building a hackintosh comparable to Mac Pro?

[agilluk]

Hey guys,

Im not new to building PC's but definitely new to building a hackintosh. So I've been doing some reading lately and of course, the more information I find the more confusing my choices become. Im looking to create a powerful hackintosh within a reasonable budget. My main concern is that I want this to run flawlessly. Im not 100% set on overclocking (dont have any personal experience in overclocking) also I'm not fully persuaded that i wont have any problems if I do decide to overclock. This computer is gonna be used for some 3D modelling and rendering software, photoshop and some intense gaming (mainly battlefield 3) and simulation games. So Ive come here seeking help from the gurus of hackintosh so please recommend and critique my new hackintosh components so i make the best choice going into this adventure!


Gigabyte Z68X-UD3H-B3 (haven't dont lots of reading on this board but seems that tony and alot of other users definitely recommend it - If you have better recommendations please do tell)
http://www.ncix.com/products/?sku=61002 ... e=Gigabyte

Intel Core i5-2500K or just simply 2500(if not overclocking)
http://www.ncix.com/products/?sku=57962 ... ture=Intel

Corsair Vengeance LP 8GB DDR3 1600MHz CL9 Dual Channel Kit 2x (2 x 4GB)= 16GB, Cerulean Blue
http://www.memoryexpress.com/Products/PID-MX35115(ME).aspx

Gigabyte Radeon HD 6870
http://www.ncix.com/products/?sku=58226 ... e=Gigabyte

Lian Li PC-A70F Black Aluminum E-ATX Full Tower Case
http://www.ncix.com/products/?sku=41137 ... re=LIAN-LI

OCZ Z-SERIES 850W 80+ Gold Certified
http://www.ncix.com/products/?sku=50802 ... omoid=1377

Western Digital Caviar Black 1TB SATA3 6GB/S 7200RPM 64MB (I read that someone had trouble with a WD drive with osx86 build, is this true for this particular model?)
http://www.ncix.com/products/?sku=50895 ... gital%20WD

ASUS BW-12B1ST Blu-Ray Writer
http://www.ncix.com/products/?sku=62678 ... cture=ASUS


I dont think im missing much else.

I want to install OS Lion on this machine, Ive read that you can install Lion straight rather than going the snow leopard to update lion route. Is this true?

Please give me all the help you guys can, because I sure need it

Thanks in advance!!

 

[magestrate]

power supply

 

[hardmantosh]

Yes its true you can boot from installer partition and install Lion to a fresh partition or drive......

 

[agilluk]

power supply

OCZ Z-SERIES 850W 80+ Gold Certified
http://www.ncix.com/products/?sku=50802 ... omoid=1377

Thanks Magestrate. Ive used this powersupply in a very powerful windows build for a friend, and I thought it was fantastic.

Magestrate - whats your experience so far with your build, are you happy with it, anything you would change or recommend. Are you able to utilize all your video card functions(eyefinity, multiple screens etc)? And how would you think it compares to apples standard ATI 5870 they install in their mac pros?

Yes its true you can boot from installer partition and install Lion to a fresh partition or drive......

Thanks harmantosh. Im gonna have to search more into this! Seems like the way i would want to go.


Also has anyone successfully got any 6970 cards functioning properly on their hackintosh, i looked through the graphics card database and didn't see it listed so I'm assuming not.

wiki/index.php?title=Graphics_Card_Database

 

[hardmantosh]

no need to search its in the guide
http://tonymacx86.blogspot.com/2011/07/ ... -lion.html

regarding graphics you could be right....try looking in user builds ..link on home screen;

 

[agilluk]

thanks 123qwaszx. I think I might go for the 2600k and do a minimal safe overclock, and ill add a better cooling system also. as for the graphics card - seems like most seem to be working great using Saphire 6870, so i'll stick to that. Like I said I wanna make this system a very solid reliable Lion hackintosh, and im hoping im picking the right components. :?

Updated list of parts

- i7-2600K

- Gigabyte Z68X-UD3H-B3

- Corsair Cooling Hydro Series H80 High Performance CPU Cooler System

- Corsair Vengeance LP 8GB DDR3 1600MHz CL9 Dual Channel Kit 2x (2 x 4GB)= 16GB

- Saphire 6870 GPU

- Lian Li PC-A70F Black Aluminum E-ATX Full Tower Case

- OCZ Z-SERIES 850W 80+ Gold Certified

- Western Digital Caviar Black 1TB SATA3 6GB/S 7200RPM 64MB (I still am not sure if this HDD is gonna work, I can't remember but I had read somewhere someone else had trouble with there WD HDD due to the way its sectors were layed out or something along those lines, hopefully someone can shed some light on that

- ASUS BW-12B1ST Blu-Ray Writer

- OS Lion

Let me know what you think, Im ready to order and start building! I forgot to mention in my first post Ill be using this for my DJing equipment using USB MIDI functionality so I need to make sure USB works flawlessly.

Once again guys thanks so much for the help, spending the last month on this forum has really persuaded me that a hackintosh is the way i wanna go!

 

[agilluk]

Another question I forgot to ask. Am I better of with a ATI card or Nvidia card, for use with a hackintosh? I dont have any personal preference im looking for a great perfoming (gaming and graphics) card that works extremely well with a hackintosh maybe even oob.

 

[Morshu]

This build guide is what I based mine on, it gets similar scores as the Mac Pro.
viewtopic.php?f=168&t=27595
The only difference is that with one i7 you have 1 memory controller vs 2 Xeons you get 2 memory controllers, so it won't be as fast, but it's still pretty quick. My build has been almost perfect except for my vms giving me kernel panics and shutdown stalls. As for the graphics cards, certain cards work oob from either nvidia or AMD. I got a 9800 GTX+ on ebay for my graphics card (worked oob) as gaming isn't my primary use of this machine.
Good luck!

 

[edbetz]

agilluk,
Very similar build to mine. I don't have the cooler, and I can't speak about the blu-ray but otherwise, I have a similar build. My OS is on an OCZ 60gb SSD and I have a WD Black (yes that works fine) and a Samsung F3 (actually tests out faster). Both 1TB.
I'm getting a 64 bit Geekbenck of 15,500 (over clocked at 42X)

I'm using a different case, and I've looked at the Cooler Master Hyper 212 plus (it seems tp perform really for the money) http://www.amazon.com/gp/product/B002G1 ... PDKIKX0DER

I get an occasional KP on boot, that I haven't tracked down yet, but if I simply power off and on it goes away. Also, I can't for the life of me figure out hot to get sleep to work.

My build, with out the WD drive was under $1000.
Followed Gordo's guide... Worked like a charm.

Good luck with your build
Ed

 

[slugnet]

- Western Digital Caviar Black 1TB SATA3 6GB/S 7200RPM 64MB (I still am not sure if this HDD is gonna work, I can't remember but I had read somewhere someone else had trouble with there WD HDD due to the way its sectors were layed out or something along those lines, hopefully someone can shed some light on that

You should be fine with either the black or blue series of drives. The green series use a different sector size (4k vs 512), which creates issues for your primary boot drive. That is the problem you were reading about I think (it is certainly the problem I hit with my build, which cleared up when I switched to a blue drive for my boot disk). They work great as secondary storage (I've got 2 in my hackintosh), and since you are using an SSD for your boot drive, you could use any of the WD drives in your build. The black drives will give you better performance overall than the green (they are WD pro grade drives), so pick whatever you need for your setup. I'm using my machine as a video editing rig, so all my files live on external drives. My greens are great for general usage/non-essential program installation.

Hope that helps! I just built a very similar system in the past couple of weeks, and am very happy with it. The full details on it are here: viewtopic.php?f=54&t=32526