

~~~
biot
It's an excellent point, but people don't tend to care about pirating software
(and writing articles admitting to such) or license terms, except when it's a
company like BMW distributing GPL software... then the pitchforks come out.

I'm actually curious what the minimum viable Apple hardware one needs to
legitimately follow Apple's license. Is it the motherboard? The case? A few
custom chips? What if you could purchase just thoes parts (eg: as repair
parts) in order to be fully license compliant, then build your Mac up around
those? You would get to be legit and you're also able to customize all the
license agnostic parts to obtain whatever specs you're after.

