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Duke's G3 B&W case mod

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Jun 11, 2011
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Motherboard
Gigabyte Z68X-UD5-B3
CPU
i7 2600k
Graphics
GTX 780 Ti
Mac
  1. MacBook Pro
Classic Mac
  1. Power Mac
Mobile Phone
  1. iOS
  2. Other
Hi guys,
As summer's coming, I thought I could use my spare time between sunbathing (and other summer stuffs) and build a hackintosh out of an old G3 B&W case (the G4-like) !

This is my first build, but with all the impressive work that was made on tonymacx86, this will probably not be an issue !
I've seen some amazing G5 case mods (cf eelhead's G5 Case Mod), that made me thinking about my poor old G3 !

Here's the config I'm thinking about:
(I've chosen some components that were recommended by tonymacx86)

- Since the G3 is more of a mini tower, I'm thinking about the GA-H55M-UD2H motherboard because I think the others won't fit.

- As for the CPU I'm not sure yet but I hesitate between those two: the Intel Core i5-760 2.8 GHz or the Intel Core i7-870 2.93 GHz (I'm not sure about the second one for heat reasons, but this may not be an issue ?)

- The GPU will probably be Gigabyte ATI Radeon HD 5770 1GB but is the 5870 that better?

I'm going to start the mod in late July but I want to know your opinion on the config first.

Sincerely,
Duke.

Edit: I saw on amazon that the HD6870 wasn't that expensive so I guess I'll take that GPU.
 
Nice! Board has a DSDT file here, I'm not sure about the CPU though. I would go with the i7, me thinks if you don't O.C. it temps wont be an issue.
I would make sure that 5870 is a solid running card, I know the 5770 works OOB.
All in all good so far. Cant wait till you get more and get some pics posted :D
 
Nice, I'd like to see your progress as I just made my very first customac/hackintosh buying all the parts recommended by tony, but I used a regular PC case. I do have a G4 Yikes that my daughter uses and it would be nice to upgrade it by replacing the innards of it with a GA-H55 mobo and a decent graphics card. BTW I'd go with the 5770 GPU (batmobile) as it works flawlessly right out of the box. When I ran multibeast I didn't even have to choose the graphics drivers, it was working right after the DSDT and System Utils install. I'd like to see how you handle fitting the board and replacing the back pannel to accomodate he mobo ports.
 
One thing to bare in mind with a G3/G4 case is that if you position the power supply as per the original you will be limited to what CPU coolers you can fit as the power supply case is in the way. The stock Intel ones fit OK but are not the quietest or the best at cooling. If you fit an older style PSU without a 120mm fan you will just have the CPU cooler height to worry about but if you fit one with a 120mm fan it will be directly over the CPU and it will be sucking air away from the CPU cooler. In effect they will be fighting against each other which could affect efficiency and create wind noise. Another thing to watch is the gap between RAM and the DVD ROM as on some boards they interfere as can the 24 pin power connecter too.

I have built a few on G4 cases as I think they look lovely with the last one being a dual boot water cooled OSX/Win7 machine which meant height of CPU coolers was not a problem and of course is lovely and quiet.
It's an older Quad Core Q6700 with an Nvidia 8800GTS but it's not much slower than the G5 case mod I have with an i5 750 and GA-P55M-UD4.









 
I hear you !
I figured that since there wasn't much room in the G3 case I'd have to do some air cooling optimization, I think I will bore some holes under the case or something like that so that air can circulate well. I'm not sure if the current design can handle well the new components and the heat they will generate, but it seems you did not change everything with your mod (which is really nice by the way!!!) except for the power supply. Water cooling looks good but I fear this is too complicated for a first mod !

As I already said I don't have the case yet so I don't know how I will modify it, but I will keep you guys posted about the thoughts I'll have on the mod !!!
 
Hi guys,
I've been doing some research and here's the config I have in mind:

CPU: Intel Core i7 2600k
GPU: HD 6870 saphire
Motherboard: GA-Z68X-UD5-B3 LGA
RAM: Corsair vengence blu 8GB
Power supply: OCZ MODXstream pro 600W
OD: Sony Optiarc
HDD: Seagate 1TB 7200 RPM
Fan: cooler master 120 mm silent case fan

Still I have several questions:
-Do I miss anything ? :D
-I'm not sure if the motherboard will fit (this one is pretty cool with USB3 AND FW400 which I still use a lot !!!)

I'm gonna buy the components this weekend (I'm really excited about that, I think this config is pretty solid and will last a long time, I hope...)

Sincerely,
Duke.

EDIT: At last I have all the components and I've emptied a G4 (not a G3 because of the color) from all it's hardware.

The power supply fits perfectly although the fan will face the case but there's still some room for the airflow.
The other fan fits.

The motherboard is roughly the same size as the old one BUT the RAM isn't positioned
like the old one (rotation of 90°) which will prevent me from closing the case...
I'm not quite sure what I'm going to do yet, I'm thinking of either forget about the OD or
changing it's place in the case (maybe placing it where the HD currently is ?)

Anyway photos will come soon !
 
Hey guys, here are the first pictures ! (sorry for their bad quality but I'm neither a photographer nor do I possess a good camera !)

What I've managed to do so far is to place the power supply exactly at the same place as the old one (although I had to cut bits of the external case, however the screw holes fitted)



DSC00269 par duke.polymtl, sur Flickr

view from the inside


DSC00270 par duke.polymtl, sur Flickr

As you can see the power supply's fan faces the "wrong" side but I don't think this is an issue since there is still one cm space between the case and the fan which I think is enough for the airflow (?)

Now that was the only thing easy... Placing the motherboard is a real pain in the *** !


DSC00271 par duke.polymtl, sur Flickr

The case is asymmetric which is not an issue for the original MB


DSC00272 par duke.polymtl, sur Flickr
this is a G3 but the MBs are just the same
On the top right corner the motherboard is slightly cut to fit whereas the new one is not and is longer...

DSC00273 par duke.polymtl, sur Flickr

I'm not quite sure what to do, if you guys have a guess tell me please !!!!

a+
Duke
 
Its a little late for this but I think MATX was the way to go for this case, for a full ATX a G5 case is your best bet
 
Hi guys,

I've got some good and some bad news...
First of all my mod is complete and "works perfectly" (photos will come soon).
Anyway, with a bit of surgery I was able to fit the motherboard with everything (CPU, GPU etc...), I guess others could try this mod with an ATX, it worked for me !!!

However... I can't install the combo update 10.6.8 without a KP, I've tried reinstalling several times but it did no good. I'm really pissed and after a good deal of research on the forums I could not find any solution (too many people with too many problems !). For info I tried to reset the PCH SATA control mode from AHCI to IDE, bad idea, you'll only get a grey screen at startup. AHCI is very important BTW during one of the kernel panic, the screen displayed among many information "firewire AHCI".
I tried to reverse HPET mode from 64 to 32 bit mode, it works but I got the same kernel panic while installing the combo update.

I'm going to try to install 10.6.4, maybe this will work.

EDIT: the 10.6.4 update seems to be working (although at first I got a KP but on second restart it worked...) I guess I'm going to install all the 10.6.x versions separately, maybe
this will help others with the same issue.

a+
Duke
 
I had same KP at 10.6.8 and I think it was something with Fake smc and smc plugins perhaps.
You should be able to jump to 10.6.7
Remember to try a couple of restarts as sometimes it takes a couple of time to have things set in lol, or it could just be me but I find that when I try three time it boots up fine after a couple of KP's
 
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