HP 8300 Elite w/ Intel i5-3470 Quad Core at Newegg

[trs96]

9-11-17 Newegg.com has a great deal on the 8300 Elite with a Core I5-3470 4GB of ram 500 GB HDD. $139.99 Shipped ! Sale is good through Sunday 9-17-17 - Remember that you will need a Sierra compatible graphics card too. See the guide below.

https://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16883287401&cm_re=8300_Intel_Core_i5_3.2-_-83-287-401-_-Product

6-14-17 Newly completed macOS Sierra Desktop Guide

As of 7-15-17 Current best price on the Elite 8300/3470/8GB SFF PC is $208 Win 10 Pro pre-installed.
https://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16883286536&cm_re=HP_Elite_8300_i5-3470-_-83-286-536-_-Product
Best Price on Amazon is $203
https://www.amazon.com/gp/product/B01CV9G1BO/?tag=tonymacx86com-20

The Mini-Tower version (CMT) is selling for $249 on Amazon.com If you want to game on this, get the Mini-Tower. It has a 320W power supply and can accomodate full height graphics cards that don't need 6 pin supplemental power. i.e. GTX 1050 Ti
https://www.amazon.com/dp/B01HSG2Q7I/?tag=tonymacx86com-20
Full 1 year hardware warranty. Add a GT 710, GTX 1050 or 1050 Ti and you've got a capable CustoMac for under $350.

The 6300 Pro Mini-Tower model has a GPU length limit of less than 7 inches. Otherwise there is heatsink interference. The EVGA 1050 Ti single fan models will fit with no problems.

​

Here's the the HP 8300 CMT on the far left (ATX size) the HP 6300 Pro is on the far right.
The 8300 CMT is 17.6 inches tall and weighs 24 pounds. Has a 320W ATX PSU.
The 6300 Pro is 14.9 inches tall and weighs 20 pounds. Has a 320W ATX PSU.

They're both made of thick, high quality steel. No flex in the side panels, very sturdy. Tool free design as well.

​

The 8300 SFF (2nd from the right) is the ideal size if you have limited space. Weighs about 16 pounds. 240W PSU.
Here's the Elite 8300 Small Form Factor Desktop with an Ivy Bridge I5-3470 CPU.
https://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=9SIA5965059422&ignorebbr=1

​

These cost $1270 new: http://www.officedepot.com/a/products/964211/HP-Business-Desktop-Elite-8300-Desktop/
Refrubished start at about $220 for the SFF versions. Have a 1 year hardware warranty and are professionally refurbished.
These ship with 8GB DDR3 ram and a 500GB HDD which has Windows Ten home installed.

5 reasons why you should purchase this specific model, the Elite 8300 (also applies to the HP 6300 Pro)

1. Ease of Installation
These make it very easy to install macOS Sierra for UEFI booting. Similar models like the Elite 8200 can't do this.
If you look back at the 13,2 iMac model from Late 2012-2013 it used the exact same CPU and a discrete GPU from Nvidia.
The AMI UEFI of this 8300 PC is the most macOS friendly one that you'll find. So when you add a compatible Nvidia card to this system it's nearly as easy as installing macOS Sierra on a "real" Mac.

2. Multiple Graphics Options
If you add a compatible graphics card, preferably Nvidia, you can have a dual boot system that can game in Windows and edit music and video in macOS. It's like getting two systems for half the price of one. These I5-3470 versions will require a low profile discrete graphics card to work with macOS. They have HD2500 graphics on chip. If you swap out the CPU for an I3-3245 or I7-3770(s) you could use HD4000 via the DisplayPort output on the rear panel.

3. Updates
Updating to a new version of macOS via the Mac App Store work flawlessly. Again, it works nearly as easily as updating a real Mac.

4. Parts
If you ever need any OEM replacement parts they can be found and purchased for a small amount of money on Ebay. Many millions of these are now off-lease so the supply of parts will never dry up in the next 5-7 years.

5. Working HDMI and Analog Audio
HDMI audio works after the install of a single VoodooHDA kext and the HDA disabler kext, when you have a compatible graphics card
See: https://www.tonymacx86.com/threads/...ff-i7-3770-gt-630.199712/page-43#post-1525171

To see what an install of Sierra on this hardware would entail read the full 6300/8300 install guide:
https://www.tonymacx86.com/threads/...cos-sierra-i5-3470-gt640.224812/#post-1526635

For a mid tower gaming rig that can accommodate a better full height graphics card. HP 6300 MT ($215 mini-tower)

https://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=9SIAAJ24D78504&cm_re=HP_Pro_6300_MT_PC-_-9SIAAJ24D78504-_-Product The PSU is 320W and can be replaced with an ATX PSU if you use a special mobo power adapter. Most GTX 950s should be able to work with the included PSU.

If you were to primarily use Windows, the GTX 1050 Ti would also be a great choice for Windows gaming. (GTX 1050 Ti is now also supported by macOS with Nvidia drivers)

https://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16814487290&cm_re=1050_Ti-_-14-487-290-_-Product
Has HDMI 2.0b for hook up to a 4K Televison. Primary use: viewing video, not gaming in 4K. 1080p gaming would work great with this card. Average 60 FPS in most new games. 4GB of Vram. Low power usage. Quiet.

Also note the ram choices in these HP desktops. If you buy an 8 or 16 GB kit make sure it is HP compatible. The Crucial Ballistix Sport DDR3 1600 modules work well. Some have also used Kingston HyperX ram with success. Many other brands of standard un-buffered 1600 MHz DDR3 ram will work.

 

[bitguru]

Haven't there been some successful builds with Intel HD Graphics 2500?

 

[trs96]

Haven't there been some successful builds with Intel HD Graphics 2500?

It doesn't matter, if you want El Capitan it's best to use a discrete graphics card instead of HD2500
or even HD3000. Both perform rather poorly with El Capitan in my experience. A GT740 LP or even a
750 Ti LP are very inexpensive and worth upgrading your graphics to. If you were running Mt. Lion on
this system you could use Intel graphics. For El Cap, best to get an Nvidia card.

Here's a LP 2GB GT740 that sells for under 100 USD.
http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=9SIA1N83U88418

So your total build cost would come in at around 320 USD. PDG for a quad core Ivy Br. system
Has Sata 3, USB 3 and UEFI. Works with El Capitan. Great deal imho. Even a discounted Haswell
I5-4690 system will cost well over 500 dollars.

 

[Adrian B]

Haven't there been some successful builds with Intel HD Graphics 2500?

There was only very brief support in Mountain Lion 10.8.3 and 10.8.4 - if you want to use OS X I would add even a basic compatible graphics card to lessen installation problems.

See here for the original HD2500 graphics thread:
http://www.tonymacx86.com/graphics/...ge-hd2500-full-resolution-qe-ci-10-8-3-a.html

 

[bitguru]

This thread inspired me to pick one of these up, however I got mine elsewhere, not at Newegg.

I also picked up a cheap GeForce GT 610 graphics card for it. You can find them for as little as $32, though I unfortunately paid a little more than that. (Mine is branded EVGA but I should have gone with MSI, Gigabyte, or Zotac. Why? Because those come with low-profile brackets and the EVGA did not. Now I have to buy a separate bracket, or maybe beg/borrow/steal one from a MSI/Gigabyte/Zotac owner. Right now I'm running with no bracket at all. But I digress.]

Anyway, the main reason I'm posting is to provide the attached VoodooHDA.kext. It took me a long time to find one that would work even a little bit with the integrated Realtek ALC221 audio, but this one does. Its based on Voodoo 2.7.3 (current Multibeast has 2.8.6/2.8.7/2.8.8 ) but that might not mean much because I did try other 2.7.3 kexts that didn't work.
Anyway, it does provide audio out, either through the internal amplified speaker (which is a nice feature of the HP Elite 8300) or through the green rear jack. And it does get a signal from the blue rear mic jack, but I don't know if it's line-level or mic-level. But there are flaws. The green rear jack has white noise mixed in, which is vexing. The front jacks don't seem to work. The volume maxes out at IMHO too low a level. So feel free to use it, as it does (sort of) work, but caveat emptor.

 

[trs96]

This thread inspired me to pick one of these up, however I got mine elsewhere, not at Newegg.

Anyway, the main reason I'm posting is to provide the attached VoodooHDA.kext. It took me a long time to find one that would work even a little bit with the integrated Realtek ALC221 audio, but this one does. Its based on Voodoo 2.7.3 (current Multibeast has 2.8.6/2.8.7/2.8.8 ) but that might not mean much because I did try other 2.7.3 kexts that didn't work.
Anyway, it does provide audio out, either through the internal amplified speaker (which is a nice feature of the HP Elite 8300) or through the green rear jack. And it does get a signal from the blue rear mic jack, but I don't know if it's line-level or mic-level. But there are flaws. The green rear jack has white noise mixed in, which is vexing. The front jacks don't seem to work. The volume maxes out at IMHO too low a level. So feel free to use it, as it does (sort of) work, but caveat emptor.

Thanks for posting about your Voodoo HDA experience. My Elite 8000 User Build gives some more options for audio that utilize some external USB adapter cards that are very inexpensive. That's another option to explore if anyone can't get Voodoo to work well enough for their needs. One trick I've read about to reduce static and noise when using VHDA is to go into the Utilities folder and then Audio Midi Setup. Turn all the volume input levels down for Mic and then see if it reduces the white noise levels.

 

[bitguru]

One trick I've read about to reduce static and noise when using VHDA is to go into the Utilities folder and then Audio Midi Setup. Turn all the volume input levels down for Mic and then see if it reduces the white noise levels.

I had heard about that Audio MIDI Setup thing, too. Unfortunately it didn't help a whit.

I was, however, able to get rid of the white noise/crackling sound. What I did was go into the VoodooHDA control panel, which has two pull-down lists on the left. On my machine, the upper pull-down has "1: Speaker (Analog)", "2: Line-out (Green rear)", and "3: Line-in (Blue rear)". The lower pull-down has two items with long names, both starting with "AppleACPIPlatform/PCI0@0/".
If I choose the first of those long names, all the slider controls are greyed out. But if I choose the second of the long names, some of the sliders become enabled, including the one for Input Gain. (Actually, now that I look closer, it seems to enable Input Gain for some of the upper pull-down items, too.) If I slide Input Gain all the way to the left, the white noise goes away and I get clean audio through the green rear jack. Unfortunately this seems to disable output to the internal amplified speaker, but I can live with that.


But here's the bad news. I upgraded the BIOS firmware from version v2.05 to version v2.99 (dated October, 2015). I was hoping it would help the white noise issue, which it didn't, but now I can no longer boot from the hard drive. The screen goes black or, if I boot verbose, I see a single line of plusses and it hangs immediately. The Big List of Solutions for El Capitan Install Problems mentions this ("Seen on MSI Z97/H97 and GA-Z97MX" which this isn't) but I haven't been able to solve it. I can still use the unibeast-created USB thumb drive to boot to the hard drive, though.

So the BIOS update was a mistake, and I don't see a way to revert. I can download v2.90 (dated 2013) and v2.57 (dated 2012) from HP's site, but it's not letting me apply them on top of v2.99.

 

[trs96]

But here's the bad news. I upgraded the BIOS firmware from version v2.05 to version v2.99 (dated October, 2015). I was hoping it would help the white noise issue, which it didn't, but now I can no longer boot from the hard drive. The screen goes black or, if I boot verbose, I see a single line of plusses and it hangs immediately. The Big List of Solutions for El Capitan Install Problems mentions this ("Seen on MSI Z97/H97 and GA-Z97MX" which this isn't) but I haven't been able to solve it. I can still use the unibeast-created USB thumb drive to boot to the hard drive, though.

So the BIOS update was a mistake, and I don't see a way to revert. I can download v2.90 (dated 2013) and v2.57 (dated 2012) from HP's site, but it's not letting me apply them on top of v2.99.

One person with an HP Elite 8000 reported the same problem when they applied the latest November of 2015 BIOS update to that PC. Those still have legacy BIOS, not UEFI so you should check if there is a new secure boot option that you can turn off in your UEFI settings. My advice to anyone installing OS X on these HP models is to only update BIOS/UEFI if you absolutely have to. If you do need to update/flash don't install anything released in 2015 as it will likely prevent booting OS X. Should have no effect on Windows though.

 

[bitguru]

What I don't understand is why trying to boot form the SATA hard drive's EFI partition and choosing the HFS OSX partition fails, but booting from the USB thumb drive's EFI partition and choosing the same HFS OSX partition succeeds. It seems to me that if the USB thumb drive can do it, then (with enough fiddling) the hard drive should also be able to do it. But no. At least not so far.

I may try buying a small stubby USB thumb drive to boot from and leave it permanently inserted.

 

[trs96]

What I don't understand is why trying to boot form the SATA hard drive's EFI partition and choosing the HFS OSX partition fails, but booting from the USB thumb drive's EFI partition and choosing the same HFS OSX partition succeeds. It seems to me that if the USB thumb drive can do it, then (with enough fiddling) the hard drive should also be able to do it. But no. At least not so far.

I may try buying a small stubby USB thumb drive to boot from and leave it permanently inserted.

Where did you install the VooDooHDA kext to ? /L/E ? 10.11 Kexts folder in the ESP ?
Did you use kextbeast or another app to install it.

You could possibly try the trick from the Big List. What you do is replace the HDD EFI partition contents with the EFI partition contents of the USB flash drive that can boot successfully.