Hackintosh Pros and Cons

I'm a Macbook user considering building a hackintosh for the following reasons:

1. Cost - I'm hoping I can save considerably vs. buying a iMac from Apple.
2. Future upgrades - I'll have the option to upgrade components vs. buying a new rig.

My concerns though and the risks I see are:

1. The possibility that Apple will disable the hackintosh through some future update.
2. Difficulty in keeping the system up to date due to the above.

My thinking is that as long as the cost savings is considerable, it's worth taking the risk - particularly once Mavericks is out and is shown to continue working with Hackintoshs.

With this in mind, I did a cost comparison between the CustoMac Pro build @ http://www.tonymacx86.com/384-building-customac-buyer-s-guide-september-2013.html and 27" iMac configuration @ http://store.apple.com/us/configure/ME089LL/A?.

My spreadsheet showing the numbers is here:
https://docs.google.com/spreadsheet/ccc?key=0An7rI9K15nA4dE5LNXN3QWlWcllOV2wxdlhNNTQ5UGc&usp=sharing

I was surprised to see the savings is only $300 -- and this excludes the wifi support and a similar but not exact GPU.

My question is -- would you expect to save more than $300 to build a system equivalent to an iMac? If so, where did I go wrong?

Thanks for any help,

Brooks

brooksc said:

I'm a Macbook user considering building a hackintosh for the following reasons:

1. Cost - I'm hoping I can save considerably vs. buying a iMac from Apple.
2. Future upgrades - I'll have the option to upgrade components vs. buying a new rig.

My concerns though and the risks I see are:

1. The possibility that Apple will disable the hackintosh through some future update.
2. Difficulty in keeping the system up to date due to the above.

My thinking is that as long as the cost savings is considerable, it's worth taking the risk - particularly once Mavericks is out and is shown to continue working with Hackintoshs.

With this in mind, I did a cost comparison between the CustoMac Pro build @ http://www.tonymacx86.com/384-building-customac-buyer-s-guide-september-2013.html and 27" iMac configuration @ http://store.apple.com/us/configure/ME089LL/A?.

My spreadsheet showing the numbers is here:
https://docs.google.com/spreadsheet/ccc?key=0An7rI9K15nA4dE5LNXN3QWlWcllOV2wxdlhNNTQ5UGc&usp=sharing

I was surprised to see the savings is only $300 -- and this excludes the wifi support and a similar but not exact GPU.

My question is -- would you expect to save more than $300 to build a system equivalent to an iMac? If so, where did I go wrong?

Thanks for any help,

Brooks

Click to expand...

There is a difference in performance of the GTX760 and the 775M card in the iMac. Mobile parts
like that card usually don't perform at the level of a desktop GPU and the ability to cool the card is much
better with a GTX760 than the 775m. So if you will be gaming, photo and video editing the CustoMac pro
is a better choice just by the graphics advantage. You can also always add more fans to a PC case
if you need better cooling. The iMac is a great system and an incredible value. Which is better for you
mainly depends on how you'll be using your computer. You can also easily over clock the 4670K in a
CustoMac with the GB motherboard. If you use windows you can run it from a separate HDD or SSD
and get great performance with that as well. So my vote would be for the CustoMac although it's very
close as to which is the better value.