HackPro G5: Budget Gaming Hackintosh Build

[ADK_XJ]

I started my G5 case mod on overclock.net in June of 2012 and I am just now finishing it. It has been a labor of love and I want to start on my next one already!

Jeffinslaw

Cool man, send me a link? I respect your dedication for sure.

 

[Jeffinslaw]

Cool man, send me a link? I respect your dedication for sure.

http://www.overclock.net/t/1266917/case-mod-murdermac There you go!

Jeffinslaw

 

[ADK_XJ]

All right, I had a (very) slight deviation from my plan and just bought a refurbished 250gb WD Blue 6.0gbs SATA to run my OS off of (I have an older WD 250 to clone the dual-boot OS to) and I pulled the trigger on a Sans Digital 5 spot HDD rack as mentioned in a couple really clean builds I've seen. That, along with two new 60mm fans for adapting the stock PSU case, set me back a total of $64. So, we're now at a net investment of $54 beyond my original trade-in value for the old iMac. Down the line I'm going to need to mirror my 2tb WD media drive as well, so that will add some cost.

Here's the stock photo of the drive rack, I think this is going to give me the cleanest and most efficient mounting solution vs trying to first locate and then daisy chain a bunch of the G5 2-drive bays:



The other thing I'm now mulling over is whether I want to use the extra space above my motherboard where the HDD caddy originally went to create a top exhaust vent driven by my extra 120mm fan. I could either cut a hole to size and put a filter over it or do a template and drill setup like that incredible 1 year build I posted a couple days ago. The template/drill would look like this:



And then, if I went with the full cutout and filter I'd like to do something like this:


At this point, I have no idea exactly how much heat this baby will really put off but it might be kind of a cool addition to the whole black and brushed aluminum theme I've got going with the Mountain Mods back panel. What do you guys think?

 

[Wolfie81]

Leave it. There's heaps of holes in the case it essiential acts as a big ass vent case if there's enough positive air flow inside, it'll find a way to get out through the case.

 

[ADK_XJ]

It's Newegg Christmas! My HDD rack, PSU 60mm fans, OS harddrive and spare set of SATA cables came today...okay, it's not Christmas but it's always a little exciting to unwrap gear:

 

[ADK_XJ]

So, after a two frustrating days of being only partially able to work on the install I finally had a big breakthrough when I realized I had to physically remove the Graphics Card and I am now the proud owner of a fully functioning Hack Pro G5. I'm about to head out on a week of vacation, but when I get back I'll start cleaning up the internals and fully mounting up my HDD cage and the new-old PSU container into the case.

Just for proof, here's the new system up and running...once I figured out my mistakes over at this spot of the forum:

http://www.tonymacx86.com/mountain-...-shutdown-msi-z77ma-g45-whatd-i-do-wrong.html

I was good to go and it took OS X and the 10.8.3 update like a champ!

 

[ADK_XJ]

Been a slow month on the Hackintosh since getting OSX installed. I got around to ordering a DVD-RW so that I can setup my dual-boot with Windows 7 and also procured a copy of 7. I've only used the Hack Pro mildly in the last couple weeks since I've been gone so much but I'm kinda bumming on the laggy boot and application load of the old SATA I'm using for the OS. I decided to pull the trigger on a OCZ Vortex 2 60gb SSD for under $40...that should be arriving later this week and I can finally get this thing into shape for regular use.

Hoping to get dual boot and the SSD installed over the weekend. We'll see what happens...stay tuned!

 

[jamba]

looks good..
for the metal fan filter, Lian Li has some nice aluminium, flat ones!

..did I see a small clone in the background?