- Joined
- Jun 30, 2016
- Messages
- 163
- Motherboard
- GA-H110M-A
- CPU
- i5-6500
- Graphics
- RX 560
- Mac
- Mobile Phone
Components
Gigabyte GA-H170-Gaming 3 (rev. 1.0)
http://www.amazon.com/dp/B015CQ8D46/?tag=tonymacx86com-20
http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16813128863
Intel i5-6500
http://www.amazon.com/dp/B0136JON7M/?tag=tonymacx86com-20
http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16819117563
Crucial Ballistix Sport LT 16GB (2x8) DDR4 2400 (PC4 19200)
http://www.amazon.com/dp/B00UFF7Y4A/?tag=tonymacx86com-20
http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16820148985
Samsung 850 EVO 250GB SSD
http://www.amazon.com/dp/B00OAJ412U/?tag=tonymacx86com-20
http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=9SIA2W02CZ2241
EVGA GTX 950 2GB (replaced)
http://www.amazon.com/dp/B013WQCC8Q/?tag=tonymacx86com-20
http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16814487156
EVGA GeForce GTX 970 4GB FTW GAMING ACX 2.0 (current)
http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16814487077
https://www.amazon.com/dp/B00OSS0AG4/?tag=tonymacx86com-20
TP-Link PCI Express Wifi Adapter (N)
http://www.amazon.com/dp/B007GMPZ0A/?tag=tonymacx86com-20
http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16833704133
Corsair CS 550 Watt Power Supply
http://www.amazon.com/dp/B00GH9NA6O/?tag=tonymacx86com-20
http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16811154091
Corsair Carbide 200R Computer Case
http://www.amazon.com/dp/B009GXZ8MM/?tag=tonymacx86com-20
http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16811139018
Already Owned Parts
ASUS 23" LED VX238H MONITOR
2.1 Logitech Speakers
3 TB Western Digital SATA 7200 RPM hard drive (installed and mounted after initial install as shown below). Using 1 TB for Time Machine.
External Optical Drive - Lenovo DVD Burner
Comments
Thanks for the wonderful site and all the valuable info. This is my first Hackintosh build. I am a Linux geek and long time Windows developer, but wanted a newer OSX machine to add to my arsenal. I still have an early 2009 Mac Mini running El Capitan that is getting long in the tooth, but I haven’t used OSX regularly for a few years. Hopefully this build description will help someone else looking for a similar middle of the road "value" build.
All parts listed were selected from the "Buyers Guide" on this site for compatibility purposes. Click here for up-to-date part links on Newegg and Amazon: http://www.tonymacx86.com/buyersguide/july/2016. The build cost me ~$719 USD.
My goals were as follows:
Installing the optional TPLINK WiFi adapter made the installation a little easier until Ethernet was working and will give me OS X WiFi should I ever need it.
I am currently running Clover SMBIOS system set to "iMac14,2" but am considering changing to "iMac17,1" since that seems to recommended for Skylake builds. As expected, I experience the blank screen when I try booting with iMac17,1 option temporarily in Clover. I see a fix for this, but not sure if it is worth the trouble since the machine is flawless for me right now. I would like to know if there is any evidence that shows this will make the machine perform better, use less power etc. Please comment if you can provide actual concrete evidence on why I should change.
What works?
Everything that I have tested thus far! (WiFi, Ethernet, audio, USB 3, headphone jack, GPU acceleration, shutdown/restart, sleep/resume short and long term, App Store, USB Mic, Optical drive). The system is very stable and has never crashed. I am very happy with this configuration.
What doesn’t work?
Nothing that I know of! Still testing...
I don’t use iMessage, so I haven’t tried that. I’m sure it can be made to work using the normal methods suggested on this site.
Installation Notes
BIOS Settings
(DEL to enter using USB keyboard)
Load optimized defaults first, then:
Unibeast Installer
16GB USB3 stick - created and used Unibeast per the recommended instructions:
http://www.tonymacx86.com/threads/u...pitan-on-any-supported-intel-based-pc.172672/
Multibeast Post-Install
Audio Hack - Realtek ALC1150
Video Driver
Kexts
realtekALC.kext
sudo kextcache -Boot -U /
(You may need to run the command a couple times. Run until it returns without any issues.)
Generated a SSDT for CPU Power Management
Turbo states worked before I did this, but single core performance seemed to fair better afterwards.
Details here:
http://www.tonymacx86.com/threads/quick-guide-to-generate-a-ssdt-for-cpu-power-management.177456/
Clover Configuration
I used Clover Configurator 4.30.0 for viewing/editing my config.plist and for mounting the EFI partition.
Resources
[EFI Partition]/EFI/CLOVER/ACPI/patched/SSDT-HDEF-HDAS-1.aml
[EFI Partition]/EFI/CLOVER/ACPI/patched/SSDT.aml
config.plist
Benchmarks
32-bit Geekbench:
Heaven using default settings with GTX 950:
Heaven using default settings with upgraded GTX 970:
Gigabyte GA-H170-Gaming 3 (rev. 1.0)
http://www.amazon.com/dp/B015CQ8D46/?tag=tonymacx86com-20
http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16813128863
Intel i5-6500
http://www.amazon.com/dp/B0136JON7M/?tag=tonymacx86com-20
http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16819117563
Crucial Ballistix Sport LT 16GB (2x8) DDR4 2400 (PC4 19200)
http://www.amazon.com/dp/B00UFF7Y4A/?tag=tonymacx86com-20
http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16820148985
Samsung 850 EVO 250GB SSD
http://www.amazon.com/dp/B00OAJ412U/?tag=tonymacx86com-20
http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=9SIA2W02CZ2241
EVGA GTX 950 2GB (replaced)
http://www.amazon.com/dp/B013WQCC8Q/?tag=tonymacx86com-20
http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16814487156
EVGA GeForce GTX 970 4GB FTW GAMING ACX 2.0 (current)
http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16814487077
https://www.amazon.com/dp/B00OSS0AG4/?tag=tonymacx86com-20
TP-Link PCI Express Wifi Adapter (N)
http://www.amazon.com/dp/B007GMPZ0A/?tag=tonymacx86com-20
http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16833704133
Corsair CS 550 Watt Power Supply
http://www.amazon.com/dp/B00GH9NA6O/?tag=tonymacx86com-20
http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16811154091
Corsair Carbide 200R Computer Case
http://www.amazon.com/dp/B009GXZ8MM/?tag=tonymacx86com-20
http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16811139018
Already Owned Parts
ASUS 23" LED VX238H MONITOR
2.1 Logitech Speakers
3 TB Western Digital SATA 7200 RPM hard drive (installed and mounted after initial install as shown below). Using 1 TB for Time Machine.
External Optical Drive - Lenovo DVD Burner
Comments
Thanks for the wonderful site and all the valuable info. This is my first Hackintosh build. I am a Linux geek and long time Windows developer, but wanted a newer OSX machine to add to my arsenal. I still have an early 2009 Mac Mini running El Capitan that is getting long in the tooth, but I haven’t used OSX regularly for a few years. Hopefully this build description will help someone else looking for a similar middle of the road "value" build.
All parts listed were selected from the "Buyers Guide" on this site for compatibility purposes. Click here for up-to-date part links on Newegg and Amazon: http://www.tonymacx86.com/buyersguide/july/2016. The build cost me ~$719 USD.
My goals were as follows:
- Teach my son how to build a computer.
- Build a system that was Hackintosh-friendly using the current Buyer's Guide on this site.
- The system will need to be used for a wide variety of tasks (photo management/editing, video editing, gaming, internet browsing, audio editing etc.)
- Keep the budget low, but not with any major sacrifices. SSD and discrete GPU were a must, as was at least 16GB RAM.
- Reuse some parts we already had (large 3TB HDD, monitor, 2.1 speakers, and external DVD burner).
Installing the optional TPLINK WiFi adapter made the installation a little easier until Ethernet was working and will give me OS X WiFi should I ever need it.
I am currently running Clover SMBIOS system set to "iMac14,2" but am considering changing to "iMac17,1" since that seems to recommended for Skylake builds. As expected, I experience the blank screen when I try booting with iMac17,1 option temporarily in Clover. I see a fix for this, but not sure if it is worth the trouble since the machine is flawless for me right now. I would like to know if there is any evidence that shows this will make the machine perform better, use less power etc. Please comment if you can provide actual concrete evidence on why I should change.
What works?
Everything that I have tested thus far! (WiFi, Ethernet, audio, USB 3, headphone jack, GPU acceleration, shutdown/restart, sleep/resume short and long term, App Store, USB Mic, Optical drive). The system is very stable and has never crashed. I am very happy with this configuration.
What doesn’t work?
Nothing that I know of! Still testing...
I don’t use iMessage, so I haven’t tried that. I’m sure it can be made to work using the normal methods suggested on this site.
Installation Notes
BIOS Settings
(DEL to enter using USB keyboard)
Load optimized defaults first, then:
- Set EFI Boot = On (default to EFI boot)
- Set Secure Boot = Off
- Set Fast Boot = Off
- Set Virtualization VT-d = Disabled
- Set ErP = Enabled - this is necessary to allow shutdown to work properly, i.e. not reboot seconds after shutdown. ErP Support determines whether to let the system consume less than 1W of power in S5 (shutdown) state. When the setting is enabled, the following four functions will become unavailable: PME Event Wake Up, Power On By Mouse, Power On By Keyboard, and Wake On LAN.
- Set OS Type to “Other”
- Set IO SerialPort to Disabled
- Set XHCI Handoff to Enabled
Unibeast Installer
16GB USB3 stick - created and used Unibeast per the recommended instructions:
http://www.tonymacx86.com/threads/u...pitan-on-any-supported-intel-based-pc.172672/
- Used front case USB3 port to boot. Use F12 to select a boot drive.
- Used vanilla process to get initial system installed.
- I did not need to disable NVIDIA card using the bootloader parameter nv_disable=1, but it won't work by default (more on that later).
- WiFi works out-of-box so you can download whatever you need for the rest of the install.
Multibeast Post-Install
- Used MultiBeast for El Capitan 8.2.3
- Take the defaults and only Install the Clover bootloader to internal SSD only (some other options may be mandatory, but you can’t uncheck them)
- Do NOT install ALC1150 audio as suggested in the Installation Guide.
Audio Hack - Realtek ALC1150
- No audio drivers should have been installed by Multibeast as per instructions above.
- Backup stock OSX AppleHDA.kext just in case. It is located in in /S/L/E (/System/Library/Extensions folder)
- Mount EFI Partition - Clover Configurator can do this and there is also some scripts and command line commands that can it as well.
- Download and run audio command script by toleda (audio_cloverALC-110_v1.0r10.command) https://github.com/toleda/audio_CloverALC (directions at the bottom)
- In System Preferences/Sound, choose “Internal Speakers” as “Output”
- Reboot and you should have sound, but only until the computer sleeps (see CodecCommander.kext below to fix sleep issue below).
Video Driver
- Nvidia Web Driver - download from Nvidia
- Used WebDriver-346.03.10f02.pkg http://www.tonymacx86.com/threads/n...cs-drivers-for-os-x-10-11-5-346-03-10.193172/)
- Clover config.plist add boot argument nvda_drv=1
- Reboot
- The Nvidia control panel always says it is using the Default OS X Default Graphics Driver, but it lies. I don’t show the Nvidia icon on the menu bar because it doesn’t appear to work, at least for me.
Kexts
realtekALC.kext
- This kext gets installed to [EFI Partition]/EFI/Clover/Kext/10.11/ (I believe the audio_cloverALC-110_v1.0r10.command installed it here)
- For Ethernet - installed to /L/E using KextBeast
- Source: https://github.com/Mieze/AtherosE2200Ethernet
- Installed to /S/L/E using KextBeast
- Source: http://www.tonymacx86.com/threads/f...p-on-1150-and-possibly-other-realteks.170063/
- I used the “ready-made kext for 1150” provided as a download.
- I also set boot argument darkwake=8 as shown below.
sudo kextcache -Boot -U /
(You may need to run the command a couple times. Run until it returns without any issues.)
Generated a SSDT for CPU Power Management
Turbo states worked before I did this, but single core performance seemed to fair better afterwards.
Details here:
http://www.tonymacx86.com/threads/quick-guide-to-generate-a-ssdt-for-cpu-power-management.177456/
Clover Configuration
I used Clover Configurator 4.30.0 for viewing/editing my config.plist and for mounting the EFI partition.
Resources
[EFI Partition]/EFI/CLOVER/ACPI/patched/SSDT-HDEF-HDAS-1.aml
[EFI Partition]/EFI/CLOVER/ACPI/patched/SSDT.aml
config.plist
- Acpi: (defaults)
- Boot:
- dart=0 (already present as a default, disabled VT-d. Not really required as it should be disabled in the BIOS already)
- darkwake=8 (using for sleep/wake)
- nvda_drv=1 (only add this after Nvidia drivers are installed)
- CPU: (defaults)
- Devices: Audio = 1
- Disable Drivers: (defaults)
- Gui: (defaults)
- Graphics: defaults (Inject Intel is all that is checked)
- Kernel and Kext Patches: defaults and what was enabled by audio_cloverALC-110_v1.0r10.command script. I added nothing additional here:
- Apple RTC (checked)
- Asus AICPUPM (checked)
- KernelPm (checked)
- KextsToPatch - there are four, but I didn’t enter manually, they are the result of the audio script.
- AppleHDA (3)
- AppleAHCIPort (1)
- Rt Variables: (defaults)
- SMBIOS: started with MacPro3,1 and switched to iMac14,2 using Clover Configurator. Rest are defaults.
- System Parameters: defaults (Inject Kexts = Yes, Inject System ID is checked)
Benchmarks
32-bit Geekbench:
Heaven using default settings with GTX 950:
Heaven using default settings with upgraded GTX 970:
Attachments
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