Looking for some buying advice for those more experienced than me.

Hey there. I've been looking at creating a hackintosh to replace my 2009 Mac Pro, which is starting to show it's age a little, and was hoping some of the more experienced users could spare a minute or two to offer some wisdom and advice.

I do have a Windows PC that I was looking at cannibalising for the base for the new machine. The parts I have are:

• Bitfenix Phenom mATX case
• Corsair CX550 PSU
• Various fans, SATA cables and cable ties
• 3.5" SATA SSD and HDDs

Initially I would have a tight budget, looking at the price I could get for my Mac Pro and the old processor and motherboard, I would be looking at spending close to around £400/$550. The parts I was looking at are:

• MSI Intel H270M Mortar Arctic - ~£100
  
• Intel Core i5 7500/7600/7600K - £166-£200
• Crucial 8GB/16GB ddr4 2133 DIMM - £68.99/£115.97

For now I'd be content using the integrated Intel graphics, so long as it could drive my monitor at 3440x1440. I'm not a big gamer and the only video editing I do are family movies. If the Intel graphics would cause any issues then I would be willing to purchase a graphics card, likely a GTX 1050 or RX480 depending on compatibility (and if I can find the damn things for sale!) I would also look at getting the Fenvi WiFi and bluetooth card in the future too.

Although these items are shown on a the compatibility list I remember making a hackintosh way back in 2009 and having all manner of issues such as no sound, no ethernet etc. Are these issues still prevalent now? I'm quite worried about using a hackintosh with Apple's iMessage and iCloud services, as well as issues with waking from sleep as I seldom turn the current Mac off, instead choosing to put it to sleep each night.

I know this is quite a long post, so if you've read this far I thank you. If you can think of any pitfalls or have a suggestion for a better choice of components then I'm more than open to hearing them, once again thanks for bearing with my rambling post.

Hello,
parts seem good. I would not include the 7600 because for a few more dollars you can get the "K" version instead. I'm not sure if the problems with sleep/wake still exist on the Integrated Graphics but if this is something that your not looking to have problems with go with an inexpensive GPU, like the GT 1030. It is still the current recommendation to go with a GPU. I see that you want to run the monitor at 3440x1440. If you do go with a GPU like the GT 1030 then resolution should not be a problem. Can't speak on iCloud because I don't use it. iMessages was easy to get working on my build following some of the guides available. Nowadays its easier to do a working hackintosh then it was 7 or 8 years ago. It just requires patience.

I only dove in to hackintoshing about 1.5 years ago. From what I've seen, with the 100-series and 200-series motherboards, compatibility is generally very high. Audio, ethernet, USB, SATA, etc. can all be made to work with very little effort. iMessage and iCloud is working very well.

I know that sleep was an issue for those who used the integrated GPUs on Skylake systems. I don't know if this has been resolved or if this also affects Kaby Lake CPUs. I haven't had a chance to test them myself yet... If you use a dedicated graphics card, sleep can be made to work. I leave my system up 24/7 and system goes to sleep during inactivity automatically. I've been doing this for over a year without any issues.