Contribute
Register

hackintosh for video editing (avid)

Status
Not open for further replies.
Joined
Oct 27, 2015
Messages
9
Motherboard
GA-Z97X-UD5H
CPU
Corsair RM SERIES 750W
Graphics
NVIDIA GeForce GTX 960 2047 MB
hi there,


i plan to build a hackintosh for my work as an video editor. i so far planed to buy the following parts:



  • Gigabyte GA-Z97X-UD5H (as the Gigabyte GA-Z97X-UD7-TH is not for sale in my country)
  • Intel Core i7-4790K (4000) Quad Core (BX80646I74790K)
  • Crucial Ballistix Tactical DDR3-1600 32GB Kit (4x 8GB) CL8 (BLT4CP8G3D1608DT1TX0BEU)
  • EVGA GeForce GT 740 2GB Superclocked (02G-P4-3747-KR)
  • Samsung SSD 850 EVO Basic 500GB
  • Seagate Barracuda 3 TB STBD3000200 (STBD3000200)
  • Corsair Carbide Series 500R (CC-9011012-WW)
  • Corsair RM SERIES 650W (CP-9020054-EU)
  • TP-Link TL-WDN4800 - 450Mbps-Wireless-N-Dualband-PCI-Express-Adapter (TL-WDN4800)

what would you say? will this combination work for my needs? anything missing? as i'm a total greenhorn in this field: will i need specific extra material (extra cooling, special cables etc.) to put my hackingtosh together?

and also: does anybody know, if this combination will also work with el capitan?

thanks for you help already in advance!

:beachball:

konx
 
I too am in the process of building this exact system but I'm going with the MSI gaming 5 MOBO. I'm hoping it will work fine. I haven't read much testing with this MOBO but I don't see why it wouldn't work. It has the x97 chipset. Crossing my fingers!



:):)
 
hi there,


i plan to build a hackintosh for my work as an video editor. i so far planed to buy the following parts:



  • Gigabyte GA-Z97X-UD5H (as the Gigabyte GA-Z97X-UD7-TH is not for sale in my country)
  • Intel Core i7-4790K (4000) Quad Core (BX80646I74790K)
  • Crucial Ballistix Tactical DDR3-1600 32GB Kit (4x 8GB) CL8 (BLT4CP8G3D1608DT1TX0BEU)
  • EVGA GeForce GT 740 2GB Superclocked (02G-P4-3747-KR)
  • Samsung SSD 850 EVO Basic 500GB
  • Seagate Barracuda 3 TB STBD3000200 (STBD3000200)
  • Corsair Carbide Series 500R (CC-9011012-WW)
  • Corsair RM SERIES 650W (CP-9020054-EU)
  • TP-Link TL-WDN4800 - 450Mbps-Wireless-N-Dualband-PCI-Express-Adapter (TL-WDN4800)

what would you say? will this combination work for my needs? anything missing? as i'm a total greenhorn in this field: will i need specific extra material (extra cooling, special cables etc.) to put my hackingtosh together?

and also: does anybody know, if this combination will also work with el capitan?

thanks for you help already in advance!

konx

The UD5H works fine with El Capitan. I have the Black edition and no problems. Unless you really, really, really need Thunderbolt, don't get the UD7H. Force yourself to ask the question as to why you want Thunderbolt. Do you have Thunderbolt drives? Do you have any reasonable expectations of getting anything with Thunderbolt in? Otherwise its just a waste of money AND more hassle.

The 4790K works fine with the UD5H. You *may* need to do a BIOS upgrade to support the K series if your UD5H is an older model. I forget which one I have as I'm away from home all week. Its no big deal to update the BIOS though.

Is the memory explicitly stated for the UD5H? Check and check again. If it is then great, 32GB does work with the Z97X UD5H with no problems if you have the right memory. Mine worked first time. Check, check and check again. Do not make any assumptions whatsoever about the memory, It needs to be stated in black and white on the Crucial website. Do not buy cheap memory and assume that because it works in similar systems it will work here.

The nVidia is an OK card but nothing special. Is it listed on the Avid site as compatible? You need to check it carefully.

Clearly you have never used wifi for transferring video files :) Its slow, nope scratch that, its very slow. If all you are doing with your kit is local editing and transferring files through hard disk, then wifi is just about acceptable. If you are doing any transfers of video files via wifi, make sure you have a good library card and get loads of books into read.

Dump the wifi and use the inboard Intel Ethernet driver. Ignore the Killer crap ethernet as its errr.... crap. The reason for this is that Intel Ethernet has its on onboard mini CPU for handling Ethernet. This means that your CPU throws a packet at the driver and ignores it as the Intel chips handle all the hard work. Realtek and other drivers don't have this extra hardware which costs money, so your CPU has to do the handwork. Thats why Intel ethernet cards are more expensive. They're also massively better.

I use a Noctua CPU cooler, dead quiet and works very well. Not cheap but cheaper than water cooling.

The UD5H SATA sockets are right under the slots for the graphics boards and if the 740 is a long card, they make accessing the SATA sockets difficult. Get SATA cables with straight plugin connectors as opposed to right angled ones to save your knuckles from being skinned.

Your PSU is big enough for one GPU, possibly two. Make sure its fully modular.

The case is immaterial.

The SSD is fine.

Rob
 
Looks like a pretty solid build IMO. The only thing that worries me, is the graphics card. I don't know much about Avid and it's ability to utilize GPU, but it other video editing software like Adobe Premiere and Apple FCPX does that. When it comes to GPU rendering you really can't buy a graphics card that is too fast, and since GT 740 really isn't a render-beast, a faster card would probably be important to consider.

The good thing about the GT 740, though, is that it's supported natively by Apples drivers built into OS X. This means that you don't rely on Nvidias "web driver" for your build to work. By upgrading your graphics to a faster one (such as the Maxwell cards - GTX 9xx, Titan X etc.) you are forced to go through some work and configurations every damn time theres a new update to OS X, since the Nvidia web drivers must be reinstalled with a newer and compatible version. For some, this might be a bit of a hassel.
 
hi rob,

first of all: thanks a lot for all your kind help! i really appreciate it a lot!

The UD5H works fine with El Capitan. I have the Black edition and no problems. Unless you really, really, really need Thunderbolt, don't get the UD7H. Force yourself to ask the question as to why you want Thunderbolt. Do you have Thunderbolt drives? Do you have any reasonable expectations of getting anything with Thunderbolt in? Otherwise its just a waste of money AND more hassle.

Thanks for that. No need for thunderbolt, so that's decided then...

The 4790K works fine with the UD5H. You *may* need to do a BIOS upgrade to support the K series if your UD5H is an older model. I forget which one I have as I'm away from home all week. Its no big deal to update the BIOS though.

Is the memory explicitly stated for the UD5H? Check and check again. If it is then great, 32GB does work with the Z97X UD5H with no problems if you have the right memory. Mine worked first time. Check, check and check again. Do not make any assumptions whatsoever about the memory, It needs to be stated in black and white on the Crucial website. Do not buy cheap memory and assume that because it works in similar systems it will work here.

both ok. and thanks for the memory-reminder! i would have definitely bought the wrong memory, thats for sure! didn't know that...

The nVidia is an OK card but nothing special. Is it listed on the Avid site as compatible? You need to check it carefully.

as avid doesn't really work a lot with the graphic card at all, i think the 740 could be my choice. not expensive, natively working with apple. officially there are only two graphic cards compatible with avid as far as i found out: the one built in the macpro. so, i'll have to just try... also on the internet not much information concerning this problem...

Clearly you have never used wifi for transferring video files :) Its slow, nope scratch that, its very slow. If all you are doing with your kit is local editing and transferring files through hard disk, then wifi is just about acceptable. If you are doing any transfers of video files via wifi, make sure you have a good library card and get loads of books into read.

Dump the wifi and use the inboard Intel Ethernet driver. Ignore the Killer crap ethernet as its errr.... crap. The reason for this is that Intel Ethernet has its on onboard mini CPU for handling Ethernet. This means that your CPU throws a packet at the driver and ignores it as the Intel chips handle all the hard work. Realtek and other drivers don't have this extra hardware which costs money, so your CPU has to do the handwork. Thats why Intel ethernet cards are more expensive. They're also massively better.

actually i am quite a lot into video transfering to the world wide web. i just didn't think about that too much... thanks for the advice!

I use a Noctua CPU cooler, dead quiet and works very well. Not cheap but cheaper than water cooling.

as i just don't know anything about that: is it really necessary to buy an extra cooling? would this cooler for example match my cpu: Noctua NH-L9A?

The UD5H SATA sockets are right under the slots for the graphics boards and if the 740 is a long card, they make accessing the SATA sockets difficult. Get SATA cables with straight plugin connectors as opposed to right angled ones to save your knuckles from being skinned.

thanks for the advice!

Your PSU is big enough for one GPU, possibly two. Make sure its fully modular.

The case is immaterial.

The SSD is fine.

Rob

perfect!

thanks so much for everything! this forum is just amazing!

konx
 
hi glud,

thanks a lot for your food for thougt! i tried to search the web forward and backward to find more information about that. as it turns out: avid officially only supports the two graphic cards built into the new macpro on the mac-front - both not for sale individually (at least as far as i was able to bring in experience..).

so: do you by any chance have a suggestion for a better card? the native support with apple seems for me quite important... do you by chance know of an faster card which is also natively supported by apple? and also: which not too expensive?

thanks for you kind help! i just love this forum! and all the very intelligent people answering my (i guess sometimes) quite stupid questions...

konx
 
hi rob,

as avid doesn't really work a lot with the graphic card at all, i think the 740 could be my choice. not expensive, natively working with apple. officially there are only two graphic cards compatible with avid as far as i found out: the one built in the macpro. so, i'll have to just try... also on the internet not much information concerning this problem...

The one built into the Mac Pro is probably the 5770. Its an old card now, bit it works very well with Macs and FCP X.

as i just don't know anything about that: is it really necessary to buy an extra cooling? would this cooler for example match my cpu: Noctua NH-L9A?
konx

The CPU cooler is not extra cooling, its instead of the standard Intel cooler, which to be honest is fine, if you aren't worried about the noise. Intel will not sell you a rubbish cooler, its just not the best cooler.

Rob
 
hi glud,

thanks a lot for your food for thougt! i tried to search the web forward and backward to find more information about that. as it turns out: avid officially only supports the two graphic cards built into the new macpro on the mac-front - both not for sale individually (at least as far as i was able to bring in experience..).

so: do you by any chance have a suggestion for a better card? the native support with apple seems for me quite important... do you by chance know of an faster card which is also natively supported by apple? and also: which not too expensive?
konx

Who is glud?

You don't want to buy the cards built into the Mac Pro. From memory they are equivalent to the 270X and the 280X and a lot more money. Google for the card names vs AMD 7970 to see what I mean.

Its basically a 7970 or a 280X depending on Mac model. Much the same cards, AMD's marketing makes these out to be newer and faster, they're not.

Personally speaking I'd get exactly the same card I have now if I had to buy again. The 290X *might* work but its not 100% at the moment. My 280X worked out of the box, no flags, no drivers. The only 'special' thing to do is whats called the EFI mod. The instructions take 10-15 minutes, its trivially easy and it makes the 280X bootable as opposed to boot off a USB stick. The only time I regret my dual 280X cards is playing Battlefield 4 in Windows 7. The rest of the time, they're great.

Rob
 
Status
Not open for further replies.
Back
Top