Official CustoMac Mini 2011 Guide and Notes (in progress)

[TreeMan2011]

So I guess it depend on what's important to you and how much effort you are willing to spend on working around problems (and probably also on whether there will be a Customac Mini Tuneup Kit v4 that concentrates on fixing audio and video issues) but if you will not be satisfied by anything that does not work "perfectly" I'd pass on this for now.

Thank for taking the time to present this valuable feedback. A little history: The Tuneup Kit was the result of user feedback describing difficulties using the CustoMac Mini (graphics hangs, port problems, audio, etc.). I built my CMM months ago and it had lots of problems. All of those problems were associated with HD 3000 Integrated Graphics. The Tuneup Kit addresses the HD3000 problems, specifically for users that want HD3000 HDMI audio.

You do not need to install the Tuneup Kit if you are building a CustoMac Mini with discrete graphics (with or without HDMI audio) or HD3000 integrated graphics without HDMI. More on this later.

For those interested in HD3000 integrated graphics with HDMI audio installing the Tuneup Kit is beneficial. This is the only place you can get turnkey HDMI audio in our DIY world. The current HDMI audio is very close to native with the sacrifice of other audio capabilities. The reason there is not a mic is that adding a mic breaks HDMI audio. For those applications that require HDMI audio, this is low cost, reasonable (not optimal) solution.

The CustoMac Mini is very desirable for most other applications. Full 889 on board audio, single and dual slot graphics with and without HDMI/DisplayPort audio, up to i7-2600K processing power and many other options and capabilities make this platform completely customizable from the low end to the high end in cost and performance. For those interested in HDMI/DP audio with discrete graphics cards , the dsdt in the Tuneup Kit includes the required edits. To uninstall Tuneup Kit audio, simply install the MultiBeast 889 audio solution or an 889 edited Lion AppleHDA.kext for full on board audio.

toleda, thank you for that explanation. I wish I'd known all that at the time we did the 10.7.2 upgrade. Right after we did the upgrade, HDMI video worked fine, the network worked fine, etc. and the ONLY thing that I am certain did not work was audio output (I didn't test input at that point) and that was what I was wanting to fix by installing the tuneup kit. Basically, I'm using a computer monitor with no sound capabilities (a HP 2311x to be exact) and then running the sound into a separate audio amplifier to feed speakers (same setup I've been using since probably the days of Windows '95). So I have absolutely no need for HDMI audio. May I suggest that you include a note about this in the -Read_Me_First file so that people who have no need for HDMI audio (in particular, those sending video to a computer monitor rather than a HDTV set) will know that they are actually going to lose audio input capabilities? People might want to be aware of that prior to installing.

You said, "To uninstall Tuneup Kit audio, simply install the MultiBeast 889 audio solution or an 889 edited Lion AppleHDA.kext for full on board audio." I'm looking at this image from the first post in this thread:

I'm assuming you mean to run MultiBeast and just check the ALC8xxHDA selection? Do I also need to check AppleHDA Rollback? Do I need to check any of the other boxes (that is, if something on the list is already installed and I leave the associated box unchecked, it won't remove what's already there, will it)?

I don't really understand what you mean by "an 889 edited Lion AppleHDA.kext" and don't know where I'd get one or how to install it, so that's why I'm asking how to do it using MultiBeast. If it would be easier to do it the other way then I'd need explicit instructions (I'm pretty new at this so I apologize if I'm asking about something obvious to most people here).

I really do appreciate what you are trying to do here and if I were trying to feed a TV set I'm sure my priorities would be quite different, but as I say I'm working with a plain HDMI monitor that has no built-in audio whatsoever.

 

[TreeMan2011]

I am using the V3 tuneup kit. I can tell you the Logitech HD Webcam Pro C910 and the HD Webcam C615 both work OOB, audio included. Facetime, iChat and Skype all work great with these two webcams.

Interesting. I have a Logitech EyeToy which unfortunately never was able to send video to any Apple program (such as iChat or PhotoBooth, both of which refuse to recognize the presence of the camera) but has always worked fine with Macam and Skype. However, I discovered just tonight that under the V3 tuneup kit the webcam's microphone, which always worked fine on my Mac Mini, sends unintelligible noise (was was described to me as "chipmunk sounds"). In other words the person at the other end knows I'm talking, but can't understand a word I'm saying. However, as I mentioned in a previous post, the microphone input on my iMic USB Audio Interface does work, but the output on it does not. I don't know if this is at all affected by the presence of the V3 tuneup kit, so I'm not laying blame, just making an observation. It may be that the EyeToy microphone would fail on any computer running Lion, for all I know.

 

[hower1k]

I followed the guides step by step I'm at 10.7.2 Im only having a few issues that I can't figure out. I still can't log into the app store. When I try to boot from HD I get the Boot0: Error and I Still can't get audio out of the HDMI port my question is if I get CustomBeast will it fix everything so it works and I can stop spending hours on these issues?

 

[TreeMan2011]

Most of us have had video artifacts (I suspect those who say they haven't don't try to play YouTube videos much, because certain formats of YouTube videos seem to trigger them even if you have pretty much expunged them otherwise) and sound issues of one kind or another. Some are blaming this on the Customac Mini Tuneup Kit (and actually, I'd love to know if there is a way to CLEANLY uninstall that once it's been installed, just to run some tests) but I installed that to get sound to work.

I have ZERO video or audio artifacts, and this system truly has been put through the ringer within the past 2 weeks. My go-to video test on a system is always the Vimeo HD channel, which plays back perfectly. Also, to be specific, these are some other formats/ sources I can confirm work for me: HD quicktimes from Apple Trailers website, HD videos from youtube, x264 HD and SD avis, mkvs, and mp4s... I'm a video editor, and am familiar with video that looks bad.

For everything that I will use it for (an htpc machine in the living room), i would say that yes, it does work "perfectly"... Although right now I don't have or need working HDMI audio out or optical audio out (although eventually I would like to get that to work). I don't even need more than one usb2.0 port, so I haven't even looked into usb3.0.

Note: I'm not using the Tuneup Kit.
Please don't take this as me "blaming" the kit... I'm just saying that it didn't work for me.

VERY interesting. I feel the same way - I don't want to automatically blame the tuneup kit for the problems some of us have had, because the tuneup kit may or may not have anything whatsoever to do with those problems, and toleda is providing a valuable service to those who need it. I just wish there were an easy way to disable or enable it (particularly the parts that could affect audio or video) so that it would be easy to do A/B testing. It would be really nice if, for example, the tuneup kit had a panel in System Preferences where various features could be set to enabled or disabled, although that might be a bit of overkill because once you get everything working as it ought to you'll probably never want to change it again (then again, that's true of most things in System Preferences).

But you have to realize that it's just a little frustrating to read some people (like you) saying they've had zero issues with either artifacts or sound, and we're wondering exactly why fate decided to smile on you and not the rest of us! And when you say you're not using the tuneup it, it really makes me wonder, at least.

 

[tom-e]

I want to give my 2cents aswell.

I build the customac mini with same parts as Tony. Only expection is I have kingston 1333 memory and 500w antec PSU. Updated bios to F7 and set GPU frequency to 1000 and GPU voltage to 'NORMAL' and enabled Graphics DVID with the value of '-0.030'.

Installed SL and updated to 10.6.6. downloaded Lion, put it on a USB stick and did a clean install. I didn't use the tuneupkit. EVERYTHING* is working as it should, there are ZERO artifacts and sound is perfect through line out (green jack on MB).

This has been my first hackintosh build and I'm more than pleased with it.,

edit: *except wake up from sleep. Have to press enter 2 times

 

[Paul]

I have used both of the recommended graphics cards and both work OOB. Graphics enabler=yes for the Nvidia GT240, Graphics enabler=no for the ATI 5570.

Both worked for me OOB with no artifacts whatsoever. Also the VGA ports worked as well.

Of note, the ATI 570 card was silent and the Nvidia GT240 was loud.

You used those graphic cards with the apex mi-008 250w psu? does it have enough power? if so il buy the 5570

 

[Montmac]

I have used both of the recommended graphics cards and both work OOB. Graphics enabler=yes for the Nvidia GT240, Graphics enabler=no for the ATI 5570.

Both worked for me OOB with no artifacts whatsoever. Also the VGA ports worked as well.

Of note, the ATI 570 card was silent and the Nvidia GT240 was loud.

You used those graphic cards with the apex mi-008 250w psu? does it have enough power? if so il buy the 5570

Yes, worked fine.

 

[Connie Mac]

You do not need to install the Tuneup Kit if you are building a CustoMac Mini with discrete graphics (with or without HDMI audio) or HD3000 integrated graphics without HDMI. More on this later.

I'm interested in dual displays but not HDMI audio - I need the green or black audio ports on the back to be active. Would you suggest I remove the Tuneup V3 kexts (i.e., restore to 10.7.2 vanilla)?

Thanks for you work on this - it is greatly appreciated.

 

[toleda]

I'm assuming you mean to run MultiBeast and just check the ALC8xxHDA selection? Do I also need to check AppleHDA Rollback? Do I need to check any of the other boxes (that is, if something on the list is already installed and I leave the associated box unchecked, it won't remove what's already there, will it)?

I don't really understand what you mean by "an 889 edited Lion AppleHDA.kext" and don't know where I'd get one or how to install it, so that's why I'm asking how to do it using MultiBeast. If it would be easier to do it the other way then I'd need explicit instructions (I'm pretty new at this so I apologize if I'm asking about something obvious to most people here).

I really do appreciate what you are trying to do here and if I were trying to feed a TV set I'm sure my priorities would be quite different, but as I say I'm working with a plain HDMI monitor that has no built-in audio whatsoever.

For MultiBeast 889 audio select both choices (ALC8xxHDA and AppleHDA rollback). No need to select anything else. The native Lion AppleHDA.kext does not support the ALC889. An 889 edited Lion AppleHDA.kext has been edited to enable 889 on board audio in Lion. Installation is performed by KextBeast or Kext Wizard. If you're interested, I can post a beta 889 edited Lion AppleHDA.kext to try.

 

[Paul]

I have used both of the recommended graphics cards and both work OOB. Graphics enabler=yes for the Nvidia GT240, Graphics enabler=no for the ATI 5570.

Both worked for me OOB with no artifacts whatsoever. Also the VGA ports worked as well.

Of note, the ATI 570 card was silent and the Nvidia GT240 was loud.

You used those graphic cards with the apex mi-008 250w psu? does it have enough power? if so il buy the 5570

Yes, worked fine.

Can i have the exact model number of the graphic card you used?