First Hackintosh, Project: Icon, all advice welcome

[Reactor-core]

Hi Guys,

I have been a long-time lurker, first time poster here...

I'm in the process of building my first Hackintosh what I'm calling Project: Icon. This Hackintosh will primarily be used for the following: Web development, Image processing, Light video production/editing, Light audio work and of course gaming MMOs to FPSs. I'm looking for a slick, seamless/rock-solid build, as much as possible, which also has some horespower under the hood without taking a second mortgage out. If anyone has better suggestions for improved component compatibility or better performance/future-proofing please let me know.

I have the vague notion there's not huge "speed" benefit going from a Sandy Bridge to an Ivy Bridge CPU with similar clock speeds, plus I have heard Sandy Bridges run a little cooler. I'm also waiting for the new CustoMac Buyer's Guide 2012 to be published but the wheels are already rollin' on my end. Any advise such as major options/performance or price differences for Sandy compared to Ivy CPUs will help as well.

Preliminary components for the build I'm looking at are:
CASE: Custom build - http://www.reactor-core.com/mods/icon.php
CPU: i5-2500k
Motherboard: Gigabyte 1155 GA-Z77-DS3H
RAM: 16GB (8GB x 2) Corsair Vengeance Blue DDR3 SDRAM (Might have to go "low-profile" for my CPU cooler)
Graphics: Radeon 6870 1GB
Storage: Two OCZ 120GB Agility 3 SATA 6Gb SSD (Plan on running in RAID 0 Mode)
Storage: Two Samsung 128GB 830 SATA III SSD (Plan on running in RAID 0 Mode)

Items I already have:
PSU: Kingwin 850w
CPU cooler: Zalman CNPS12X Pure Copper/Aluminum CPU Cooler

Many thanks for reading and any advice/suggestions would be greatly appreciated.

-Reactor

 

[hmttony]

You chose a z77 board + Sandy bridge i5 . If you only want to use the sandy bridge processor and have no intent of upgrading to ivy bridge . My suggestion is get a different MOBO (maybe Z68) , It will save you money and there really is no point in paying more for z77 if you aren't going to use ivy bridge .

Also Even though you gave your reasons for not choosing ivy bridge , i still highly recommend the IVY bridge processors because they are natively supported in Mountain lion . They take less power , They are Efficent and they are newer

 

[Reactor-core]

z68 vs. z77

If you only want to use the sandy bridge processor and have no intent of upgrading to ivy bridge . My suggestion is get a different MOBO (maybe Z68) , It will save you money and there really is no point in paying more for z77 if you aren't going to use ivy bridge.

Thanks for the advice hmttony, yes currently I don't see a huge benefit for Ivy Bridge CPUs but I don't want to lock myself out of upgrading either. The z77 should run both Sandy and Ivy Bridge CPUs so I chose it for future proofing my build a little, the board is only $120 so it's not like i'm gonna save a ton of money on a z68 I would think.

Thanks again for the feedback, -Reactor
------------------------------------
My original post of the build was deleted somehow, here it is again:
http://www.reactor-core.com/mods/icon.php

Project: Icon build
Case: Custom built, (In Progress)
Motherboard: Gigabyte GA-Z77-DS3H
CPU: Core i5-2500K
Graphics: GIGABYTE HD6870 1GB
RAM: 16GB Corsair VengeanceDDR3 SDRAM, (2 x 8GB)
Hard Drives: Two OCZ 120GB Agility 3 SATA 6Gb SSD (Will use in RAID 0)
Hard Drives: Two SAMSUNG 830 128GB SATA 3 SSDs (Will use in RAID 0)

Items I already have:
CPU Cooler: Zalman CNPS12X Pure Copper/Aluminum
Power Supply: Kingwin Lazer 850w, Modular

Any advice/suggestions are welcome, thanks, -Reactor

 

[zaptoons]

I'm liking the ivybridge board/sandybridge CPU option more and more. Now I'm kind of wishing I had done that rather than my z68 board, even though I'm extremely satisfied with my build.

But anyway, that's great for future proofing.

I'd impart the same things I learned from my build- the Radeon 6870 is a fantastic card, but just know it can require some fiddling if you're going to use more than 1 monitor. I learned a lot from threads about it on this forum and got my monitors working using trial and error to find the right Boot.plist flags for it. Just one monitor? Then no worries.

If apps you plan to use make use of nVidia's CUDA (Adobe apps) then consider an equivalent nVidia card.

I probably come off as bitter about it, but I warn everyone about my bad experience with OCZ Agility 3 hard drives. It must be luck of the draw- I'm on my 2nd RMA for the 120GB. Reading newegg user comments, one person is on his 5th RMA with that drive! Suffice it to say, from my personal experience, I'd recommend another brand/model of SSD drive. I got a Samsung 128GB 830 series, and it's been rock solid.

 

[Reactor-core]

I'm liking the ivybridge board/sandybridge CPU option more and more. Now I'm kind of wishing I had done that rather than my z68 board, even though I'm extremely satisfied with my build.

But anyway, that's great for future proofing.

I'd impart the same things I learned from my build- the Radeon 6870 is a fantastic card, but just know it can require some fiddling if you're going to use more than 1 monitor.

If apps you plan to use make use of nVidia's CUDA (Adobe apps) then consider an equivalent nVidia card.

I probably come off as bitter about it, but I warn everyone about my bad experience with OCZ Agility 3 hard drives. It must be luck of the draw- I'm on my 2nd RMA for the 120GB. Reading newegg user comments, one person is on his 5th RMA with that drive! Suffice it to say, from my personal experience, I'd recommend another brand/model of SSD drive. I got a Samsung 128GB 830 series, and it's been rock solid.

Thank you for the info/advice zaptoons. Re: OCZ Agility SSDs, yeah the more I read reviews and user experiences, the more I no likey. I'll definitely have to check out Samsung's offerings.

Anyone else have some good SSDs they would like to recommend in 120-to-240GB flavors? (hmm... that actually sounds kinda kinky)

 

[Reactor-core]

SSDs

You chose a z77 board + Sandy bridge i5 . If you only want to use the sandy bridge processor and have no intent of upgrading to ivy bridge . My suggestion is get a different MOBO (maybe Z68) , It will save you money and there really is no point in paying more for z77 if you aren't going to use ivy bridge .

Also Even though you gave your reasons for not choosing ivy bridge , i still highly recommend the IVY bridge processors because they are natively supported in Mountain lion . They take less power , They are Efficent and they are newer

Somehow my build got deleted, oops, here it is again...

Hi Guys,

I have been a long-time lurker, first time poster here...

I'm in the process of building my first Hackintosh what I'm calling Project: Icon. This Hackintosh will primarily be used for the following: Web development, Image processing, Light video production/editing, Light audio work and of course gaming MMOs to FPSs. I'm looking for a slick, seamless/rock-solid build, as much as possible, which also has some horsepower under the hood without taking a second mortgage out. If anyone has better suggestions for improved component compatibility or better performance/future-proofing please let me know.

I have the vague notion there's not huge "speed" benefit going from a Sandy Bridge to an Ivy Bridge CPU with similar clock speeds, plus I have heard Sandy Bridges run a little cooler. I'm also waiting for the new CustoMac Buyer's Guide 2012 to be published but the wheels are already rollin' on my end. Any advise such as major options/performance or price differences for Sandy compared to Ivy CPUs will help as well.

Preliminary components for the build I'm looking at are:
CASE: Custom build - CPU: i5-2500k
Motherboard: Gigabyte 1155 GA-Z77-DS3H
RAM: 16GB (8GB x 2) Corsair Vengeance Blue DDR3 SDRAM (Might have to go "low-profile" for my CPU cooler)
Graphics: Radeon 6870 1GB
Storage: Two OCZ 120GB Agility 3 SATA 6Gb SSD (Plan on running in RAID 0 Mode)
Storage: Two Samsung 128GB 830 series SATA 3 6Gb SSD (Plan on running in RAID 0 Mode)


Items I already have:
PSU: Kingwin 850w
CPU cooler: Zalman CNPS12X Pure Copper/Aluminum CPU Cooler


Many thanks for reading and any advice/suggestions would be greatly appreciated.


-Reactor