MUSIC PRODUCTION Skylake Build
10.12.3 (Sierra)
Project: Lilly v2.0
Gigabyte Z170X-Designare (Thunderbolt 3 x2
)
Intel 6700K
Intel HD 530
Samsung 960 EVO 500GB M.2 - OSX
Samsung 850 EVO 250GB SSD - WIN10
Dual Boot OSX/WIN10
View attachment 231929
Components
Comments
The purpose of this guide is to help people from the Audio community who intend to build a solid Hackintosh for their Music Production projects utilising the latest Thunderbolt 3 technology. There are many threads here which mention
Universal Audio products which use Thunderbolt 2 for their connections so I wrote this guide in mind for those units but I bet it is also applicable for other Sound Cards as well,
which also use TB.
I have an
Apollo 8 Quad,
Satellite Octo, [
Apollo Twin MKII Quad coming soon as it's only been announced at NAMM]) and they are all running via Thunderbolt 3 using Apple TB3 USB-C to TB2 Adapter!
The new SSD format M.2 is also getting more affordable on the market so it only made sense to use these blazing fast SSDs in the setup. *At the time of writing this*
[22/Jan/2017] Samsung's 960 EVO 500GB range seems like the cheapest and best option for M.2 SSD!
Installation
UEFI BIOS Settings (version F21)
- Enter BIOS with DELETE key
- Update your BIOS to version F21 [22/Jan/2017]
- Enter BIOS
Save & Exit > Load Optimized Defaults
Then reboot, press delete and enter the BIOS for a second time. The important non-default settings are:
M.I.T. > Advanced Memory Settings > Extreme Memory Profile (X.M.P.) > Profile 1 - this is needed to enable the 3000MHz on the Dominator DDR4 Sticks
BIOS > Full Screen LOGO Show > Disabled - the Gigabyte boot-loader is terribly slow so I always disable it to speed up the booting process
BIOS > Storage Boot Option Control > UEFI
Peripherals > Initial Display Output > IGFX - Because we are using the Integrated Intel 530 Graphics
Peripherals > Thunderbolt (TM) Configuration > Security Level > No Security
Peripherals > Super IO Configuration > Serial Port > Disabled
Peripherals > USB Configuration > XHCI Hand-off > Enabled
Chipset > VT-d > Disabled
Chipset > DVMT Pre-Allocated > 256M - If you don't increase the DVMT Settings you are going to get weird glitchy flickering Graphics problems in OSX!
Chipset > DVMT Total Gfx Mem > MAX
Chipset > Wake on LAN Enable > Disabled
- Save and Exit
*Thunderbolt*
- THUNDERBOLT WORKED OUT OF THE BOX BUT to be able to get a much more stable Thunderbolt connection you need to follow tonymac86's guide in flashing the Thunderbolt ports in Windows 10! He wrote the guide for the Z170X-UD5-TH which I have quoted below but slightly changed it around for the Z170X-Designare!
10.12.3 Sierra - Fresh Install on Samsung 960 EVO M.2 NVMe SSD
- Create a Bootable USB Drive with UniBeast
- Download the following:
- The M.2 drive won't show up in Disk Utility when you'll boot into Sierra as it's not supported by default we'll need to edit that Bootloader a little!
Mount the disk that corresponds to your Unibeast USB's EFI then go to
*Unibeast USB* EFI/EFI/CLOVER/kexts/10.11 and paste the "
NVMeGeneric.kext" into that folder that you can download from the bottom of the page on this site:
http://www.macvidcards.com/nvme-driver.html
- This will allow your M.2 NVMe drive to show up in Disk Utility once you boot with Unibeast!
- *Apperantly there is an even better patch for NVMe support from ReHabman but I personally haven't figured that out yet but I'll update this guide when that's done* [23/01/2017]
Use a Black USB port in on the back of your Motherboard to install OS X using your Unibeast USB device
(I used a USB 2.0 drive because for some reason my USB 3.0 didn't get picked up - strange 
)
Boot to the device by hitting the F12 Key
Follow the Install Guide on how to Format/Start the OSX Install
After installing 10.11.6, the install WILL crash if you do not choose that the computer does not connect to the Internet when it asks you for your Internet Settings (it will work later just do this for now)
After OSX installs make sure to boot from your USB Device again and then proceed to boot from your Hard Drive on the clover select screen
Launch
System Preferences then choose
Security & Privacy > General > Allow Apps downloaded from: [ANYWHERE]
Open Multibeast and use the following MultiBeast 8.2.3 Settings:
- View attachment 232006
Click Build > Install and let it finish
Shut down your computer and unplug the USB drive
Start your computer back up and you should be able to boot into OSX!
Installing Windows 10
***I'll update the guide once I've done this! ***
TESTING
- WORKING - Updates via App Store
- WORKING - USB 3.0 - Front, Rear, Adapters, etc...
- WORKING - Integrated Graphics Acceleration (Shows Full 1536MB Memory) - Using Onboard DisplayPort
- WORKING - Built-in Sound via ALC1150 (although I'm using Universal Apollo for the Soundcard so I actually disabled the Onboard Audio but I had this tested and it worked )
- WORKING - Network LAN (PLEASE SEE PROBLEMS for that minor issue regarding the Secondary Port!)
- WORKING - Thunderbolt 3 ports
- WORKING - Universal Audio Apollo 8 Quad via Apple TB3 to TB2 Adapter on Port 1
- WORKING - Universal Audio Satellite Thunderbolt Octo via Apple TB3 to TB2 Adapter on Port 2
- WORKING - LaCie Rugged RAID 4 TB External HDD via UA Satellite - Daisy Chained
- WORKING - Samsung 960 EVO M.2 SSD Drive
- Read Speed: 2,000 MB/sec (I bet it gets up to around 3,200 MB/sec as well but Blackmagic Disk Speed Test cannot measure anything above 2,000 MB/sec) - Someone can possibly suggest a better Disk Speed Test app?
- Write Speed: 1,788.1 MB/sec
- PROBLEMS - RAM Size & Full Speed is incorrect!
- PROBLEMS - This MoBo uses Intel i219-V x2 chipset and only 1 port works out of the 2 using the IntelMausiEthernet 2.1.0d3 so make sure you are using the bottom one WHICH WORKS!
- PROBLEMS - If I hit Shutdown from the Apple Menu the computer Restarts so I manually have to hit the Power Down
- PROBLEMS - Sleep doesn't work! (System Preferences > Energy Saver > Computer Sleep > NEVER )
- PROBLEMS - Boots slow - Despite using one of the fastest SSDs on the market the booting time is still relatively slow but I'm sure if I tweaked the Clover boot-loader it'd be much much better but I need to figure that one out!
- PROBLEMS - No Hot Plug for Thunderbolt - You must Turn On and plug the TB Devices in Pre-boot or Restart to make it show up. Also Unplugging one TB device from the the chain will disconnect the connection for all of them! - This has always been a known issue with Hackintoshes!
TO DO LIST:
- Do the Firmware flash for the Thunderbolt ports via Windows! They do work as they are but that might fix some errors as it's probably a newer version...
- Configure Clover a bit more so the system will behave even better!
- SSDT
- DSDT
- SMBIOS
- Memory Size and Frequency
- Faster booting?
- Find a better Kext for Intel i219-V x2 chipset which makes both LAN ports work! Newer version of IntelMausiEthernet?
- Fix Sleep problem if possible!
- Overclocking the 6700K
- TRIM Support in OSX for the Samsung 960 EVO?
- Better Settings for the Thunderbolt ports in BIOS! Current settings are fully functional but I think once I'll have another Thunderbolt device Daisy chained I'll need to increase the number for Reserved Memory & Reserved PMemory!
- Windows 10 Dual Boot
- Get RehabMan's better NVMe driver which should solve the "Shut Down" problem I'm having!
BENCHMARKS
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View attachment 233608
Universal Audio via Thunderbolt 3 using the Apple TB3 to TB2 Adapter
View attachment 232015
REFERENCES:
