Building an Hackintosh from a OS X Clone.

[dreinz]

Hi folks,

i'm taking seriously to build an Hackintosh for Christmas, so i would like to know if it's possible to build the entire PC and just boot from my OS X Clone Backup instead installing OS X from scratch? I actually have a Macbook Pro Retina 15" 2013.

Thanks!

 

[Going Bald]

Hi folks,

i'm taking seriously to build an Hackintosh for Christmas, so i would like to know if it's possible to build the entire PC and just boot from my OS X Clone Backup instead installing OS X from scratch? I actually have a Macbook Pro Retina 15" 2013.

Thanks!

If this is a clone of your MBP, then it will not boot on a PC build by itself - you need to create a Clover boot USB or a UniBeast USB to boot it with. Then you will need to run MultiBeast and install the bootloader, FakeSMC.kext, audio and networking kexts for your PC hardware.

 

[kiiroaka]

I doubt it. It's different hardware, a laptop and a desktop. I doubt you could do that with any hardware/software optimized system, say, Windows or Linux.

 

[Going Bald]

I doubt it. It's different hardware, a laptop and a desktop. I doubt you could do that with any hardware/software optimized system, say, Windows or Linux.

Wanna bet?
I can take a linux drive and move it from build to build and have it working, adding drivers as needed for the different hardware and chips on the different boards.
OS X is just as easy, but for a laptop to run OS X it is a bit more difficult depending on the way the display is connected and other things that may need patches. Going from a Mac install to a PC is just a matter of adding kext files and patches, but do not try to go from a PC Mac to a real Mac.

Early versions of Windows could be done the same way, but with the introduction of Windows Vista and Microsoft's continuing battle with software piracy this is no longer possible. Windows 7 was very difficult to do, Win 10 is almost impossible due to the way the licensing key is now introduced into the mainboard firmware/UEFI. It makes it much easier to re-install since you do not need the license key once you have validated it the first time, but it does make it impossible to move the drive to a different build and have it work. If you think you can validate the license key on multiple builds, think again. There is a cycle of checks for each license key. If multiple machines are found to be using the same key, the check reveals this and flags the first dated key as valid, the rest are pirated. Next time you boot your machine it automatically goes on line to check the key, finds it is invalid and black screens you, notifying you that this is a pirated OS, please contact Microsoft.

 

[malibyte]

Which is most likely the reason they kept telling people not to run Windows 7 and 10 in VMs. That's how I run Windows - mainly to avoid this nonsense. Why should I have to call Micro$oft to update my licensed copy to a new machine? They could simply check that the same key isn't being used on multiple boxes.

I have never had a problem moving a Linux build to a new machine (the exceptions being trying to move from a 64-bit build to a 32-bit (though the reverse works fine) or an x86/and64 to an ARM - those won't fly). Easy-peasy, no hassle.

 

[pastrychef]

I know it's not recommended, but I keep all my hackintosh related kexts in /EFI/CLOVER/kexts/Other/ and I am able to boot from drives with macOS installed from other Macs/hacks without problems. I do this quite frequently to test things for other users here.

I have Linux installed on one very old SSD and I plug it in to any of my computers when I want to run Linux on them.

When I made the transition from my old Mac Pro to hackintosh, I just transplanted my Windows drive. I had to call Microsoft because it was complaining about the license but I am using a full retail copy of Windows and this is supposed to be allowed. It took a bit of time, but eventually, they fixed it for me and I'm still using the same license.

 

[Going Bald]

...When I made the transition from my old Mac Pro to hackintosh, I just transplanted my Windows drive. I had to call Microsoft because it was complaining about the license but I am using a full retail copy of Windows and this is supposed to be allowed. It took a bit of time, but eventually, they fixed it for me and I'm still using the same license.

With a full retail copy of Win7 this is allowed - just call MS Support and verify you are moving the drive to a new home and not using it with the old hardware. If you went the less expensive route and bought an OEM version of Win7 then it is considered to be licensed to the first hardware it is installed on and cannot be moved (you might be able to argue MS Support into re-validating it, but not likely).
With Win10, the situation is the same as OEM since MS decided to no longer offer a full retail version of Windows OS.